There will be seven years of great plenty in all the land of Egypt.

The time of plenty will be entirely forgotten, because the famine which follows will be so terrible.

The following year they came to him and said, "We will not hide the fact from you, sir, that our money is all gone and our livestock belongs to you. There is nothing left to give you except our bodies and our lands.

Joseph said to the people, "You see, I have now bought you and your lands for the king. Here is seed for you to sow in your fields.

"You have six days in which to do your work, but do not work on the seventh day, not even during plowing time or harvest.

They are to take it down to a spot near a stream that never runs dry and where the ground has never been plowed or planted, and there they are to break its neck.

He will make some of them officers in charge of a thousand men, and others in charge of fifty men. Your sons will have to plow his fields, harvest his crops, and make his weapons and the equipment for his chariots.

The oxen and donkeys that plow your fields will eat the finest and best fodder.