Genesis 42:20

Then get your youngest brother, and bring him here to me. Then I will know that you told me the true story, and I will not kill you.” So Joseph’s brothers agreed to do what he said. But they still didn’t know that he was their brother Joseph. They still thought he was an Egypt man.

Plain English Version

In The King James Version

But bring your youngest brother unto me; so shall your words be verified, and ye shall not die. And they did so.

In Context

19Then Joseph said to them, “You told me that you are good men, and you don’t tell lies. So listen, this is what you have to do. Pick one man from your mob, and I will keep that man here in jail. The rest of you mob, you can go back to your home country. You can take food with you, and you can give that food to your families, because they are really hungry.

21Then Joseph’s brothers talked to each other in their own language. They said, “You know, a long time ago, we made bad trouble for our brother Joseph. We chucked him into a big hole in the ground, and then we sold him to some men from the Midian tribe. At that time, we saw that he was really frightened, and he asked us strongly to be good to him, but we didn’t listen. That’s the reason why we’ve got this bad trouble now. God is punishing us for those things that we did to Joseph.”

Read all of Genesis 42

Cross References

Genesis 6:22Then Noah did all of that. He did everything that God told him to do.

Genesis 42:26Then Joseph’s brothers put their food bags on their donkeys, and they left that place and started to go back towards Canaan country.

Genesis 43:3But Jacob’s son Judah said, “You know that we can’t go back to Egypt country without our youngest brother Benjamin. That man that is in charge of Egypt, he will not let us do that. Last time we went to Egypt, that man talked strongly to us, and he said, ‘You can only come back here if you bring your youngest brother with you.’”

Genesis 43:19So when those men got near to Joseph’s house, they stopped outside the door of the house, and they talked to Joseph’s worker.

Genesis 44:23Then you said to us, ‘You mob can only come back here if you bring your youngest brother with you.’”

Matthew Henry on Genesis 42:8-21

Joseph Speaks Roughly to His Brethren. ( b. c. 1706.) 7 And Joseph saw his brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spake roughly unto them; and he said unto them, Whence come ye? And they said, From the land of Canaan to buy food. 8 And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not him. 9 And Joseph remembered the dreams which he dreamed of them, and said unto them, Ye are spies; to see the nakedness of the land ye are come. 10 And they said unto him, Nay, my lord, but to buy food are thy… Read the whole commentary →

This Verse In Other Editions

Study Genesis 42:20