"But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive."
Genesis 50:20 · King James Bible
The story
Joseph is the eleventh of Jacob's twelve sons — the first born to Rachel, the wife Jacob had loved most. Genesis devotes almost fourteen chapters to him (Genesis 37–50), more than to any other patriarch. It is the longest sustained biographical narrative in the Old Testament.
His father makes him a "coat of many colours" (Genesis 37:3). His ten older brothers hate him for the favour. They also hate his dreams — sheaves bowing to his sheaf, sun and moon and eleven stars bowing to him. When they get the chance, they strip him of the coat, throw him into a pit, and sell him to a passing caravan of Ishmaelite merchants for twenty pieces of silver. They dip the coat in goat's blood and tell Jacob a wild beast has torn his son.
Joseph is sold in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh. Potiphar's household prospers under Joseph's hand because "the Lord was with Joseph" (Genesis 39:2). Potiphar's wife tries to seduce him; when he refuses, she accuses him falsely. He goes to prison — but "the Lord was with Joseph, and shewed him mercy" (Genesis 39:21). In prison he interprets the dreams of Pharaoh's baker and butler.
Two years later Pharaoh dreams of seven fat cows swallowed by seven lean cows, and no wise man in Egypt can interpret it. The butler remembers Joseph. Joseph is brought out of the dungeon, shaved, given clean clothes, and told the dream. "It is not in me: God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace" (Genesis 41:16). Seven years of plenty, then seven years of famine. Pharaoh sets Joseph over all Egypt: "There is none so discreet and wise as thou art" (41:39).
When the famine reaches Canaan, Jacob's other ten sons come to Egypt to buy grain. They bow before the vizier — the very dream he had told them. They do not recognize him. He tests them, weeps in secret, and at last reveals himself: "I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt" (45:4). The whole family — seventy souls — moves down to Egypt, and Jacob dies there. When the brothers fear revenge after Jacob's death, Joseph gives the line that Genesis has been building toward: "But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good."
Why he matters
Joseph is a figure Christian tradition has always read as pointing forward to Christ: beloved of his father, sold for pieces of silver, hidden as though dead, exalted after suffering, feeding the nations, and forgiving those who betrayed him. Every Sunday school has taught his coat and his dreams for a reason. The line "ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good" is one of the deepest sentences in Scripture — the doctrine of providence in one breath.
Where to read
Genesis 37; 39; 40; 41; 42–45; 47; 50 (KJV). The whole story reads as one continuous novella; a household can read it in a week of evenings.