Genesis 41:49

49 Joseph collected so much grain - it was like the sand of the ocean! - that he finally quit keeping track.

Genesis 41:49 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 41:49

And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much,
until he left numbering
At first he took an account of the quantities that were bought and laid up, how much there was in each granary, until it amounted to so much, that there was no end of numbering it; it was like the sand of the sea, an hyperbolical expression, denoting the great abundance of it: for [it was] without number;
not only the grains of corn, but even the measures of it, whatever were used; so Artapanus, an Heathen writer, says ^F16, Joseph, when governor of Egypt, got together the corn of seven years, an immense quantity.

---

FOOTNOTES:

F16 Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 23. p. 430.

Genesis 41:49 In-Context

47 During the next seven years of plenty the land produced bumper crops.

48 Joseph gathered up the food of the seven good years in Egypt and stored the food in cities. In each city he stockpiled surplus from the surrounding fields.

49 Joseph collected so much grain - it was like the sand of the ocean! - that he finally quit keeping track.

50 Joseph had two sons born to him before the years of famine came. Asenath, daughter of Potiphera the priest of On, was their mother.

51 Joseph named the firstborn Manasseh (Forget), saying, "God made me forget all my hardships and my parental home."