Genesis 41:17-24

New English Translation

¹⁷ Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “In my dream I was standing^[a] by the edge of the Nile. ¹⁸ Then seven fat and fine-looking cows were coming up out of the Nile, and they grazed in the reeds.^{[b] 19} Then^[c] seven other cows came up after them; they were scrawny, very bad looking, and lean. I had never seen such bad-looking cows^[d] as these in all the land of Egypt! ²⁰ The lean, bad-looking cows ate up the seven^[e] fat cows. ²¹ When they had eaten them,^[f] no one would have known^[g] that they had done so, for they were just as bad-looking as before. Then I woke up. ²² I also saw in my dream^[h] seven heads of grain growing on one stalk, full and good. ²³ Then^[i] seven heads of grain, withered and thin and burned with the east wind, were sprouting up after them. ²⁴ The thin heads of grain swallowed up the seven good heads of grain. So I told all this^[j] to the diviner-priests, but no one could tell me its meaning.”^[k]