Another day begins, and for another day I feel the old sense of unease. Ra's return reminds all of us who serve here in the temple at Per-Ra how much we have yet to endure before we may return to the days of abundance.
The famine continues into the second year, as has been foretold by the Grand Vizier, and we are promised five more years beyond this until the fields of the Two Lands will once again be fertile. We have already seen much upheaval in the kingdom; none now remember the times before the Amu came, except through legend and story.
Our Lord Pharaoh Per-aa has just made known that the Great Steward of the Lord of the Two Lands is of a family of shepherds and is bringing his family into Egypt to provide them with shelter and assistance during the famine. I have met this Joseph and, despite his previous profession, am impressed with him. His natural abilities at dream interpretation would do well with study and development; I do not say that he could achieve the skill of a professional interpreter at his age, for he is now nearly 40, yet he does possess an untrained facility that has in fact served the nation well in helping us to prepare for the desolation that now plagues our fields. He foresaw in Pharaoh's dreams the seven years of plenty which allowed us to fill the granaries in preparation for these seven years of famine. He took the seven fat, healthy cows and the seven robust stalks of grain to be the seven years which we did indeed enjoy before all were swallowed up by the seven sickly cows and seven withered stalks arising out of the Nile. His interpretation was obviously correct, as we are now witnesses.
Among us are those who would question Joseph's rapid rise, saying that he may be one of the Amu himself. Yet he was bought by one of our own countrymen, the Egyptian captain of Pharaoh's own guard, has come out of the bet ha-Sohar because of his ability at deciphering dreams. He has take...