Now Jacob had his favourite son, Joseph, to whom he gave a multi-coloured robe, and all his brothers began to dislike him. When he was seventeen years old he was with his brothers shepherding their father's flock. But then he saw a dream in which all of them were binding their sheaves into bundles, and his brothers' sheaves bowed down to his. In another dream he had, the sun, moon and eleven stars were bowing down to him! This was enough to tick off his brothers who now began to hate him.

One day, when Joseph's brothers were pasturing the sheep in another place, Jacob asked him to go and see if they were all right. When they saw him coming, they thought it was now their opportunity to get back at him. They wanted to kill him, and took off his robe, but Reuben convinced them not to do that to their brother. He suggested putting him in a dry pit thinking that later he would return him to the father. But when Reuben was not there, these brothers sold him off to some traders going towards Egypt. Then they killed a lamb, dipped Joseph's robe in its blood and took it to Jacob saying that perhaps some wild animal had killed him. Jacob's sorrow had no limit.

In Egypt, Joseph was sold as a slave to Potiphar, a high official with Pharaoh, the king. Joseph was so faithful there that Potiphar handed over the complete charge of his house to Joseph. But Potiphar's wife was attracted to Joseph and invited him to sleep with her. But Joseph was clear that he could not do that against God, and tried to avoid her. Once when he was alone in the house, she caught him by his dress and tried to force him. But he ran away, leaving his coat behind. She was so furious at being frustrated that she screamed and started saying he had tried to rape her. When Potiphar came to know about this, he had no option but to put Joseph in jail. Joseph was faithful even there, and soon the jailer put him in charge of the other prisoners. God was with him, and so he found favour with others around him.