Genesis 45:11, commentary and pictures

The famine reached Canaan and left Jacob's household in need of food, so Jacob sent ten of his sons to Egypt to buy grain where Joseph as ruler could provide for them. Two years of the famine had passed and five years remained in which there would be neither earing nor harvest, meaning neither plowing nor reaping. Joseph spoke his promise of provision after proving his brothers and seeing in them the fruits of true repentance for selling him. When alone with them he wept aloud and revealed himself as their brother, and they were troubled, astonished and ashamed at his presence as they remembered selling him, despising his dreams, and fulfilling those dreams by bowing to him.

He called them near and comforted rather than censured them, seeking to make the meeting as easy as possible because they had suffered enough. He told them not to grieve nor be angry with themselves, easing their embarrassment over their past cruelty. He explained that God, not they, had sent him ahead to preserve life, to preserve them a posterity in the earth and to save their lives by a great deliverance. God had made him a father to Pharaoh and lord of all his house and ruler throughout all Egypt.

In that setting of forgiveness he invited Jacob and his household to dwell in Goshen near him and urged haste to bring Jacob down without delay with children, grandchildren, flocks, herds and all he had. There Joseph himself would nourish Jacob, his household and all that he had through the five remaining years of famine, lest they come to poverty. The promise was followed by Joseph weeping on Benjamin and kissing all his brothers, while they humbly confessed, entreated forgiveness, rejoiced that he was alive, and were relieved that they were not guilty of his blood.