Commentaire sur La Genèse 41:48

אכל שדה העיר אשר סביבתיה נתן בתוכה THE FOOD OF THE FIELD WHICH WAS ROUND ABOUT EVERY CITY LAID HE UP IN THE SAME — for every district preserves its own produce; and for this people always put amongst the grain some of the earth of the place in which it grows and this prevents it decaying (Genesis Rabbah 90:5).

AND HE STORED UP ALL THE FOOD. “He” refers to Joseph mentioned above.¹⁰⁸In Verse 46: And Joseph was… The same applies to the following verse: And Joseph piled up grain… until he ceased numbering.¹⁰⁹Verse 49 here. The pronoun “he” refers to Joseph, who was mentioned.
Now Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra said that the phrase, all the food, is not to be understood literally, for otherwise they would have died of famine immediately. A similar case is the verse, And all the lands came into Egypt to Joseph to buy grain.¹¹⁰Verse 57 here. This verse is also not to be understood in its literal sense since Jacob and Benjamin did not come to buy grain. The meaning of he stored up all the food is only that Joseph stored up all the food which he could.
It appears to me to be correct that Joseph gathered all food under his control, and he gave enough of it every year for sustenance to the Egyptians, so that they should not squander it. This is the intent of his statement, And let them store up all the food of those good years that come, and pile up corn under the hand of Pharaoh… and hold it there.¹¹¹Verse 35 here. Ramban thus makes a distinction between ochel (food) and ibur (corn). At the end of the paragraph, he will mention that Onkelos makes no distinction between them. Now in view of the fact that it says, And let them store up all the food… and pile up corn,¹¹¹Verse 35 here. Ramban thus makes a distinction between ochel (food) and ibur (corn). At the end of the paragraph, he will mention that Onkelos makes no distinction between them. and [here in the verses before us] it says, And he stored up all the food… And Joseph piled up grain, this would indicate that he gathered whatever is eaten by man; corn, bread, and all food essential to life, even figs, fresh and dried, and similar things. He piled the corn — meaning the produce which is brought under a winnowing shovel and fan for fanning and cleansing — under the hand of Pharaoh, and he laid up in the cities enough of all the fruits for sustenance. Thus all the food was held in need for the years of famine to be drawn upon to the degree essential for life, and the balance of the corn he preserved in the storehouses.
It is possible that Joseph paid them money from the royal treasures at a low market price. This was why the corn belonged to Pharaoh, and he sold it to them in the years of famine, just as it is written, And Joseph collected all the money that was found in the land of Egypt.¹¹²Further, 47:14. It is possible that the king took it by force, saying: “I preserved it.”¹¹³For were it not for the king’s dream, the food of the seven years of plenty would have been squandered.
Onkelos, however, translated both ochel (food) and bar (corn) alike.¹¹⁴Calling them ibur. See Note 111.

ויקבץ את כל אכל, He collected all the food, etc. According to the commentary on verse 34 that the word וחמש meant setting aside a tax of 20% the words "all the food" refer to the king's share. According to the alternative commentary that the word וחמש means lending a sense of urgency to the measures to be taken, the verse may be explained literally; Joseph collected the entire excess of that year's harvest over average years' harvests. He bought up all the excess. The farmers offered it for sale seeing they had no use for it.

ויקבוץ את כל אוכל, we already explained this on verse 35.

ויקבוץ את כל אכל, “he collected all the (surplus) food, etc.” Ibn Ezra is quick to point out that Joseph, of course, did not collect all the food, for had he done so the people would have died. The word כל is not always to be understood literally, as for instance in Genesis 41,56 וכל הארץ באו מצרימה, where it does not mean that the population of entire surrounding countries all came to Egypt. Nachmanides writes that Joseph first collected all the harvest, and released it in the form of rations per family. This is the meaning of the verse 41,35 “let them gather all the produce of the good years that are now coming and stockpile grain under Pharaoh’s authority, etc.” According to this verse, when the time came, Joseph collected every kind of crop including dried fruit, in order to have a stockpile and to prevent waste, [and eventual profiteering. Ed.] It is quite possible that Joseph paid cash to the farmers who handed in their crops in order to encourage them not to hold out on him. By doing this, the entire crop became legally Pharaoh’s, and was not only on loan to him. When the time came, Pharaoh could charge a higher price when the Egyptians bought it back, as no doubt prices had risen considerably by then, driven by international demand.

ויתן אכל בערים, “he placed food supplies in the cities.” The fact that previously the Torah had spoken of כל אכל, and here it speaks merely of אכל, shows that in the previous verse the word כל did not refer to quantity but to variety, i.e. “all types of food, not only grain.”
אכל שדה העיר אשר סביבותיה נתן בתוכה, “the food of the field around each city he placed within it.” Joseph’s procedure as reported here caused our sages (Bereshit Rabbah 90,5) to state that when local food supplies are stored locally, such food supply will keep as the earth of that neighbourhood acts as a preservative for what it has produced.

Because every area preserves its produce. I.e., the verse implies that Yoseif stored all the produce that grew in a town’s area into that specific town. Why? Rashi explains, “Because every area preserves it produce...”

אשר היו בארץ מצרים. Weil die außerordentliche Fruchtbarkeit nur im Lande Mizrajim war, war die Gelegenheit zur Handelsausfuhr umsomehr gegeben, und umsomehr die Notwendigkeit, dem kontrollierend vorzubeugen.

אוכל שדה העיר, “he stored inside each city the kind of food had had grown in the vicinity of that city.” By doing this it would be near at hand when the time came for drawing on these supplies.

ויתן אכל בערים, he built all the storage silos in the towns and not in the villages. The twenty percent of the harvest the farmers in the villages had to turn in, Joseph stored in the cities.

And they put among the grain some of the earth from the place... This is an opinion [also from Bereishis Rabboh] which explains it differently: They brought all the produce to [the capital of] Egypt, where Yoseif was. When it is written אכל שדה העיר ... נתן בתוכה, it means they needed to mix into the produce some of the soil from where it grew, but afterwards they would bring it to Egypt [for storage].