(28) Their heart failed them.--This verse is far more poetical in the Hebrew, where, literally it is And their heart went forth, and they trembled each to his brother. Their courage left them, and they stood looking at one another in terror.

Verse 28. - And he (i.e. the one who had opened his sack) said unto his brethren, My money is restored; and, lo, it is even in my sack (amtachath): and their heart failed them (literally, went forth; as it were, leapt into their mouths through sudden apprehension), and they were afraid, saying one to another (literally, they trembled each one to his brother, a constructio pregnans for they turned trembling towards one another, saying), What is this that God hath done unto us? Elohim is used, and not Jehovah, because the speakers simply desire to characterize the circumstance as supernatural.

42:25-28 The brethren came for corn, and corn they had: not only so, but every man had his money given back. Thus Christ, like Joseph, gives out supplies without money and without price. The poorest are invited to buy. But guilty consciences are apt to take good providences in a bad sense; to put wrong meanings even upon things that make for them.And he said unto his brethren, my money is restored,.... The money paid for the corn is returned:

and, lo, it is even in my sack; this put them all upon opening their sacks, where every man found his money, though not expressed, see Genesis 43:21,

and their heart failed them; through surprise and fear; or "went out" (c) front them, as it were, they were ready to faint and swoon away:

and they were afraid; their consciences being awakened, and loaded with the guilt of their former sins, they were afraid that more evil was coming upon them for them; and that this was a scheme laid to entrap them, and that they should be pursued and seized, and fetched back, and charged with a fraud and trick, as going off with their corn without paying for it:

saying one to another, what is this that God hath done unto us? for whoever was the instrument, they concluded the overruling hand of divine Providence was in it, for the further chastisement and correction of them for their iniquity: instead of being thus frightened and distressed, it is very much it did not give them suspicion of Joseph, that he was the person they had been conversing with, and that he had done this in kindness to them; but their minds were so pressed with the guilt of their sin, that they were possessed of nothing but fears and dreadful apprehensions of things, and put the worst construction upon them they could, as men in such circumstances usually do, even fear where no fear is, or no occasion for it.

(c) "et exiit cor eorum", Montanus, Drusius, Piscator, Schmidt.