One of the more unsettling portions of this text is how the author describes the work of Joseph in the seven years of famine:
Genesis 47:20–25
20 So Joseph bought all the land in Egypt for Pharaoh. The Egyptians, one and all, sold their fields, because the famine was too severe for them. The land became Pharaoh’s, 21 and Joseph reduced the people to servitude, from one end of Egypt to the other. 22 However, he did not buy the land of the priests, because they received a regular allotment from Pharaoh and had food enough from the allotment Pharaoh gave them. That is why they did not sell their land.
23 Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have bought you and your land today for Pharaoh, here is seed for you so you can plant the ground. 24 But when the crop comes in, give a fifth of it to Pharaoh. The other four-fifths you may keep as seed for the fields and as food for yourselves and your households and your children.”
25 “You have saved our lives,” they said. “May we find favor in the eyes of our lord; we will be in bondage to Pharaoh.”
First of all, your Bible may have a footnote on verse 21. There is a discrepancy in the translations of this verse. Some ancient texts, which the KJV adopts, read, "he moved them all into towns," whereas others say what the NIV translates it here, "Joseph reduced the people to servitude." It's easy to see how this could be misread based on the misreading of 2 Hebrew letters that could easily be confused for each other. However, in translation context is king. The NIV here is likely the correct reading because it makes more sense of v. 23, 25, which are not in question.
So what's going on here? Why didn't he just give the people food? Modern readers tend to read this as exploitative and cruel. First, we must remember that Joseph serves Pharaoh. He is second in command of all of Egypt. His primary job is to increase the power, control, wealth and influence of Pharaoh. This he does and does really well. The people seem to gladly accept it as verse 25 indicates because the alternative would be death by starvation. There is no indication that the type of slavery that Joseph reduced the people to was cruel or harsh like the slavery the Egyptians imposed on the people of Israel (Ex. 1:12-14). Slavery in ancient times was in some cases different than the Atlantic slave trade that we think of today. As Lev. 25:14-43 indicates it was often thought of as a noble thing to purchase the land of the destitute and take them under your care until the next year of Jubilee. Also, the narrative of this text is simply stating what happened and not making a moral judgment on the actions of Joseph and the circumstances here.
Of course, slavery is wrong. This is obviously a hot topic today and rightfully so. It's fair to say that texts like this are some of the most difficult to justify in all of Scripture. We can soften it with all of the details I've outlined in the paragraph above but it nonetheless leaves us feeling unsettled. This is something for us to bring to God and ask why he didn't make it clearer in Scripture that slavery is wrong. Sometimes that is the best we can do.
In the bigger picture what we should be seeing is a Hebrew enslaving the people of Egypt. God had so elevated the status of Joseph that now the whole region serves him. The original readers of Genesis would have only known the Egyptians as their cruel slave masters. Knowing how Joseph had formerly reduced their slave masters to servants themselves would have led them to see and trust in God's sovereign power all the more.