Sforno on Genesis 43:11/ספורנו על בראשית מ״ג:י״א

1אם כן, if the matter is indeed as you have said that although the man harassed you he is a G’d-fearing individual,

2איפוא, then it is quite clear what you have to do;

3קחו מזמרת הארץ מעט צרי, although when one presents a gift to an ordinary person it is important to impress him with the quantity of the gift so that he can feast his eyes on it, this man who has everything will only be impressed with the quality of the gift instead of the quantity; therefore take rare items but only in appropriately small quantities to emphasise their rareness. All the items sent to Joseph were of this nature, as opposed to the gift Yaakov had sent to his brother Esau on a previous occasion.

4הורידוהו לאיש מנחה, before you will actually meet him face to face again. This will enable you to judge if he receives your gift with goodwill. If he does, you will have reason to be confident that he will receive you also with goodwill. This thought has also been expressed in Judges 13,23 when the wife of Manoach, in trying to calm her husband’s fears, said to him: “if G’d had wanted to kill us He would not have accepted our burnt-offering and our gift-offering first.” After this conversation,