Genesis 48:5-7

"And now thy two sons which were born to thee in the land of Egypt, before I came unto thee in Egypt, are mine; Ephraim and Manasseh, even as Reuben and Simeon, shall be mine; And thy issue, that thou begettest after them, shall be thine; they shall be called after the name of their brethren in their inheritance. And as for me, when I came from Paddan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan in the way, when there was still some distance to come unto Ephrath (the same is Bethlehem)."

This is not an account of the formal adoption which would follow, but it is a statement to Joseph of Jacob's purpose, including also an emotional statement of one of his principal reasons for the action he was about to take. Reuben and Simeon were the two firstborn sons of Jacob, and the proposal here is that Ephraim and Manasseh would be placed on a parity with them, and thus reckoned among the other sons of Jacob, ranking them among the patriarchs. But Jacob made it clear that any other sons of Joseph would not be accorded that distinction. There were doubtless many reasons why Jacob had decided to do this. The incest of Reuben and his irresponsibility had clearly disqualified him to receive the double portion according to the rules of primogeniture, and Simeon too, in the massacre of the Shechemites had showed a disposition that was incompatible with any thought of transferring the birthright to him. Jacob therefore decided to give Joseph the double portion, one of the principal benefits pertaining to the birthright, an honor that Jacob surely felt that Joseph was qualified to receive. Not only was Joseph the firstborn of Rachel, the only wife that Jacob ever decided to marry, but, additionally, he was the savior of the whole nation in being the instrument through whom God had preserved the covenant people through the famine. Furthermore, Jacob's true wife, in the sense of his intentions, had suddenly died, at a time when Jacob was doubtless praying that through her he would have other sons. She died in giving birth to Benjamin, cutting short Jacob's hopes, but now Jacob would expand his beloved Rachel's status as the mother of the Patriarchs by the addition of her two grandsons born to Joseph. This intention fully explains the mention of Rachel's death in this context. Kline and many other discerning scholars have recognized that this reference to the death and burial of Rachel was "prompted by the honoring of her son Joseph"[1] at this very moment when Jacob was in the act of doing so. One can marvel at the blindness that sees nothing appropriate in this. Dummelow even suggested that, "The verse would perhaps be more appropriately placed after Genesis 49:31, where Jacob spoke of the burial of his ancestors!"[2] The burial of Jacob's ancestors had absolutely nothing to do with the signal honor Jacob was in the process of bestowing upon the first-born of Rachel. "All these deeper points of view seem hidden to those who are critically minded."[3]