Genesis 49:1-27

JACOB’S PROPHETIC BLESSING ON HIS SONS, Genesis 49:1-27.

Jacob was the last great patriarchal representative and possessor of the covenant blessing of Jehovah. His grandfather Abraham had been separated from his kindred and native land, and received the promise and the covenant of circumcision. Isaac was preferred, to the exclusion of Ishmael and the sons of Keturah, and he transmitted the prophetic blessing of the covenant to Jacob, thereby excluding and supplanting Esau. Jacob is now about to die, and the chosen seed are henceforth to be represented by twelve tribes rather than by one great father. It was fitting, therefore, before this last great patriarch was gathered to his people, the voice of prophecy should issue from his lips, and, magnifying itself above the blessings of the everlasting hills, (Genesis 49:26,) should disclose unto his children some things that would befall them in the last days. Israel will have no successor like himself, and the Book of Genesis ends with the “generations of Jacob;” but the divine thoughts of this prophecy appear again in the blessing of Moses, (Deuteronomy 33:0,) and may also be traced in the song of Deborah. Judges 5:0. The student should also compare with this prophetic psalm that of Isaac when he felt his end approaching, (Genesis 27:1; Genesis 27:4; Genesis 27:26-29; Genesis 27:39-40,) the farewells of Joshua (Joshua 23, 24 ) and of Samuel, (1 Samuel 12:0,) the last words of David, (2 Samuel 23:0,) and the language of Simeon (Luke 2:25-32) and of Paul, (2 Timothy 4:5-8.) All these saints breathed the same prophetic spirit, and were divinely gifted to utter words of imperishable value. They caught in vision the outlines of future great events, the full significance of which they but imperfectly comprehended. 1 Peter 1:10-11. It was a prevalent opinion of heathen antiquity that highly gifted souls were wont to prophesy at the moment of their departure from the world . Thus Socrates (in Plato’s Apology) says to his judges: “And now, O men who have condemned me, I would fain prophesy to you; for I am about to die, and that is the hour in which men are gifted with prophetic power . ”

Modern critics, of all rationalistic schools, deny the genuineness of this prophecy, and refer it to a period long subsequent to Jacob’s time. They hold that its author, after the manner of poetical writers of all nations, conceived the happy thought of transferring certain facts of his own time and nation to the prophetic vision of a famous ancestor. Similarly Virgil, in the sixth book of the AEneid, (756-891,) represents father Anchises detailing to his son a long account of the fortunes of his posterity in Italy. These critics claim that the language of this poem is too highly wrought, and its historical and geographical allusions too minute, to be the utterance of an illiterate old man, who had been a shepherd all his life.

To these criticisms it may be replied, that the quiet of shepherd life, the deep and varied experiences through which Jacob passed, and the serene grandeur of his old age, furnished the most natural conditions of such a prophecy. So far, therefore, from being an objection, these considerations furnish a strong argument in favour of the genuineness of this poem. He who had the dream at Bethel, the vision of angels at Mahanaim, and the struggle and triumph at Peniel; who had traversed hills and plains, and been exposed to the extremes of heat and cold and storms; who, like David in later times, became, by means of pastoral life and exposure, familiar with the habits of the lioness and the lion’s whelp, the ravening wolf and the bounding hind, and the horned serpent hidden by the wayside; the father, who had studied the characters of all his sons with more than human interest; who had watched the merchant-caravan to learn the ways of other lands and peoples; who had stood in the presence of Pharaoh, and abode seventeen years in Egypt; the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the heir of the promises he, of all men, would seem to have been the fittest person to voice these oracles. So we aver that this prophecy is traceable to a psychological basis in the life and experiences of the aged patriarch, as they are presented to us in the Book of Genesis.

As to the poetical form of the prophecy, we may suppose a number of hypotheses. The rapturous utterances of such a seer naturally take poetic form and fervour, and the critical reader of this poem will note its intensity of passion, sudden transitions, outbursts of alarm, ejaculations of prayer, and a multiplicity of similes and metaphors. Can we suppose any of the greatest poets of the world to have spoken in such exalted strains? Certainly, but not without premeditation. Milton composed his finest passages in the stillness of the night, and dictated them to his daughters the following day. Similarly Jacob may have mentally prepared this entire poem, and have repeated it with glowing inspiration when his sons stood about his bed. Nothing forbids the supposition that months and even years had been previously given to its preparation. It has been suggested that each of the sons remembered his own blessing or oracle, and wrote it down, and afterwards the eleven separate oracles were united in the order in which they now stand. Others have thought that the patriarch blessed his sons in substantially the words which we have here, and the general sentiments were treasured up in the memory of his sons, written out in rhythmic form by a later poet, and possibly revised and supplemented at a still later day. Any or all of these suppositions are permissible with one who defends the genuineness of the prophecy, so long as he holds that, whatever revision it has received by later hands, it truly preserves in substance what the dying patriarch said to his sons.

This prophecy contains nothing in itself incredible nothing which might not, in substance if not in form, have been spoken by Jacob in his last days. It is in admirable keeping with the dream of Bethel, which was a sublime revelation of the great truth, running through the whole Old Testament, that in him and his posterity all families of the earth were to be blessed. Genesis 28:14. Such a gift of prophecy has its measure of the supernatural, but nothing miraculous . The super-naturalism of genuine prophecy implies no violence done to the prophet . The prevision with which he was for the time gifted, was as truly in harmony with his natural powers as was the far-reaching prophetic dream at Bethel .

The charge that this poem abounds with minute geographical and historical allusions inconsistent with genuine prophecy, is abundantly refuted by the fact that the adverse critics cannot agree as to its date, but have referred its composition all the way from the times of the judges to the later kings of Israel. Determining data must be sadly deficient in a production which has been assigned by eminent critics to such different times as the six following:

1) The period of the Judges. (Dillmann, Baur, Ewald.)

2) The time of Saul’s reign, and probably written by Samuel. (Tuch.)

3) The reign of David. (Eichhorn, Knobel, Bohlen.)

4) Somewhere in the period covered by the reigns of David and Solomon. (Reuss.)

5) In the earlier period of the divided kingdom, when Judah and Joseph were the two great rival tribes. (Kalisch.)

6) During the times of the Syro-Israelitish wars, to which allusion is supposed in Genesis 49:23-24.

It is evident from this diversity of opinion that when we remove this prophecy from the date and person to whom it is assigned by the sacred writer, we go out upon a sea of uncertainty and conjecture which involves greater difficulties than to accept it as the genuine word of Jacob.

The order in which the sons are named is: A. The six sons of Leah: 1) Reuben. 2) Simeon. 3) Leviticus 4:0) Judah. 5) Zebulun. 6) Issachar. B. The four sons of the handmaids: 7) Daniel 8:0) Gad. 9) Asher. 10) Naphtali. C. The two sons of Rachel: 11) Joseph. 12) Benjamin. If we compare the narrative of the several births, (chapter 30,) we see that Zebulun was born after Issachar, though named before him here, and Naphtali is placed here after Gad and Asher, though probably born before them. It is possible, however, that Naphtali was born after both Gad and Asher; for after giving birth to Dan, (Genesis 30:6,) Rachel’s handmaid, Bilhah, may not have borne her second child, Naphtali, until after Leah’s handmaid, Zilpah, had borne both her sons, (Genesis 30:9; Genesis 30:13. ) The placing of Zebulun before Issachar was, perhaps, designed in this prophetic blessing, like the placing of Ephraim before Manasseh, to denote that the younger should be in some way greater than the elder. Compare Genesis 48:14; Genesis 48:19; Deuteronomy 33:18. In comparing the order followed in Moses’s psalm, we find 1) Reuben, whose precedence in birth never could be denied; 2) Judah, the princely; 3) Levi, the priestly; 4) Benjamin, placed before 5) Joseph; 6) Zebulun, as here before 7) Issachar; and the sons of the handmaids are arranged as follows: 8) Gad, 9) Daniel , 10) Naphtali, 11) Asher, while Simeon is left out altogether .

As a part of the exegesis we furnish a new translation of this poem, and accordingly the notes are based upon the new translation.