Bible Commentaries

And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you [that] which shall befall you p> p>

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in the {(a)} last days.

(a) When God will bring you out of Egypt, and because he speaks of the Messiah, he calls it the last days.

Reuben, thou [art] my firstborn, my ^b might, and the beginning of my strength, ^c the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power:

(b) Begotten in my youth.

(c) If you have not left your birthright by your offence.

O my soul, come not thou into their ^d secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a ^e man, and in their selfwill they digged down a wall.

(d) Or, tongue: meaning that he neither consented to them in word or thought.

(e) The Shechemites (Genesis 34:26).

Cursed [be] their anger, for [it was] fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I will ^f divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.

(f) For Levi had no part, and Simeon was under Judah, (Joshua 19:1) till God gave them the place of the Amalekites, (1 Chronicles 4:43).

Judah, thou [art he] whom thy brethren shall praise: thy hand [shall be] in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall ^g bow down before thee.

(g) As was verified in David and Christ.

Judah [is] a lion's whelp: from the prey, my son, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion; ^h who shall rouse him up?

(h) His enemies will so fear him.

The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until ⁱ Shiloh come; and unto him [shall] the gathering of the people [be].

(i) Which is Christ the Messiah, the giver of prosperity who will call the Gentiles to salvation.

Binding his foal unto the ^k vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes:

(k) A country most abundant with vines and pastures is promised to him.

Issachar [is] ^l a strong ass couching down between two burdens:

(l) His force will be great, but he will lack courage to resist his enemies.

Dan ^m shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel.

(m) Shall have the honour of a tribe.

^o I have waited for thy salvation, O LORD.

(o) Seeing the miseries that his posterity would fall into, he bursts out in prayer to God to remedy it.

Out of Asher his ^p bread [shall be] fat, and he shall yield royal dainties.

(p) He will abound in corn and pleasant fruits.

Naphtali [is] a hind let loose: he giveth ^q goodly words.

(q) Overcoming more by fair words than by force.

^r The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot [at him], and hated him:

(r) As his brethren when they were his enemies, Potiphar and others.

But his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty [God] of Jacob; (from thence [is] the shepherd, the ^s stone of Israel:)

(s) That is God.

The blessings of thy father have ^t prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was ^u separate from his brethren.

(t) In as much as he was closer to the accomplishment of the promise and it had been more often confirmed.

(u) Either in dignity, or when he was sold from his brethren.

And when Jacob had made an end of commanding his sons, he ^x gathered up his feet into the bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his people.

(x) By which is signified how quietly he died.