Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Genesis 50:23

Clarke's Commentary

Verse Genesis 50:23. Were brought up upon Joseph's knees. — They were educated by him, or under his direction; his sons and their children continuing to acknowledge him as patriarch, or head of the family, as long as he lived.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

Deaths of Jacob and Joseph (49:29-50:26)

Again Jacob insisted that he be buried at Machpelah, as a final witness that he died having the same faith as Abraham and Isaac (29-33; cf. 47:29-31). When Jacob died, Pharaoh declared an official time of mourning for him of seventy days. Pharaoh also sent a large group of officials and servants to Canaan with Jacob’s family to provide all necessary help and protection (50:1-9). The Canaanites were amazed that Egyptians should come all the way to Canaan to bury someone who was obviously a very important person (10-14).
After seventeen years in Egypt (see 47:28), Joseph’s brothers still had feelings of guilt and fear because of their treatment of Joseph in his youth. Joseph was saddened that they should think he might yet try to take revenge on them. He repeated that he would look after them in the future as he had in the past, for God had overruled their evil to preserve the family (15-21; cf. 45:7).

Joseph lived for at least another fifty years after the death of his father (22; cf. 41:46; 45:6; 47:28). Like his father he saw his family grow, and he died with the same assurance that his descendants would inhabit the promised land. As an expression of that faith, he left instructions that when the covenant people moved to Canaan they take his remains with them (23-26; cf. Hebrews 11:22). His faith was not disappointed (Exodus 13:19; Joshua 24:32).

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Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

"And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house: and Joseph lived a hundred and ten years. And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation: the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were born upon Joseph's knees. And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die; but God will surely visit you, and bring you up out of this land unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence. So Joseph died, being a hundred and ten years old: and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt."

"Joseph lived a hundred and ten years" Many have pointed out that such an age "represented the Egyptian ideal of a complete life."Merrill F. Unger, op. cit., p. 99.

"The third generation" It is not clear whether "grandchildren," or "great grandchildren." are meant, depending on whether "third" is figured from Joseph or Ephraim. However, regarding the children of Machir, it is clearly the great grandchildren which are meant. And, from this, it is usually assumed that the same is true of the descendants of Ephraim.

"Born on his knees" In some circumstances, these words imply the adoption of the children so born, but we agree with Leupold that this meaning is "not suitable here."H. C. Leupold, op. cit., p. 1218. It appears to mean that they were born while Joseph still had the strength to take them upon. his knees, thus loving them.

"Machir" This individual headed "a powerful Manassite clan."Arthur S. Peake, op. cit., p. 167.

The outstanding thing in this whole chapter is the conviction of all of Jacob's sons that God, in time, would remove them from Egypt and bring them into the Promised land. This appears in Genesis 50:17, where the brethren of Joseph referred to themselves as "the servants of the God of thy father," and again here, where Joseph refused to be buried in Egypt and took an oath of the children of Israel that they would take his remains with them when they went into Canaan, a promise that was fulfilled (Exodus 13:19; Joshua 24:32). Of course, the same conviction motivated and sustained Jacob throughout his whole life, appearing dramatically here in these final chapters of Genesis in the dying patriarch's requiring an oath of Joseph that he would bury him in Canaan. This faith was continued throughout the history of the old Israel. However, it may be doubted that they understood fully the spiritual purpose of God in bringing in the Messiah through them. Nevertheless, despite their focal attention upon the land promise, there always continued to be a remnant Israel who were deeply aware of the Messianic import of their separation from the pagan nations about them. Even from the tribe of Simeon, one of his descendants also called Simeon "looked for the consolation of Israel" (Luke 2:25), and Anna the prophetess was "of the tribe of Asher" (Luke 2:36). From this, it may be inferred that despite the apostasy of the great majority of Israel, each of the Twelve Patriarchs had a part in the fulfillment of God's purpose. The failure of the majority of men did not foil the purpose of the Eternal.

This chapter records the burial of Jacob by the side of Leah, instead of by Rachel his favorite wife. Apparently, Jacob finally accepted the rightful place of the long-despised Leah as actually his true wife. Francisco has this:

After the death of Rachel, Leah had Jacob alone for a number of years. Did she finally win his love, and did Jacob see that her love was far more meaningful than the fitful passion of the more beautiful Rachel? We cannot tell for certain, but this passage hints at Leah's ultimate victory over Rachel.Clyde T. Francisco, op. cit, p. 51.

In connection with this, it should be recalled that Judah (Leah's son) emerged as the spiritual leader of Israel, that the Messiah came through Leah, and that, at last, in the cave of Machpelah, her body rested alone by the side of Jacob. On the other hand, Rachel apparently continued to be an idolater, as witnessed by her stealing the gods of Laban, and her son Joseph's marriage to the daughter of a pagan priest probably planted the seeds of destruction for all of northern Israel (the Ten Tribes).

"He was put in a coffin in Egypt" "Coffin" here was not at all like the burial caskets used today. "The word in Hebrew is [~'arown], primarily meaning a box, and also used for the `ark of the covenant.' Here the term indeed may mean coffin, but the type of coffin used for mummies in Egypt is the familiar, painted, wooden mummy case."H. C. Leupold, op. cit., p. 1220.

What a glorious book is the Book of Genesis! In this marvelous narrative, the principal purpose was that of outlining the providential manner in which God brought about the separation of the Hebrews in order to bless "all the families of men," how He providentially over-ruled the sins, hatreds, failures, and disobedience of men in order to achieve His purpose, and how, for thousands of years, He guided the Chosen Nation to that hour when the angels of heaven would shout over the hills of Judea, "Glory to God in the Highest … for there is born to you this day in the city of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord."

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

- The Burial of Jacob

10. אטד 'āṭâd Atad, “the buck-thorn.”

11. מצרים אבל 'ābêl-mı̂tsrayı̂m, Abel-Mitsraim, “mourning of Mizraim,” or meadow of Mizraim.

This chapter records the burial of Jacob and the death of Joseph, and so completes the history of the chosen family, and the third bible for the instruction of man.

Genesis 50:1-3

After the natural outburst of sorrow for his deceased parent, Joseph gave orders to embalm the body, according to the custom of Egypt. “His servants, the physicians.” As the grand vizier of Egypt, he has physicians in his retinue. The classes and functions of the physicians in Egypt may be learned from Herodotus (ii. 81-86). There were special physicians for each disease; and the embalmers formed a class by themselves. “Forty days” were employed in the process of embalming; “seventy days,” including the forty, were devoted to mourning for the dead. Herodotus mentions this number as the period of embalming. Diodorus (i. 91) assigns upwards of thirty days to the process. It is probable that the actual process was continued for forty days, and that the body lay in natron for the remaining thirty days of mourning. See Hengstenberg’s B. B. Mos. u. Aeg., and Rawlinson’s Herodotus.

Genesis 50:4-6

Joseph, by means of Pharaoh’s courtiers, not in person, because he was a mourner, applies for leave to bury his father in the land of Kenaan, according to his oath. This leave is freely and fully allowed.

Genesis 50:7-14

The funeral procession is now described. “All the servants of Pharaoh.” The highest honor is conferred on Jacob for Joseph’s sake. “The elders of Pharaoh, and all the elders of the land of Mizraim.” The court and state officials are here separately specified. “All the house.” Not only the heads, but all the sons and servants that are able to go. Chariots and horsemen accompany them as a guard on the way. “The threshing-floor of Atari, or of the buck-thorn.” This is said to be beyond Jordan. Deterred, probably, by some difficulty in the direct route, they seem to have gone round by the east side of the Salt Sea. “A mourning of seven days.” This is a last sad farewell to the departed patriarch. Abel-Mizraim. This name, like many in the East, has a double meaning. The word Abel no doubt at first meant mourning, though the name would be used by many, ignorant of its origin, in the sense of a meadow. “His sons carried him.” The main body of the procession seems to have halted beyond the Jordan, and awaited the return of the immediate relatives, who conveyed the body to its last resting-place. The whole company then returned together to Egypt.

Genesis 50:15-21

His brethren supplicate Joseph for forgiveness. “They sent unto Joseph,” commissioned one of their number to speak to him. now that our common father has given us this command. “And Joseph wept” at the distress and doubt of his brothers. He no doubt summons them before him, when they fall down before him entreating his forgiveness. Joseph removes their fears. “Am I in God’s stead?” that I should take the law into my own hands, and take revenge. God has already judged them, and moreover turned their sinful deed into a blessing. He assures them of his brotherly kindness toward them.

Genesis 50:22-26

The biography of Joseph is now completed. “The children of the third generation” - the grandsons of grandsons in the line of Ephraim. We have here an explicit proof that an interval of about twenty years between the births of the father and that of his first-born was not unusual during the lifetime of Joseph. “And Joseph took an oath.” He thus expressed his unwavering confidence in the return of the sons of Israel to the land of promise. “God will surely visit.” He was embalmed and put in a coffin, and so kept by his descendants, as was not unusual in Egypt. And on the return of the sons of Israel from Egypt they kept their oath to Joseph Exodus 13:19, and buried his bones in Shekem Joshua 24:32.

The sacred writer here takes leave of the chosen family, and closes the bible of the sons of Israel. It is truly a wonderful book. It lifts the veil of mystery that hangs over the present condition of the human race. It records the origin and fall of man, and thus explains the co-existence of moral evil and a moral sense, and the hereditary memory of God and judgment in the soul of man. It records the cause and mode of the confusion of tongues, and thus explains the concomitance of the unity of the race and the specific diversity of mode or form in human speech. It records the call of Abraham, and thus accounts for the preservation of the knowledge of God and his mercy in one section of the human race, and the corruption or loss of it in all the rest. We need scarcely remark that the six days’ creation accounts for the present state of nature. It thus solves the fundamental questions of physics, ethics, philology, and theology for the race of Adam. It notes the primitive relation of man to God, and marks the three great stages of human development that came in with Adam, Noah, and Abraham. It points out the three forms of sin that usher in these stages - the fall of Adam, the intermarriage of the sons of God with the daughters of men, and the building of the tower of Babel. It gradually unfolds the purpose and method of grace to the returning penitent through a Deliverer who is successively announced as the seed of the woman, of Shem, of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Judah. This is the second Adam, who, when the covenant of works was about to fall to the ground through the failure of the first Adam, undertook to uphold it by fulfilling all its conditions on behalf of those who are the objects of the divine grace.

Hence, the Lord establishes his covenant successively with Adam, Noah, and Abraham; with Adam after the fall tacitly, with Noah expressly, and with both generally as the representatives of the race descending from them; with Abraham especially and instrumentally as the channel through which the blessings of salvation might be at length extended to all the families of the earth. So much of this plan of mercy is revealed from time to time to the human race as comports with the progress they have made in the education of the intellectual, moral, and active faculties. This only authentic epitome of primeval history is worthy of the constant study of intelligent and responsible man.

Smith's Bible Commentary

Chapter 50

And Joseph fell upon his father's face, and he wept upon him, and kissed him. And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father: and the physicians embalmed Israel. And forty days were fulfilled for him; for so are the days which they take to embalm them: and the Egyptians mourned for him for seventy days ( Genesis 50:1-3 ).

Now embalming processes took forty days and the period of mourning in Egypt for a great person was seventy days. And so it fulfilled the traditional things.

Now it would be interesting if you could find the cave of Machpelah because though you wouldn't find any remains of Abraham and Isaac and their wives, you should find a coffin and the mummified body of Jacob still existing there. And so it would be interesting if you could come across the cave of Machpelah and go down in and see the mummy Jacob because of the embalming of Egypt. He would be preserved like King Tut and some of the others who were embalmed by the Egyptian arts of embalming. Also Joseph was embalmed. So you ought to be able to find Joseph, too. That is, if you're interested in looking for mummies. One thing you'll never find, that's the body of Jesus.

And when the days of his mourning were past, Joseph spoke to the house of Pharaoh, saying, If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, My father made me swear, saying, Lo, I'm going to die: in my grave which I have digged for me in the land of Canaan, there shall you bury me. Now therefore let me go up, I pray thee, and bury my father, and I will come again. And Pharaoh said, Go up, and bury your father, according as he has made you to swear ( Genesis 50:4-6 ).

Now though he was buried in a cave and they didn't need to dig the grave that way, yet in these caves they dug niches in the walls and they would lay the bodies in these niches in the wall.

If you've been to the catacombs in Rome, you've seen it there, the niches in the walls that they have dug out for the bodies. And the same is true in Israel; there are caves right up at the top of the Mount of Olives just below the Intercontinental Hotel. There is an interesting burial cave there and all of these niches in the wall of the cave that they dug out for the various people, who in times past were buried in them.

And so he had dug out his own niche and so that's where he means "in the grave, which I dug". He had dug out his niche in this cave when he dug out Leah's niche. He probably no doubt dug out his own niche to be buried by her in the cave.

And so Joseph is now asking the Pharaoh for permission. And of course, they at this time have become an important part of the whole Egyptian prosperity and the Egyptians probably did not want them to leave at this point. And so to ensure the fact that they aren't just migrating back now to Canaan, he's asking permission to go and to bury his father but with the assurance that we will come back again to the land. "And I will come again", he declares, in verse five. And Pharaoh said, "Go up, and bury your father, according as he made you to swear."

And Joseph went to bury his father: and with him the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his house, and all of the elders of the land of Egypt, And all the house of Joseph, and his brothers, and his father's house: only their little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen ( Genesis 50:7-8 ).

So they didn't take the children but the adults all went. Of course, leaving their children and the herds was one of the greatest guarantees that they're not immigrating back but they're just going for the burial. Now a great multitude went.

There went up with him both chariots and horsemen: and it was a great company of people. And so they came to the threshingfloor of Atad, which is beyond Jordan, and ( Genesis 50:9-10 )

As they came up, they actually came up on the eastern side crossing above the Red Sea coming up on the eastern side of the Dead Sea into the area about where Joshua crossed in the area of Jericho. And from Jericho coming up the pass towards Jerusalem veering to the left, coming up through the area of Bethlehem across through the valley of Eshcol and to Hebron where the cave existed.

So they came up on the east bank of the Jordan because there are more fresh water supplies on the east bank. Coming up the West Bank of the Dead Sea, it would have been a long, hard journey without water because there are very few water tributaries coming into the Dead Sea from the west side. But there are some good streams and springs on the east side of the Dead Sea. So that's why they made their journey up that way, then crossed the Jordan river on the north side of the Dead Sea and then on up. As I said, that valley towards Jerusalem, cutting across to Bethlehem and down through the valley of Eshcol to Hebron where Jacob was to be buried.

But they stopped for a little celebration on the east side of the Jordan River and,

there they mourned with a very great and sore lamentation: and he made a mourning for his father for seven days. And when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, This is a grievous mourning to the Egyptians: wherefore the name of it was called Abelmizraim, which is beyond Jordan ( Genesis 50:10-11 ).

And so they, of course, didn't know probably that it was actually Jacob that his sons Joseph, they just figured they were all Egyptians.

And his sons did unto him according as he commanded them: for the sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the field for a possession of a buryingplace of Ephron the Hittite, before Mamre. And Joseph returned into Egypt, he, and his brothers, and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father ( Genesis 50:12-14 ).

Now this was Jacob's desire and it was probably a desire; it did express faith, the faith of Jacob that this is the land God has given us up here. And so by faith Jacob made mention of his bones before he died asking them to bury him back in the land. It was a mark of faith. But really it was putting upon the family certainly an unnecessary burden. To carry that body all the way from Egypt clear on up to Hebron to bury it there, what an unnecessary strain and burden he's putting upon the family. But there was a special purpose for it and so it was an expression of faith. This is the land that God has promised. This is the land where I want to be buried.

But let me tell you something. God hasn't promised me any land and I don't care where they bury me because I think that we make much too much fuss over the old house. Once the spirit has departed, all it is is an empty shell. It's the tent in which the person used to dwell. But they now have a "building of God, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens" ( 2 Corinthians 5:1 ). And I think that we make much too much fuss over the old tent.

Sure we sorrow. And there's nothing wrong with sorrow. Surely we grieve and that's only natural. We're going to miss them. We can't help but miss them. There's nothing sinful or wrong with sorrowing or grieving because a loved one has been taken from us. But to make a big fuss over the body, to get all upset because the casket, you know, just isn't what you wanted or the florist just didn't fix the flowers right, and you know to have a big old thing, such a shame.

My wife said to me the other day, "What do you want me to do with you if you should go before I do?" I said, "I really don't care. Cremate me if you want and scatter my ashes in a big surf." You know it really doesn't matter. Once I leave this old tent, it really doesn't make any difference. You say, "Oh, but cremation. Can Christians be cremated?" I look upon cremation as just a speeding up of nature's process. Cremation will do in thirty-seven minutes what nature will do in thirty-seven years. I see no problem with it spiritually. In time if there were going to be time, the body is just going to go back to the dust again, the tent.

But the tent is me. It has never been me. It has only been the place where I have been living. Now we learn to relate people to the body and that is rightfully so. But once the person's spirit leaves the body, we shouldn't relate them to that body anymore. "Behold, I show you a mystery though; We're not going to all sleep, we're all going to be changed, in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye" ( 1Co 15:51 , 1 Corinthians 15:52 ). I'm looking forward to that.

Now when Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, Aha, Joseph will now hate us, and he'll certainly require from us all of the evil which we did him ( Genesis 50:15 ).

He's going to get even now. He's going to requite us all of that evil.

And they sent a messenger unto Joseph, saying, Your father did command before he died, saying, So shall you say to Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin; for they did unto thee evil: and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father. And Joseph wept when they spoke unto him ( Genesis 50:16-17 ).

They sent messengers to Joseph saying, Your dad Jacob before he died said, "Hey, treat your brothers all right, will you?" And the brothers came in and said, "You know, hey, we're the servants of your father's God. Please, you know, forgive us the things that we've done." And Joseph wept before them.

And his brothers also went and they fell down before his face; and they said, Behold, we'll become your slaves. And Joseph said unto them, Don't be afraid: for am I in the place of God ( Genesis 50:18-19 )?

Now this is a very illuminating phrase because it shows that Joseph has a right estimate of things. That is, that judgment belongs to God. Am I in the place of God? Am I in the place of bringing retribution? Am I in the place of bringing judgment? Am I in the place of bringing vengeance upon you? God said, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord" ( Romans 12:19 ).

Therefore, it is not up to me to bring judgment or vengeance upon a person who I feel has wronged me. That's God's place. It isn't my place at all. And Joseph recognizing it as God's place then had the right attitude towards his brothers in this whole thing. Am I in the place of God? That shows us actually the secret behind his attitude is his commitment to God, and that area to God. And we also need to commit to God that area of judgment.

There are people that will say horrible things against you if you do anything. If you don't do anything, no one's going to say anything. But if you dare to do anything for the Lord, you're going to get your critics. Now you can waste your time going around trying to answer all your critics or you can just go on doing the work of the Lord and let the Lord take care of the critics that rise. And if you have the right perspective, you'll just leave that in the hands of the Lord. You'll not try to defend yourself or whatever. But, you know I think it's one of Satan's tricks really to get us off of the real work of God and into the area of Apologetics and Defense, get us fighting.

Fighting communism. Fighting liberalism. Fighting, you know, so many different things. And we're no longer really proclaiming the power of God and the love of God and the work of God, but we're fighting now all of these, you know, entities that are out there, fighting the devil. I think that it's a trap that it's easy to fall into.

But as for you, [Joseph said] you thought evil against me; but God intended it for good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, the salvation of many people alive ( Genesis 50:20 ).

Now your intentions were evil. You were wrong. Your motives were wrong, but even behind it God was working. The Bible says that God uses "the wrath of man to praise His name" ( Psalms 76:10 ). It is interesting to me how so many times God turns the tables on the devil. He'll prepare a trap for the children of God and God will just turn the tables on him.

Now here the brothers of Joseph, their intentions were evil, no getting around that, but behind it God was working for good. And this is true all the way through life for "no weapon that is formed against you will prosper. This is the heritage of the children of the LORD" ( Isaiah 54:17 ). Though man may intend to evil and to hurt you and all, God is able to turn it around and to bring good from it. We need to have that kind of confidence in God that "all things are working together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose" ( Romans 8:28 ). And even though a person might maliciously seek to malign you and hurt you, God can turn it for good. You meant it for evil but God has intended it for good, for the salvation of many people.

Now therefore don't be afraid: for I will nourish you, and your little ones. And he comforted them, and spoke kindly to them. And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house: and Joseph lived a hundred and ten years ( Genesis 50:21-22 ).

So another fifty-four years after his father's death.

And Joseph saw Ephraim's children to the third generation: and the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were brought up on Joseph's knees ( Genesis 50:23 ).

So he was a great grandpa and brought up his grandkids on his knees, bounced them around and had the joy of seeing not only his grandchildren, but his great grandchildren. And I don't know, grandkids are great and I suppose great grandkids are just that much more. So he had the joy of bouncing his great grandkids on his knees.

And Joseph said unto his brethren ( Genesis 50:24 ),

And that it would indicate that some of his brothers were still alive perhaps at the time that he was going to die.

I'm going to die: and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he swear to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. And Joseph took an oath of his children of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and shall and ye shall carry up my bones from here. So Joseph died, being a hundred and ten years old: and they embalmed him, and he was put in a casket in Egypt ( Genesis 50:24-26 ).

Now Joseph didn't put them to all the trouble of carrying his bones back immediately, the body back immediately, but he at least-when you leave here and you go. And so some three hundred years later when they left, they took this casket of Joseph and the children of Israel carried it out of the land of Egypt and they brought it into the land and buried him in the land of promise. So Joseph again expressing that same faith of Jacob. This isn't my land. I'm a stranger and a pilgrim here. I want to be buried in the land that God has promised unto us.

And so the Jews' love for the land isn't something that has arisen lately. It isn't something that has risen because of the persecution in Germany or the persecution in Russia or elsewhere. That love for the land has been something that has been planted in them from the beginning. Even before they possessed the land, that love for the land was there in their hearts. And Joseph said, "Hey, keep me here for awhile but when you leave, take me with you. I want to be buried in the land that God has promised unto our fathers. And surely God will visit and bring you out."

Now as I said, if they had been reading the Scriptures, they would have known that their time in Egypt would be quite awhile. Four hundred years they were to sojourn in Egypt, but yet the faith and confidence that one day God is going to bring them out, bring them into the land. "When He does, take me with you." And so again, beautiful faith in the promises of God.

So now we jump a period of some three hundred years as we leave now Joseph and as we begin next week the book of Exodus. We are leaving three hundred years unaccounted for in their history because the next important event of their history is their coming out of the land of Egypt. And now under new leadership a man named Moses who was of the tribe of Levi; cruel, short-tempered, hot tempered Levi. And yet of Moses it is said, "Of all of the men upon the earth he's probably the meekest". So surely he did not have the characteristics of Levi, except in the beginning.

You see, he had forty years to learn meekness. In the beginning he did display that hot temper of Levi. That's what got him into trouble. He was out and he saw the Egyptian mistreating one of the Israelites and he killed him. There's Levi again. But by the time God was through with him after his forty years out in the backside of the wilderness, there was a real change wrought in Moses and he became one of the meekest men who ever lived.

The changes that God is able to make in a human personality are really glorious. Taking a person from a fiery hot-tempered, no control, to a meek, quiet kind of a spirit, the work of God in Moses' life.

So we get into Exodus next week, the first five chapters. Shall we stand?

May the Lord be with you and bless you. May His hand be upon your life this week and may God work in your life in the changing of your nature. With open face may you behold the glory of the Lord. And as you gaze into His glory, may His Spirit work in you, changing you from glory to glory into His image. That God might conform you into the image of Christ that you might become the person that God wants you to be.

Not governed by your own will but governed by the Spirit of God. Reacting and responding not after the flesh but after the Spirit that your life might be a testimony in your home, in the office, at your place of work, wherever you are, as that nature and character of Christ is revealed in you. And thus may men be drawn unto our Lord and may your life be used as a witness for God's glory. In Jesus' name "

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

The death of Joseph 50:22-26

Joseph lived to see God’s blessing on his children’s children. He died 54 years after Jacob’s death when he was 110 years old. [Note: See Hugh C. White, "The Joseph Story: A Narrative that ’Consumes’ Its Content," Semeia 31 (1985):49-69.] Some Egyptian texts refer to 110 as the ideal lifespan. [Note: Hamilton, The Book . . . Chapters 18-50, p. 709.]

Joseph probably could have experienced burial in a pyramid or had some other grand burial in Egypt. However, he wanted his family to embalm him and place his body in a coffin in Egypt. Later descendants could bury him in the Promised Land near Shechem. They did so in the parcel of land his father had bought and given to him, perhaps under Abraham’s oak (Genesis 48:22; cf. Joshua 24:32). This expression of Joseph’s faith in God’s promises to his forefathers provides a fitting climax for the Book of Genesis and the formative period of Israel’s history. Genesis 50:24 contains the first reference to the three patriarchs together.

"The outstanding feature of Joseph’s life was faithful loyalty to God under all circumstances." [Note: Thomas, p. 379.]

"The story of Joseph illustrates patient faith and its reward. It ends the book of Genesis and brings its theme to a literary climax. . . . But the story of Joseph shows us that the road to victory, dominion, mastery, and judicial authority, is through service, the humble service of a slave. Through service and suffering, God purges and destroys indwelling sin in the believer (not completely, but sufficiently), builds character in him, and fits him for the mastery of the world." [Note: Jordan, pp. 67-68.]

"The Book of Genesis, like the Old Testament in microcosm, ends by pointing beyond its own story . . . . Joseph’s dying words epitomized the hope in which the Old Testament, and indeed the New (cf. Revelation 22:20), would fall into expectant silence: God will surely visit you." [Note: Kidner, p. 224.]

Believers who trust that the Lord will fulfill His promises to bless in His own inscrutable ways will demonstrate their faith in the way they die.

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation,.... His great grandchildren's children; and which shows, as most interpreters observe, that Jacob's prediction, that Ephraim should be the greatest and most numerous, very early began to take place:

and the children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were brought up upon Joseph's knees; Machir had but one son by his first wife, whose name was Gilead; but marrying a second wife, he had two sons, Peresh and Sheresh; see 1 Chronicles 7:14 who might be born before the death of Joseph, and be said to be brought up upon his knees, being educated by him, and often took up in his lap, and dandled on his knees, as grandfathers, being fond of their grandchildren, are apt to do.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      22 And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house: and Joseph lived an hundred and ten years.   23 And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation: the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were brought up upon Joseph's knees.   24 And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die: and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.   25 And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.   26 So Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old: and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.

      Here is, I. The prolonging of Joseph's life in Egypt: he lived to be a hundred and ten years old,Genesis 50:22; Genesis 50:22. Having honoured his father, his days were long in the land which, for the present, God had given him; and it was a great mercy to his relations that God continued him so long, a support and comfort to them.

      II. The building up of Joseph's family: he lived to see his great-grand-children by both his sons (Genesis 50:23; Genesis 50:23), and probably he saw his two sons solemnly owned as heads of distinct tribes, equal to any of his brethren. It contributes much to the comfort of aged parents if they see their posterity in a flourishing condition, especially if with it they see peace upon Israel, Psalms 128:6.

      III. The last will and testament of Joseph published in the presence of his brethren, when he saw his death approaching. Those that were properly his brethren perhaps were some of them dead before him, as several of them were older than he; but to those of them who yet survived, and to the sons of those who were gone, who stood up in their fathers' stead, he said this. 1. He comforted them with the assurance of their return to Canaan in due time: I die, but God will surely visit you,Genesis 50:24; Genesis 50:24. To this purport Jacob had spoken to him, Genesis 48:21; Genesis 48:21. Thus must we comfort others with the same comforts with which we ourselves have been comforted of God, and encourage them to rest on those promises which have been our support. Joseph was, under God, both the protector and the benefactor of his brethren; and what would become of them now that he was dying? Why, let this be their comfort, God will surely visit you. Note, God's gracious visits will serve to make up the loss of our best friends. They die; but we may live, and live comfortably, if we have the favour and presence of God with us. He bids them be confident: God will bring you out of this land, and therefore, (1.) They must not hope to settle there, nor look upon it as their rest for ever; they must set their hearts upon the land of promise, and call that their home. (2.) They must not fear sinking, and being ruined there; probably he foresaw the ill usage they would meet with there after his death, and therefore gives them this word of encouragement: "God will bring you in triumph out of this land at last." Herein he has an eye to the promise, Genesis 15:13; Genesis 15:14, and, in God's name, assures them of the performance of it. 2. For a confession of his own faith, and a confirmation of theirs, he charges them to keep him unburied till that day, that glorious day, should come, when they should be settled in the land of promise, Genesis 50:25; Genesis 50:25. He makes them promise him with an oath that they would bury him in Canaan. In Egypt they buried their great men very honourably and with abundance of pomp; but Joseph prefers a significant burial in Canaan, and that deferred too almost 200 years, before a magnificent one in Egypt. Thus Joseph, by faith in the doctrine of the resurrection and the promise of Canaan, gave commandment concerning his bones,Hebrews 11:22. He dies in Egypt; but lays his bones at stake that God will surely visit Israel, and bring them to Canaan.

      IV. The death of Joseph, and the reservation of his body for a burial in Canaan, Genesis 50:26; Genesis 50:26. He was put in a coffin in Egypt, but not buried till his children had received their inheritance in Canaan, Joshua 24:32. Note, 1. If the separate soul, at death, do but return to its rest with God, the matter is not great though the deserted body find not at all, or not quickly, its rest in the grave. 2. Yet care ought to be taken of the dead bodies of the saints, in the belief of their resurrection; for there is a covenant with the dust, which shall be remembered, and a commandment is given concerning the bones.

Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible

Having already shown the position of Isaac, I resume briefly with the remark that he stands before us clearly as the representative of the Son, and this too as dead, risen, and in heaven. All will understand it who remember that we have had His death and resurrection parabolically in Genesis 22:1-24; and then, after the passing away of her who was the figure of the new covenant, come the entirely novel dealings of God in the call of the bride for the Son here carefully and exclusively connected with the type of heaven. The bearing of this on the great mystery of the heavenly Christ and the church, His body and bride, does not need to be further insisted on now.

We have here, before pursuing the history of Isaac to the end, an episode which brings before us the birth of the two sons of Isaac and Rebecca. God had already affirmed the principle of His choice in the son of the free woman Sarah, when the child of the flesh was set aside. But there was this difference. It only in a preparatory way set out the great principle of God's sovereignty. There was a difference in the mother, if not in the father. There was a need, in the wisdom of God, that the sovereignty should be affirmed still more expressly. And so it was now; for Esau was the son of the same father and of the same mother as Jacob, and in fact they were twins. It was therefore impossible to find a closer parity between any than in these two sons of Isaac and Rebecca. Nevertheless, from the first, entirely apart from any grounds such as to determine a preference, God shows that He will be sovereign. He can show mercy to the uttermost, and He does; but He is God, and as such He reserves to Himself His right of choice. Why even a man does so; and God would be inferior to man if He did not. But He claims His choice and makes it, setting it forth in the most distinct manner, which is reasoned on, as we know, in the power of the Spirit of God, in the Epistle to the Romans, and alluded to elsewhere in the Bible. I only refer to it passingly to show how clearly it is brought out in the circumstances.

At the same time there is another thing to be weighed. The after history illustrates the two men and their posterity; for whatever may be said of the failure of Jacob, it is perfectly clear that not Jacob but Esau was profane, despising God and consequently his birthright. This is brought out in the same chapter. But the choice of God was before anything of the sort, and God made it unambiguous. I would only add one other word, that although scripture is abundantly plain that He chose him apart from anything to fix that choice, it is never said nor insinuated in any part of the word of God, that the prophet's solemn expression "Esau have I hated" was applicable from the first. The choice was true, but not the hatred. In fact, so far is it from the truth that we see the plainest facts in opposition to such a thought. In the first book of the Bible the choice of Jacob, and not Esau, is made plain; in the last book of the Bible, the prophecy of Malachi, the hatred of Esau is for the first time clearly affirmed. How admirable the word of God is in this! Let us delight first that God should have His choice; secondly, that God, far from pronouncing His hatred then, waited till there was that which manifestly deserved it waited, as we see, to the very last. To confound two things so distinguished, to mix up the choice at the beginning with the hatred at the end, seems nothing but the narrow folly of man's mind. The truth is that all the good is on God's part, all the evil on man's. He is sovereign; but every condemned soul will himself own the absolute justice of it.

In Genesis 26:1-35, which follows, Isaac's history is resumed. Let us bear in mind that it is the account of the risen Son. Hence mark the difference when Jehovah appears to Isaac. I call your attention to it as an interesting fact, as well as an instance of the profoundly typical character of the Scriptures. He appears as Almighty God (El-Shaddai) to Abraham: so He is also revealed as the Almighty to Jacob; but I am not aware that He is ever represented as formally proclaiming Himself in this way to Isaac. The reason is manifest. While surely included in fact like his father and son in such a revelation of El-Shaddai, Isaac has an altogether peculiar place in the record, not connected in the same way with the dispensations of God as either Abraham on the one hand, or Jacob on the other. Here we have God either in His own abstract majesty as Elohim, or in special relationship as Jehovah the two forms in which God is spoken of. These are used, but not "the Almighty." Isaac indeed speaks of Him as the Almighty when he blesses Jacob; but when God appears, Scripture describes Him simply as Elohim or as Jehovah. The reason is clear: we are upon the ground where God meant us to appreciate the very peculiar dealings with him who sets forth the Bridegroom of the church. Consequently what was merely of an earthly, passing, or dispensational nature is not brought forward.

Again, when God does appear to Isaac, He says, "Go not down into Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of." Isaac is always a dweller in the heavenly land. How admirably this suits the position of Christ as the risen Bridegroom will be too plain to call for further proof. "Sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee and will bless thee; for unto thee and unto thy seed I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father. And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven." Not a word about the sand of the sea. He is as ever exclusively connected with what is heavenly as far as the figure goes. In the case of Abraham appears the double figure: the children were to be as the stars of the sky, but also as the sands of the sea. Isaac has the peculiar place. Abraham takes in both; as we know, he is connected with that which is heavenly, but also with what is earthly. For Isaac we find the heavenly places, a relationship past resurrection as far as this could be set forth in type. But it was only the shadow, not the very image; and so alas! we find that he who was but the type denies his relationship, which Christ never does. Isaac failed like Abraham before. Unswerving fidelity is true of One only.

At the same time we have the never-failing faithfulness of God. Immediately afterwards he is blessed and blessed a hundred-fold. What is not the goodness of God? And Abimelech seeks his favour too; but Isaac remains always in the emblematic heavenly land, the type of Christ's present position.

The next chapter (Genesis 27:1-46) lets us into the sight of circumstances which searched the heart of all concerned. We see the nature which left room for the mingled character which so evidently belonged to Jacob. He was a believer; but a believer in whom flesh was little judged, and not in him only, but in Rebecca also Between them there is much to pain; and although Isaac might not be without feebleness and fault, there was deceit in both the mother and the son. As to Esau, there was nothing of God, and consequently no ground of complaint on that score. At the same time there was positive unrighteousness, of which God never makes light in any soul. Hence we find that though the blessing was wrested fraudulently from Isaac, he is astonished to find where he had been drifting through yielding to nature; for indeed flesh wrought in Isaac, but for the time it ruled, I may say, in Rebecca and in Jacob. Shocked at himself, but restored in soul, he finds himself through his affections in danger of fighting against the purpose of God. Spite of all the faults of Rebecca and of Jacob, they at least did hold fast the word of God. On the whole it is a humiliating spectacle: God alone shines throughout it all as ever. Isaac therefore, awakened to feel whence he was fallen, affirms the certainty of the purpose of God, and pronounces in the most emphatic terms that, spite of the manner in which Jacob had possessed himself of his blessing, he shall be blessed of God.

In Genesis 28:1-22 we have Jacob called by Isaac, and sent to Padan-Aram for a wife, with El-Shaddai's blessing on him. Now the governmental dealings of God begin to appear, and Jacob is the standing type of the people of God not walking in communion with God like Abraham, and consequently the first type of a pilgrim and of a worshipper too; not as the son, risen from the dead and in the heavenly land, but an outcast; forced to be, if a pilgrim, a pilgrim against his will in the government of God, and consequently the most apt possible type of Israel, for unfaithfulness expelled from their own land, passing under corrective discipline, but blessed at last with rest and joy here below. This is what Jacob represents none more suitable to be such a type, as we shall find by the very name which God gives him. So "Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan-aram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father; and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban, thy mother's brother. And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee."

Jacob accordingly goes out on his lonely way, and went to Padan-aram, and there it is that he dreams; and he beheld standing above the ladder Jehovah, who proclaims Himself to Jacob as the God of his fathers. "I am Jehovah, the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth." Mark again the consistency of the word of God. Not a word here about the stars of the sky. Abraham had both; Isaac had the heavenly part alone, and Jacob the earthly alone. And He says, "Behold I am with thee, I will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." Jacob awakes; but, as is always the case when a person is simply under the government of God without being founded in His grace, there is alarm. The presence of God is more or less an object of dread to the soul, as indeed he expressed it. "He was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." Many of us may be astonished to think of such a conjunction, that the house of God should be associated with terror. But so it must always be where the heart is not established in grace; and Jacob's heart was far from it. He was the object of grace, but in no way established in grace. Nevertheless there is no doubt of God's grace towards him, little as he might as yet appreciate its fulness. Jacob then rises up early, and takes the stone that be had put for his pillow, and sets it up, calling the name of the place Bethel, and vowing a vow; for all here is of a Jewish savour: "If God* will be with me, and will keep me in the way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on" his demands were by no means large, legalism is of necessity contracted "so that I come again to my father's house in peace, then shall Jehovah be my God; and this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house; and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee." He was in no way a man delivered from self or from the earth. It is as nearly as possible the picture of a man under law. How appropriate, therefore, for the type of the Jew driven out through his own fault, but under the mighty hand of God for government, but for good in His mercy at the end! This is precisely what Jacob himself has to prove, as we may see.

*There is no real difficulty in understanding the propriety of the various divine names in these chapters according to the motive which governs. Thus El-Shaddai is the peculiar patriarchal name of guaranteed protector; Jehovah of special relationship for covenant blessings of Israel according to promise; but then Jehovah is Elohim in His own majesty, or He would be a merely national deity, Compare Genesis 17:1-27, where it is expressly Jehovah that appears and calls Himself El-Shaddai, yet immediately after talks as Elohim with Abram. See also Genesis 22:1; Genesis 22:8-9; Genesis 22:12; Genesis 22:11; Genesis 22:14-16, where the various document-system is manifestly disproved. Esau in Genesis 27:1-46, has neither covenant nor divine name of any sort.

Thus he goes on his journey; and among the children of the east ensues a characteristic scene, which need not be entered into in a detailed manner the providential introduction to his experiences with Laban and his family. (Genesis 29:1-35)

Now experiences are admirable in their own way as a school for the heart in the soul's finding its way to God; but experiences completely melt away in the presence of God. This and the grace known there in Him who died and rose again alone can give fully either the end of self or communion with God. Experiences may be needed and wholesome; but they are chiefly wholesome as a part of the road while on our way to Him. Before what God is to us in Christ they disappear I do not mean the results, but the processes. So we shall find it was with Jacob. He is a man evidently cared for by God. He shows us much that was exceeding sweet and lovely. No doubt he had often to suffer from Laban's deceit; but was there not a memorial here of the deceit in which he had acted himself? He is deceived about his wife, deceived about his wages, deceived about everything; but how had he dealt with his father, not to speak of his brother? Deceit must meet with deceit under the retributive hands of God. Wonder not overmuch at the tale of .Jacob; but bless with all your heart the God who shows Himself caring for His servant, and, after he had suffered awhile, giving him although slowly yet surely to prosper. At his setting out he was by no means a young man, being somewhere about eighty years of age when he reached Laban. There he receives, not willingly, two wives instead of one. Leah he did not want, Rachel he did. But in his chequered course, as we know, their maids were given as concubines, with many a child and many a sorrow.* And spite of Laban abundance was his in herds and flocks. (Genesis 30:1-43)

*Can it be doubted that this part of Genesis is typical like what goes before and after? Surely Jacob's love for Rachel first, for whom nevertheless he must wait and fulfil the week afresh after Leah had been given him, is not without evident bearing on the Lord's relation to Israel first loved, for whom meanwhile the slighted Gentile has been substituted with rich results in His grace. Rachel is at length remembered by God, who takes away her reproach by adding to her a son (Joseph) type of One glorified among the Gentiles and delivering His Jewish brethren after suffering among both Jews and Gentiles So her history closes in the death of her Benoni and Jacob's Benjamin son of the mother's sorrow and of the father's right hand, as the people of God will prove in the end. I take this opportunity Of noticing the beauty of Scripture in the use of the divine names in these chapters, the best answer to the superficial folly which attributes them to different writers and documents. In the case of Leah (Genesis 29:1-35), who was hated compared with Rachel, Jehovah as such interposed with His special regard to her sorrow, and this was expressed in the name of her first-born son, Reuben; and His hearing in her second, Simeon. At Levi's birth she does not go farther than the hope of her husband's being joined to her; but Jehovah has praise when she bore Judah. In Rachael's case (Genesis 30:1-43) there is no such expression at first of confidence in Jehovah's compassionate interest; but in disappointment of heart she gives Jacob her maid; and, when Dan was born, she accepts it as the judgment of Elohim, and at Naphtali's birth speaks of His wrestlings. Leah, following her example, gains through Zilpah Gad and Asher, but makes no acknowledgment of the divine name in either form. After this comes the incident of using mandrakes for hire, when Elohim acts for Leah in sovereign power and she owns Him as such when Issachar was born, and in Zebulun on the pledge of her husband's dwelling with her. In the same power did Elohim remember Rachael, who not only confesses that the God of creation had taken away her reproach, but calls her son Joseph saying, Jehovah shall add to me another son. This is the more striking because it is an instance of the combined use of these names admirably illustrating both sides of the truth, and irreconcilable with the double-document hypothesis. Rachel rose from the thought of His power to the recognition of His ways with His own. And even Laban (verse 39) is obliged to confess that Jacob enjoyed the blessing of One who was in special relationship with him of Jehovah.

At length, when Laban's sons murmur and their father's countenance was not toward Jacob as before, Jehovah bids him return to the land of his fathers. (Genesis 31:3) His mind is at once made up. He gives a touching explanation to Rachel and Leah, and sets out secretly; for there was no such confidence in God with a pure conscience as divested himself of fear. There was the unseen hand of God; but the power and the honour of God could not be righteously found in such a course. Grace would give these another day: they could not rightly be as yet. He steals away therefore timidly, pursued as if he were a thief by his father-in-law, whom however God takes gravely in hand, coming to him in a dream by night. The Syrian (Laban) is warned to beware what he says or does to Jacob, and even obliged to confess it himself. While Jacob lays his remonstrance before him, Laban after all cannot but seek his aid, and enters into a special covenant with the very man he had overtaken in his flight.

After this we find the angels of God meeting Jacob. (Genesis 32:1-32) "And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God's host." They were the witnesses of the full providential care of God; but no such intervention can ever set the heats or conscience right with God. This was proved immediately afterwards. The messengers whom Jacob sent to propitiate Esau returned, saying, that the dreaded chief of Seir was coming to meet him with four hundred men. God's host then gave no comfort to Jacob against the host of Esau. He is alarmed more than ever. He sets to work in his own way. He makes his plan-and then he makes his prayer; but after all he is not at ease. He devised with considerable skill; feeble was his faith, and where even generous self-sacrificing love for the family? All bears the stamp of anxiety as well as address, if not craft. This was his natural character; for though eminently a man of God, still it is not God who is prominent to his eyes, and leant on, but his own human resources. Ill at ease, he sends over I am sorry to say himself last of all! That which he valued most came latest. Jacob was not among the first! His flocks, herds and camels set first, wives and children next, Jacob last. The various bands in order were meant to serve as a breakwater between the offended brother Esau and trembling Jacob. But at length, when all were taken or sent over the ford Jabbok, comes another whom Jacob did not expect when left alone. A man struggled with him that night till break of day.

But it is well to remark, though it has been often noticed, that it is not set forth to the honour of Jacob that he wrestled with the man, for it was rather the man, or God Himself, who wrestled with him. There was still not a little in him with which God had a controversy for Jacob's good, not without his humiliation. In short God was dealing with and putting down His servant's dependence on his own strength, devices, and resources in any and every way. Hence, as the symbol of this, what was touched and shrank was the known sign of man's strength. The sinew of: the thigh was caused to wither away. But the very hand which touched the seat of natural strength imparted a strength from above; and Jacob on this occasion has a new name given to him. "Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed." He asked the name of God, but this could not, consistently with His character, be revealed yet. God keeps His name in secret now. Jacob struggles all night that he might be blessed. It was no question of peaceful fellowship, still less of earnest intercession for others. It was indeed most significant of divine mercy; but of God's mercy in the dark, where there could not yet be communion. Thus nothing could more truly answer to the state of Jacob. He was no doubt strengthened of God, but it was compassionate mercy strengthening him to profit by a needful and permanent putting down of all his own strength love that must wither it up, but would nevertheless sustain himself.

In the next chapter (Genesis 33:1-20) the meeting takes place. Esau receives him with every appearance of generous affection, refusing but at length receiving his gifts. At the same time Jacob proves that his confidence was far from being restored. He is uneasy at the presence of Esau: his conscience was not good. Esau proffers his protection. There was nothing farther from the desire of Jacob. Is it too much to say that the excuse was not thoroughly truthful? Can one believe that Jacob meant to visit him at mount Seir? Certain it is that, directly Esau's back is turned, he goes another way. "He journeyed to Succoth, and built him an house, and made booths for his cattle: therefore the name of the place is called Succoth And Jacob came to Shalem,* a city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Padan-aram; and pitched his tent before the city. And he bought a parcel of a field, where he had spread his tent.... And he erected there an altar, and called it El-elohe-Israel." Thus, it seems to me evident, that although there was unquestionably progress in Jacob's soul, he was far from being brought to that which we find in Abraham from the very beginning. He is still wandering still under corrective government. All that which hindered the enjoyment of grace was not yet removed. There was earthliness of mind enough to quit the pilgrim's tent and build a house, as well as to buy a piece of ground. What did he want it for? He erected no doubt an altar. There is progress unquestionably; but he does not in this go beyond the thought of God as connected with himself. It was in no way the homage of one who regarded God according to His own being and majesty. Now there never can be the spirit of worship till we delight in God for what He is Himself, not merely for what He has been to you or me. I grant you that it is all right to feel what He has done for us; but it is rather the preparation for worship, or at most worship in its most elementary form. It is more thanksgiving than the proper adoration of God, and in fact a circumscribing of God to our own circumstances. I admit fully that the grace of God does minister to our wants; but then it is to raise us above them and the sense of them, in order that we may freely and fully enjoy what God is, and not merely feel what He has done for us. Jacob had not reached that yet; for him God the God of Israel is all he can say. Shechem is not Bethel.

*Probably, instead of "to Shalem," etc., we should translate it "in peace to," etc. Compare Genesis 28:21, Genesis 34:21.

This conclusion, as to the then state of Jacob, seems to be confirmed by the chapter which follows The settling down in the city ere long became a sorrowful story for Jacob, who proved it in one that was near and dear to him. It was the occasion of his daughter Dinah's shame, as well as of her brother's cruel and deceitful vengeance, that brought trouble on Jacob, and caused him to stink among the inhabitants of the land, as Jacob so sorely confessed. (Genesis 34:1-31)

Once more God said to Jacob, Arise; but now it is to "go to Bethel, and dwell there; and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother." Here he is not met by a host of angels, nor does the mysterious stranger wrestle in the darkness of the night, crippling him in the might of nature, and making the weak to be strong. It is a more open call in Genesis 35:1-29.

Now it is singular to hear, that Jacob says to his household and all that are with him, "Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments." "Strange gods "? Yes, there they were, and he knew it all along, but he never before felt the seriousness of it till summoned to go to Bethel. His conscience is now awake to what previously made no impression on his mind. We easily forget what our bears does not judge as it is before God; but as He knows how to rouse the conscience adequately, so it is a sorrowful thing on the other hand when a saint forgets what ought to be the permanent object of his soul, still more solemn when his conscience is not sensitive to that which utterly sullies the glory of God. Manifestly it was the case with Jacob; but now the presence of God, not providential power, not disciplinary dealings with him, but the call to Bethel, brings light into his soul, and the false gods must be put away. Jacob will have the household in unison with an altar at Bethel. "Be clean, and change your garments, and go to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went." What in his ways can be conceived more blessed than the patient faithfulness of God? Now at length Jacob is alive to his responsibility toward God. "And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and all their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem. And they journeyed."

But was it a flight now? "And the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob." All was changed from this point. "So Jacob came to Luz which is in the land of Canaan, that is, Bethel. And he built there an altar, and called the place El-beth-el (the God of Bethel)." There Deborah, Rebekah's nurse, died and was buried. There God appeared again; and while He repeats the name of Israel instead of Jacob, He reveals Himself as God Almighty, El-Shaddai. "And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and He called his name Israel,"* blotting out in one sense all the history from the day when that name was first conferred on him. It is a sorrowful reflection for the heart when time past is, so to speak, time lost. It is not that God cannot turn it to purpose when grace is at work, but there must be merited self-reproach as we may too well know.

*Dr. Davidson (Introd. O. T. pp. 65, 66), in his arguments against unity of authorship on the score of diversities, confusedness, and contradictions, alleges this: "In like manner Jacob's name was changed to Israel, when he wrestled with a supernatural being in human form all night before he met his brother Esau, on his return from Mesopotamia (Genesis 32:28); whereas according toGenesis 35:10; Genesis 35:10 he received the name on another occasion at Bethel, not Penuel, as the first passage states. It is a mere subterfuge to assert that, because no reason is assigned for the change of name in 35: 10, it relates no more than a solemn confirmation of what had been done already. A reason for the change does not necessarily accompany its record. The words are explicit: 'And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob; thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name.' If his name were Israel before, the words plainly assert the contrary. The passages are junior Elohistic, and Elohistic respectively. An analogous example is Bethel, formerly Luz, which was so named by Jacob on his journey to Mesopotamia (Genesis 28:19, Genesis 30:13), but according to Genesis 35:15, on his return. Identical names of places are not imposed twice." It is evident that the rationalist approaches Scripture, not as a believer and learner, but as a judge, and that his criticism is captious, to say nothing of irreverence. There is nothing to hinder a repetition in giving names either to persons or places. Let those who are affected by such petty cavils weigh our Lord's giving Simon the name of Peter twice (John 1:42, Matthew 16:18), and the second time with yet more emphasis than the first. It is the more absurd in the case of Jacob changed to Israel and then confirmed, because the usual plea of Jehovah and Elohim does not apply here. In both cases it is Elohim. Hence the need of inventing a junior Elohist in order to maintain their illusion. Again, the first verse of Genesis 35:1-29. furnishes the most direct and conclusive proof that identical names of places may be imposed twice, for God is represented on this second occasion as bidding Jacob go up to Bethel (not Luz) before he calls the place for the second time Bethel. What is the value of Dr. D.'s denial of what Scripture positively affirms?

Not only then does Jacob receive afresh his new name, but God shrouds His name no longer in secrecy. Now he has not to ask, "What is thy name?" any more than He who wrestled once had to ask him wherefore he asked it. He was not then in the condition to profit by that name; nor was it consistent with God's own honour that He should make it known. Now God can reveal Himself to His servant, saying, "I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins. And the land which I gave Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land." And not unlike what was said of Abraham, so on an occasion of singular nearness it is said of Jacob, great honour for one after such an experience, that "God went up from him in the place where he talked with him." If it was a glorious moment in Abraham's history, it was especially gracious in God's ways with Jacob. "And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him, even a pillar of stone, and he poured a drink-offering thereon, and he poured oil thereon, and called the name of the place where God spake with him Beth-el." Afterwards comes the passing away of Rachel at a moment of deep interest already noticed, the birth of her second son, and her burial near Bethlehem. And on the journey there the aged father has a fresh sorrow and shame in the foul sin of his first-born.

Then follows the genealogy of Jacob's sons; and the long-delayed last sight of Isaac at Hebron, where he dies at the age of 180 years, and was buried by his sons Esau and Jacob.

But there is another genealogy (Genesis 36:1-43), and strikingly introduced in this place. The Edomite interrupts the course of the line of God's dealings. We discern at once what remarkable maturity there was here. It is always so first that which is natural, afterwards that which is spiritual. Even then we find a rapid development of power in the family of Esau. They were all great people, to be sure duke this and duke that, to the end of the chapter even kings, as we are told, reigned before there were any such in Israel. I have no doubt that this is given us as an important element to mark how rapidly what is not of God shoots up. Growth according to God is slower, but then it is more permanent.

Genesis 37:1-36 introduces to us a new and altogether different range of events the very attractive account of Joseph. It is not now a fugitive from the land under the righteous hand of God, but a sufferer who is going to be exalted in due time. These are the two main outlines of Joseph's history a more than usually meet type of Christ, in that he shone above all his fellows for unsullied integrity of heart under-the several trials. There is no patriarch on whom the Spirit of God dwells with greater delight; and among those who preceded Christ our Lord it may be questioned where one can find such a sufferer. And his suffering too was not merely outside: he suffered quite as keenly from his brethren. Wherever he lived, in Palestine or in Egypt, he was a sufferer, and this in astonishing grace, never higher morally than when lying under the basest reproach. He was one who had true understanding; and the knowledge of the holy is understanding. Such was Joseph's great distinctive trait. Thus we find it brings him, first of all, into collision with his father's house. Jacob indeed felt very differently. It was impossible for one that valued holiness to bring a good report of his brethren. But his father loved him, and when his brethren saw their father's estimate of him, they could so much the less endure Joseph. "They hated him, and could not speak peaceably unto him." The wisdom that follows fidelity and I believe it is always so as a rule is furnished and exercised in the communications of God; for if He forms a heart for what is of Himself, He gives the supply of what it craves. He ministers to Joseph dreams that shew the gracious purposes that were before Himself. For first the sheaves pay obeisance, and he with the utmost simplicity of heart tells all to his brethren; for he never thought of himself, and therefore could speak with candour. But they with instinctive dislike and jealousy of what gave glory to their brother did not fail to make the detested application of his dreams. Even the father finds it trying, much as he loved him; for Joseph has another dream, in which the sun and moon, as well as eleven stars, made obeisance to him; and Jacob felt but observed the saying.

The story proceeds: Joseph is sent to see the peace of his brethren, follows them to Dothan, and there the last errand of love brings out their deepest hatred. They determine to get rid of him. They will have this dreamer no more. Reuben sets himself against their murderous intention; but the result is that at Judah's proposal he is cast into the pit, given up for death, yet taken out of it and sold to the Midianites a wonderful type of a greater than Joseph. It was bad to sell him for twenty pieces of silver, but this was not the full extent of the wrong; for the same cruel hearts which thus disposed of a holy and loving brother did not scruple to inflict the deadliest wound on their aged father. Sin against the brother, and sin against the father such is the sorrowful conclusion of this chapter of Joseph's story.

Here again, we have another interruption; but never allow for a moment that anything is not perfect in the word of God. It is right that we should see what the leader in this wickedness was; it is well that we should know what the character and conduct of Judah was, whom we afterwards see the object of wondrous counsels on God's part. The answer lies in the shameful account of Judah, his sons, and his daughter-in-law, and himself. (Genesis 38:1-30) Yet of that very line was He born, with her name specified too, which points to the most painfully humiliating tale that we find perhaps anywhere in the book of Genesis. But what humiliation was He not willing to undergo who had love as well as glory incomparably greater than Joseph's!

In Genesis 39:1-23 Joseph is seen in the land of Egypt, for there the Midianites sold him. He is in slavery, first of all in the house of Potiphar, captain of the guard; but "Jehovah was with Joseph; and he was a prosperous man; and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian." Here again he comes into suffering; here again most unworthily is he misrepresented and maligned, and hastily cast into the dungeon. But Jehovah was with Joseph in the prison, just as much as in Potiphar's house. In verse 2, it is written, He was with Joseph; in verse 21, He was with Joseph, "and showed him mercy, and gave him favour in the sight of the keeper of the prison. The keeper of the prison looked not to anything that was under his hand." It mattered little where he was, since Jehovah was with him. What a difference it makes when God is with us God too in His special known relationship, which is implied in the use of "Jehovah" here as everywhere. "He looked not to anything that was under his hand, because Jehovah was with him; and that which he did Jehovah made it to prosper."

But God works for Joseph, and in the prison puts him in contact with the chief butler and the chief baker of the king of Egypt. (Genesis 40:1-23) They too have their dreams to tell. Joseph willingly listens, and interprets according to the wisdom of God that was given him. His interpretation was soon verified. With the remarkable prudence which marks his character, he had begged not to be forgotten. But "his soul came into iron" a little longer. The word of Jehovah tried him. God would work in His own way. If the chief butler forgot Joseph in his prosperity, God did not.

Pharaoh now had a dream; but there was none to interpret. (Genesis 41:1-57) It was two years after a long while to wait, especially in a dungeon; but the chief butler, remembering his faults, and confessing them, tells his master of the young Hebrew in the prison, servant to the captain of the guard, who had interpreted so truly.

"Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon," and presented him duly before the king. His interpretation carried its own light and evidence along with it; and Pharaoh recognized the wisdom of God not only in this but also in the counsel that Joseph gave. And what wiser man than Joseph could take in hand the critical case of Egypt, to husband its resources during the seven years of plenty, and to administer the stores during the seven years of famine that would surely follow? So the king felt at once, and his servants too in spite of the usual jealousy of a court. Joseph was the man to carry out what he had seen beforehand from God; and Joseph accordingly becomes ruler next to Pharaoh over all the land of Egypt.

"And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck; and he made him to ride in the second chariot which he had; and they cried before him, Bow the knee: and he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-paaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Poti-pherah priest of On. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt. And in the seven plenteous years the earth brought forth handfuls. And he gathered up all the food of the seven years, which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities: the food of the field, which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering; for it was without number. And unto Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came, which Asenath the daughter of Poti-pherah priest of On bare unto him. And Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh: For God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house. And the name of the second called he Ephraim: For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction. And the seven years of plenteousness, that was in the land of Egypt, were ended. And the seven years of dearth began to come, according as Joseph had said: and the dearth was in all lands; but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread: and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph; what he saith to you, do. And the famine was over all the face of the earth: And Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto the Egyptians; and the famine waxed sore in the land of Egypt. And all countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn; because that the famine was so sore in all lands."

Then comes another wonderful working of God. The sheaves had not yet stood and bowed; the sun, moon, and stars had not paid obeisance yet; but all was to follow not long after. The famine pressed upon the land where Jacob sojourned, while Joseph was in Egypt with a new family, children of the bride that was given him by the king, evidently corresponding with the place of Christ cast out by Israel, sold by the Gentiles, but exalted in a new place and glory altogether, where He too can say during His rejection and separation from Israel, "Behold I and the children whom Jehovah hath given me." Nothing can be more transparent than the application of the type.

But there is more in the type than that we have just seen. The brethren that remained with Israel have yet to be accounted for; and the pressure of the famine is upon them. It is so with Israel now, a famine indeed, and in the deepest sense. But. ten of the brethren come down to buy corn in Egypt; and there it is that God works marvellously by Joseph. He recognizes his brethren. His heart is towards them when they are altogether ignorant who he was that enjoyed the glory of Egypt. The result is that Joseph puts in execution a most solemn searching of the heart and conscience of his brethren. It is exactly what the Lord from a better glory will do ere long with His Jewish brethren. He is now outside in a new position quite unlooked for by them: they know Him not. But He too will cause the pinch of famine to press upon them. He too will work in their hearts in consequence, that He may be made righteously known to them in due time. (Genesis 42:1-38)

We find, accordingly, that first of all one of the brethren is taken, Simeon; and the charge is given that, above all, Benjamin should be brought down. There can be no restoration, no reconciliation, relief it is true, but no deliverance for Israel till Joseph and Benjamin are united. He that was separated from his brethren, but now in glory, must have the son of his father's right hand. It is Christ rejected but exalted on high, and taking the character also of the man of power for dealing with the earth. Such is the meaning of the combined types of Jacob's sons, Joseph and Benjamin Christ has nothing to do with the latter yet; He admirably answers to the type of Joseph, but not yet of Benjamin. As long as He is simply filling up the type of Joseph, there is no knowledge of Himself on the part of his brethren. Hence, therefore, this became the great question how to bring down Benjamin how to put him into connection with Joseph. But the truth is, there was another moral necessity which must be met how to get their hearts and their consciences set right all round. This part of the beautiful tale is typical of the dealings of the Lord Jesus, long severed and exalted in another sphere, first with the remnant, and then with the whole house of Israel. There are various portions. We have Reuben and Simeon; and then others come forward, Judah more particularly at the close, and Benjamin.

The famine still pressing (Genesis 43:1-34), Jacob sorely against his will is obliged to part with Benjamin; and here it is that we find affections altogether unheard of before in the brethren of Joseph. We might have thought them incapable of anything that was good; and it is very evident that their hearts were now strewn to be under a most mighty power which forced them anew, as far as, of course, the type was concerned. More particularly we see how the very ones who had so shamefully failed are now distinctly brought into communion with God's mind about their ways. Reuben is quick to feel, recalls the truth as far as he knew it about Joseph, and shows right feelings towards his father. Yet we know what he had been. Judah is even more prominent, and clearly knew yet deeper searchings of the heart, and particularly too in the way of right affections about both their father and their brother. These, as is plain, were just the points in which they had broken down before. On these they must be divinely corrected now; and so they were.

The issue of all is this, that at last Judah and his brethren return to Joseph's house. (Genesis 44:1-34) Judah speaks. Here indeed we have a most earnest pleading, and full of touching affection. "O my lord, let thy servant, I pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn against thy servant: for thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his servants, saying, Have ye a father, or a brother?" There we have evidently a heart that has been brought right, exactly where the sin lay. "We said unto my lord, We have a father, an old man." Ah, there was no lacerating of his heart now! "And a child of his old age, a little one." How little they thought of that once! "And his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his father loveth him." Do we not feel how far the hearts of all his brethren were from hating Joseph now because of Jacob's love to him! "And thou saidst unto thy servants, Bring him down unto me, that I may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my lord, The lad cannot leave his father: for if he should leave his father, his father would die. And thou saidst unto thy servants, Except your youngest brother come down with you, ye shall see my face no more. And it came to pass, when we came up unto thy servant my father, we told him the words of my lord. And our father said, Go again and buy us a little food. And we said, We cannot go down. If our youngest brother be with us, then will we go down: for we may not see the man's face, except our youngest brother be with us. And thy servant my father said unto us, Ye know that my wife bare me two sons, and the one went out from me, and I said, Surely he is torn in pieces, and I saw him not since; and if ye take this also from me, and mischief befall him, ye shall bring down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave. Now therefore when I come to thy servant my father, and the lad be not with us, seeing that his life is bound up in the lad's life, it shall come to pass, when he seeth that the lad is not with us, that he will die; and thy servants shall bring down the grey hairs of thy servant our father with sorrow to the grave; for thy servant became surety for the lad unto my father, saying, If I bring him not unto thee, then I shall bear the blame to my father for ever. Now, therefore, I pray thee, let thy servant abide instead of the lad a bondman to my lord; and let the lad go up with his brethren. For how shall I go up to my father, and the lad be not with me? lest peradventure I see the evil that shall come on my father." The moral restoration was complete.

In the following chapter follows the unveiling of the typical stranger, the glorified man, to his brethren, who up to this were wholly ignorant of him. "Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him; and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me; and there stood no man with him while Joseph made himself known unto his brethren. And he wept aloud; and the Egyptians and the house of Pharaoh heard; and Joseph said unto his brethren, I am Joseph. Doth my father yet live? And his brethren could not answer him, for they were troubled at his presence. And Joseph said unto his brethren, Come near to me, I pray you; and they came near. And he said, I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt. Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither; for God did send me before you to preserve life. For these two years hath the famine been in the land: and yet there are five years in the which there shall be neither earing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt. Haste ye, and go up to my father." (Genesis 45:1-9) And so they do. Benjamin then is embraced by Joseph; and now there is no let to the accomplishment of the purpose of God for the restoration of Israel for this complete blessing where the reality comes under Christ and the new covenant.

Jacob comes down at length, and on his way God speaks to Israel "in the visions of the night; and said, Jacob, Jacob; and he said, Here am I. And he said, I am God, the God of thy father: fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes." (Genesis 46:2-4)

Then after the genealogies of the chapter,* we have the meeting between Jacob and Joseph. Not this only; for some of Joseph's brethren are presented to Pharaoh; and Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh; and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. (Genesis 47:1-31) It was a fine sight spiritually (the more so, because unconsciously, without a definite thought, I presume, on his own part) that "the less is blessed of the greater." But so it is. A poor pilgrim blesses the monarch of the mightiest realm of that day; but the greatest of earth is little in comparison with the blessed of God. Jacob now is not merely blessed, but a blesser. He knows God well enough to be assured that nothing Pharaoh teas could really enrich him, and that there is very much which God could give, on which Jacob could count from God even for Pharaoh.

*It may be worth while to observe in this and other genealogies not often the object of infidel attack, that the differences between Genesis, Numbers' and Chronicles in their form are due to the motive for their introduction in each particular connection ; that the difficulties clearly spring from the design, in no way from error in the writer, but in fact because of ignorance in ouch readers as misapprehend them; and that both the difference and the difficulties are the strongest evidence of their truth and inspired character, for nothing would have been easier than to have assimilated their various forms and to have eliminated that which sounds strange to western ears.

This table enumerates 32 of Leah, 16 of Zilpah, 11 of Rachel, 7 of Bilhah=66. But the head also goes with his house; and so with the larger list of Leah's children we see Jacob counted (verse 8), which is confirmed by the fact of 33 attributed to Leah, whereas no more than 32 literally are named, reckoning Dinah, and excluding Er and Onan who died in Canaan as we are expressly told. Objectors have failed to take into account the peculiarity in the mention of Hezron and Hamul in verse 12. It is merely said (and said only in their case) that the sons of Pharez "were" Hezron and Hamul, not that they were born in Canaan, where those had died for whom they were substitutes; next, that the Hebrew of verse 26 does not go so far as to say with the Authorised Version, "came with Jacob into Egypt," but of, i.e. belonging to, Jacob. It should be borne in mind that there is no reason, but rather the contrary from scriptural usage for construing "at that time," of an isolated point of time, but rather of a general period, consisting as here of a number of events, the last and not the first of which might synchronize with the event recorded just before. It seems clear that Stephen (Acts 7:14) cites the LXX. where 76 are given, as the Greek version (Genesis 46:20) adds five sons and grandsons of Manasseh and Ephraim. Is it not monstrous for a man professing Christianity and ostensibly in the position of bishop, to neglect elements so necessary to a judgment of the question, and to pronounce the Biblical account "certainly incredible," mainly on the assumption that Pharez's sons were born in Canaan, which is nowhere said but rather room left for the inference that it was not so in the exceptional form of Genesis 46:12? Yet after citing this verse we are told, "It appears to me certain (!) that the writer here means to say that Hezron and Hamul were born in the land of Canaan." Is scepticism only certain that its own dreams are true, and that scripture is false? There was a natural and weighty motive for selecting two grandsons of Judah, though no other of Jacob's great- grandsons are mentioned in the list. For they only were substitutional, as the very verse in which they occur implies. And it was of the deeper interest too, as one of them (Hezron) stands in the direct line of the Messiah, which was, as it appears to me, one chief reason for introducing the details of Judah's history and its shame in Genesis 38:1-30.. It is vain to quote Numbers 3:17 to set aside the peculiar force of the allusion to the sons of Pharez in Genesis 46:12, with which there is no real analogy.

In Genesis 48:1-22 tidings of Jacob's sickness brings Joseph and his two sons to the bed of the patriarch. The closing scene of Jacob approaches, and I scarcely know a more affecting thing in the Bible. It is a thorough moral restoration. Not merely is there that which typifies it for Israel by and by, but Jacob's own soul is as it never was before. There is no such bright moment in his past life as in the circumstances of his death-bed. I grant that so it ought to be in a believer; and that it is really so in fact where the soul rests simply on the Lord. But whatever we may see in some instances and fear in others, in Jacob's case the light of God's presence was evident. It is striking that here was the only occasion on which the brightness of Joseph's vision was not so apparent. All flesh is grass. The believer is exposed to any evil when he ceases to be dependent, or yields to his own thoughts which are not of faith. Jesus is the only "Faithful Witness." Failure is found in the most blessed servant of God. So fact, so scripture teaches. Joseph, ignorant of the purpose of God about his sons, allows his natural desires to govern him, and arranges the elder before the right hand of his dying father, the younger before his left. So Joseph would have had it; but not so Jacob. His eyes were dim with age, but he was in this clearer-sighted than Joseph after all. There never was a man who saw more brightly than Joseph; but Jacob, dying, sees the future with steadier and fuller gaze than the most famous interpreter of dreams and visions since the world began.

And what thoughts and feelings must have rushed through the old man's heart as he looked back on his own early days! Did he fail to discern then how easily God could have crossed the hands of his father Isaac against his own will? Certainly God would have infallibly maintained His own truth; and as He had promised the better blessing to Jacob, not to Esau, so, spite of Esau and the fruits of his success in hunting, he would have proved that it was not to him that willed like Isaac, nor to him that ran like Esau. All turns on God, who shows mercy and keeps His word.

On this occasion, then, Jacob pronounces the blessing the superior blessing on the younger of the two boys; and this too in terms which one may safely say, were equal to so extraordinary a conjuncture, in terms which none but the Spirit of God could have enabled any mouth to utter.

In Genesis 49:1-33 we find the general prophetic blessing of Jacob's sons. Here one may convey the scope without ceasing to be brief. As the blessings allude to the history of the twelve heads of the nation, so naturally we have the future that awaits the tribes of Israel. But as this is a matter of tolerably wide-spread knowledge amongst Christians, there is no need for much to be said about it.

Reuben is the starting-point, and alas! it is, like man always, corruption. It was the first mark of evil in the creature. The second is no better, rather worse it may be in some respects, violence. Simeon and Levi were as remarkable for the latter, as Reuben for the former a sorrowful vision for Jacob's heart to feel that this not only had been but was going to be; for undoubtedly he knew, as he says, that what he then uttered would sweep onward and befall the people "in the last days." This did not hinder his beginning with the history of Israel from his own days. Corruption and violence, as they had been the two fatal characteristics of his three eldest sons, so would stamp the people in their early history. Israel under law broke the law, and was ever leaving Jehovah for Baalim; yet the sons would be no better, rather worse, than the father; but the grace of God would interfere for the generations to come as it had for their father Jacob, and the last day would be bright for them as in truth for him.

Then Judah comes before us. It might be thought, that surely there will be full blessing now. ''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; who shall rouse him up? The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.* Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes: his eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk. Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea; and he shall be for an haven of ships; and his border shall be unto Zidon."

*The real difficulty inGenesis 49:10; Genesis 49:10 is neither so much the unusual application of the word Shiloh, nor doctrinal zeal, as the desire to get rid of a prophecy. Unbelief sets out with the foregone conclusion that there is and can be no such thing. Hence the effort to destroy its only just and worthy sense. "The Deity (says Dr. D., Introd. O. T. i. 198) did not see fit, as far as we can judge, to impart to any man like Jacob the foreknowledge of future and distant events. Had He done so, He would not have left him in darkness respecting the immortality of the soul (!) and a future state of rewards and punishments (!) He would not have left him to speak on his deathbed, like an Arab chief, of no higher blessings to his sons than rapine and murder, without the least reference to another and better state of existence on which he believed he should enter, and in relation to which he might counsel his sons to act continually. The true way of dealing with the prophecy is simply to ascertain by internal evidence the time in which it was written, on the only tenable and philosophical ground of its having been put into the mouth of the dying patriarch by a succeeding writer. It has the form of a prediction; but it is a vaticinium post eventum. We believe that the time of the prophetic lyric falls under the kings. The tribes are referred to as dwelling in the localities which they obtained in Joshua's time. The announcement respecting Judah's pre-eminence brings down the composition much later than Joshua, since he is represented as taking the leadership of the tribes in subduing the neighbouring nations. We explain the tenth verse in such a manner as to imply that David was king over the tribes, and had humbled their enemies." The proper translation according to this sceptic is:

"The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,

Nor the stuff of power from between his feet,

Until he come to Shiloh,

And to him the obedience of the peoples be"

But, first, the ruling position of Judah was not till but after he came to Shiloh. That any one, therefore, during the kings would falsify the events in a pretended prophecy put into dying Jacob's lips is too much for the credulity of any one but a rationalist. Secondly, one who speaks of others so scornfully as this writer ought not to have exposed himself to the charge of such ignorance as confounding "the peoples" or nations with the people or tribes of Israel. I believe, therefore, with the amplest authority in Hebrew, that as the language admits of our taking Shiloh as the subject, not object, so the sense in the context demands that we render it "until Shiloh (i.e. Peace, or the Man of Peace' the Messiah) come."

Yes, Jacob speaks of Shiloh. But Shiloh was presented to the responsibility of the Jew first; and consequently all seemed to break down, and in one sense all really did. "To him shall the gathering of the peoples be;" and so certainly it will be, but not yet. Shiloh came; but Israel were not ready, and refused Him. Consequently the gathering (or the obedience) of the peoples, however sure, is yet in the future. The counsel of God seemed to be abortive, but was really established in the blood of the cross, which unbelief deems its ruin. It is postponed, not lost.

Zebulun gives us the next picture of the history of Israel. Now that they have had Shiloh presented but have refused Him, the Jews find their comforts in intercourse with the Gentiles. This is what they do now seeking to make themselves happy, when, if they weigh their own prophets, they must suspect fatal error somewhere in their history. They have lost their Messiah, and they court the world. "Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea; and he shall be for a haven of ships, and his border shall be unto Zidon."

The consequence is that the Jews sink under the burden, falling completely under the influence of the nations. This is shown by Issachar "a strong ass crouching down between two burdens."

Then we come to the crisis of sorrows for the Jew. In Dan we hear of that which is far more dreadful than burdens inflicted by the Gentiles, and their own subjection, instead of cleaving to their proper and distinctive hopes. In the case of Dan there is set forth the power of Satan (ver. 17). "Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backward." We see here the enemy in the serpent that bites, and the consequent disaster to the horseman. It is the moment of total ruin among the Jews, but exactly the point of change for blessing. It is then accordingly we hear the cry coming forth, "I have waited for thy salvation, O Jehovah." It is the sudden change from the energy of Satan to the heart looking up and out to Jehovah Himself.

From that point all is changed. "Gad, a troop shall overcome him; but he shall overcome at the last." Now we have victory on the side of Israel.

This is not all. There is abundance too. "Out of Asher his bread shall be fat, and he shall yield royal dainties."

Again, there will be liberty unknown under law, impossible when merely dealt with under the governing hand of God because of their faults. "Naphtali is a hind let loose: he giveth goodly words." What a difference from him who was bearing like an ass two burdens!

But, more than that, we have Joseph. Now we have the glory in connection with Israel; and finally power in the earth: Joseph and Benjamin are now as it were found together. What was realised in the facts of the history at last terminates in the blessedness the predicted blessedness of Israel.

The last chapter (Genesis 50:1-26) gives us the conclusion of the book, the burial of Jacob, the reappearance of his sons left with Joseph, and at last Joseph's own death, as lovely as had been his life. He who stood on the highest pinnacle in the land next to the throne, type of Him who will hold the kingdom unto the glory of God the Father, that single-eyed saint now breathes forth his soul to God. "By faith Joseph when he died made mention of the departing of the children of Israel, and gave commandment concerning his bones." His heart is out of the scene where it enjoyed but a transient and at best typical glory. In hope he goes onward to that which would be lasting and true unto God's glory, when Israel should be in Emmanuel's land, and he himself be in a yet better condition even resurrection. He had been exalted in Egypt, but he solemnly took an oath of the sons of Israel, that when God visits them, as He surely will, they will carry up his bones hence. He had served God in Egypt, but to him it was ever the strange land. Though he dwelt there, ruled there, there had a family, and there died fuller of honours than of years, an hundred and ten years old, he feels that Egypt is not the land of God, and knows that He will redeem His people from it, and bring them into Canaan. It was beautiful fruit in its season: no change of circumstances interfered with the promises of God to the fathers. Joseph waited as Abraham, Isaac. and Jacob. Earthly honours did not settle him down in Egypt.

On another day we may see how this oath was kept when God brought about the accomplishment of Israel's deliverance, the type of its ultimate fulfilment.