Genesis - Chapter 49

1 And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.

2 Gather yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob; and hearken unto Israel your father.

3 Reuben, thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power [thou my strength, and the first of my children, hard to be endured, hard and self-willed];

4 Unstable as water [Thou wast insolent like water], thou shalt not excel [burst not forth with violence]; because thou wentest up to thy father’s bed; then defiledst thou it whereupon thou wentest up: he went up to my couch.

5 Simeon and Levi are brethren, accomplished the injustice of their cutting off; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations.

6 O my soul, come not thou into their secret, and let not mine inward parts contend in their conspiracy; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their selfwill they digged down a wall, in their passion they houghed a bull.

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

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

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

10 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 [A ruler shall not fail from Juda, nor a prince from his loins, until there come the things stored up for him; and he is the expectation of nations].

11 Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass’s colt unto the choice vine [to the branch of it]; he washed his garments in wine shall [wash his robe in wine], and his clothes in the blood of grapes:

12 His eyes shall be red with wine [more cheering than wine], and his teeth white with [than] milk.

13 Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea [on the coast]; and he shall be for an haven of ships; and his border shall be unto Zidon.

14 Issachar is a strong ass couching down between two burdens [Issachar has desired that which is good; resting between the inheritances].

15 And he saw that rest [the resting place] was good, and the land that it was pleasant [fertile]; and bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto tribute [to labour, and became a husbandman].

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

17 Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, besetting the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backward.

18 I have waited for thy salvation, O LORD.

19 Gad, a plundering troop shall overcome [plunder] him: but he shall overcome at the last.

20 Out of Asher his bread shall be fat, and he shall yield royal dainties [dainties to princes].

21 Naphtali is a hind let loose: he giveth goodly words [Nephthalim is a spreading stem, bestowing beauty on its fruit].

22 Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall [Joseph is a son increased; my dearly loved son is increased; my youngest son, turn to me];

23 Against whom men taking evil counsel reproached. The archers have sorely grieved him [pressed hard upon him], and shot at him, and hated him:

24 But his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; (from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel) [But their bow and arrows were mightily consumed, and the sinews of their arms were slackened by the hand of the mighty one of Jacob; thence is he that strengthened Israel from the God of thy father];

25 Even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty [and my God helped thee], who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under [the blessing of the earth possessing all things], because of the blessings of the breasts, and of the womb:

26 The blessings of thy father and thy mother have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors, of the lasting mountains, unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brethren [and upon the head of the brothers of whom he took the lead].

27 Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.

28 All these are the twelve tribes of Israel [twelve sons of Jacob]: and this is it that their father spake unto them, and blessed them; every one according to his blessing he blessed them.

29 And he charged them, and said unto them, I am to be gathered unto my people: bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite,

30 In the double cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field of Ephron the Hittite for a possession of a buryingplace.

31 There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife; there they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife; and there I buried Leah.

32 The purchase of the field and of the cave that is therein was from the children of Heth.

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