| 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: |
| 4 | Unstable as
water, thou shalt not excel; because thou wentest up to thy father's bed; then
defiledst thou it: he went up to my couch. |
| 5 | Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are
in their habitations. |
| 6 | O
my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honor, be
not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their self-will
they digged down a wall. |
| 7 |
Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; 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 of thine enemies; thy father's
children shall bow down before thee. |
|
9 | 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? |
| 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. |
|
11 | 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: |
| 12 |
His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk. |
| 13 | 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. |
| 14 | Issachar is a
strong ass couching down between two burdens: |
| 15 | And he saw that rest was good, and the land that it was
pleasant; and bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto
tribute. |
| 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, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall
backward. |
| 18 | I have
waited for thy salvation, O LORD. |
|
19 | Gad, a troop shall overcome him: but he shall overcome at the
last. |
| 20 | Out of Asher
his bread shall be fat, and he shall yield royal dainties. |
| 21 | Naphtali is a hind let loose: he
giveth goodly words. |
| 22 |
Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run
over the wall: |
| 23 | The
archers have sorely grieved 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:) |
|
25 | Even by the God of thy father, who shall help
thee; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above,
blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of the breasts, and of the
womb: |
| 26 | The blessings
of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors unto the
utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and
on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brethren. |
| 27 | Benjamin shall raven 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: 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 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, and was gathered unto his people. |
