Genesis 49:22

Genesis 49 holds the words Jacob spoke over his twelve sons as he lay dying in Egypt, where Joseph had brought the family to save them from famine. He gathered them to tell them what would happen to them in the days to come (Genesis 49:1). Among the patriarchs a father’s blessing carried legal and spiritual weight, shaping inheritance, standing and the future of the family, and Jacob’s words reach forward to the tribes that would grow from each son. Reuben, Simeon and Levi hear hard words. Joseph’s blessing is long and rich, and it is full of good from beginning to end. By this time Jacob had taken Joseph’s two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, as his own (Genesis 48:5), so Joseph received a double portion and his blessing would flow into two full tribes of Israel.

Joseph’s name, Yôwçêph, means “let him add” or “he adds”. Rachel gave it at his birth as a prayer for another son (Genesis 30:24).

“Joseph is a fruitful bough” renders the Hebrew ben porath, literally “son of a fruitful tree”, that is, a fruitful son. The verb behind “fruitful”, pârâh, means to bear fruit or be fruitful, and also to sprout, grow and increase. Jacob says it twice, “a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough”, and the repetition gives it force. Joseph’s fruitfulness showed in his own life, as he prospered and raised a family in a foreign land, and it showed still more in his descendants. Ephraim and Manasseh grew into two of the largest and most influential tribes of Israel.

Jacob turns from fruit to arrows. “The archers” is baʻal chêts in Hebrew, joining baʻal, a master or owner, with chêts, an arrow. They are “masters of arrows”, bowmen who know their work. In Joseph’s blessing they picture skilled enemies who took aim at him on purpose.

Three verbs follow, and together they move from the wound to the attack to the hatred behind it. “Sorely grieved” is mârar, to be bitter or to make bitter, and the KJV’s “sorely” gives its strength, because these were wrongs that left bitterness behind them. “Shot at him” names deliberate, aimed attacks, and they came again and again over Joseph’s early life. “Hated” is sâṭam, which means to lurk for or to persecute, a settled hostility that waits for its chance to harm.

“But his bow abode in strength” answers the archers. They shot at Joseph, and his own bow held. The verb yâshab means to sit, dwell, remain or endure, and here it gives the picture of a bow that stays firm and ready under pressure. Joseph’s spirit stayed whole and his resolve stayed steady through betrayal, slavery, false accusation and prison.

The next words tell where that strength came from. “The arms of his hands were made strong” describes strength given to him, and the giver is named at once: “by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob”. The verse speaks of hands twice, Joseph’s hands made strong by God’s hands. Scripture speaks of God’s hands in human terms so that we can see how really and actively he took part in Joseph’s life.

The word for mighty, ʼâbîyr, means mighty or strong, and it is used as a title of God. The phrase ‘Abir Ya’aqob is “the Mighty One of Jacob”, and the KJV supplies the word “God” in italics. Jacob calls on the God who had protected and carried him through his own long life, and that same God strengthened his son. Moses would later say to Israel, “The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deuteronomy 33:27).

Verse 25 names the God who stands behind every blessing in Joseph’s portion, and it names him twice. “The God of thy father” uses ʼêl, which means God, and its sense also takes in strength and might. He is the God of Jacob, Isaac and Abraham, who bound himself to the patriarchs by covenant, so Joseph’s blessing comes from the same God and carries the same promises on to the next generation. He “shall help thee”, standing by Joseph and his descendants and acting for them. The psalmist says it in his own words: “My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth” (Psalm 121:1–2).

“The Almighty” is Shadday, the name God used when he said to Abraham, “I am the Almighty God”, as he promised him descendants (Genesis 17:1), and the name Isaac used when he asked God to make Jacob fruitful and multiply him (Genesis 28:3). Its exact meaning is uncertain, and “All-Sufficient One” is a possible sense. In Genesis the name belongs especially with God’s power to give children and to keep his promises of many descendants, which suits a verse about fruitfulness. Together the two names show a God who is close to his people across the generations and has all power to do what he promises.

“The blessings of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors.” The blessings Jacob now pronounces on Joseph surpass the blessings Jacob received from his forefathers, Abraham and Isaac. “Prevailed” is gâbar, to be strong, to prevail or to exceed, and both “blessings” in the clause are the word Bᵉrâkâh. God’s favour grows from one generation to the next, and in Joseph it overflows.

“Unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills” carries the blessing as far and as long as the hills of old, which have stood since ancient times. Those hills picture what is vast, firm and lasting, and Jacob gives Joseph’s blessing the same lasting quality.

“They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head” sets the blessings on him like a crown. The head and its crown stand for honour and the first place, and Joseph, who had been sold and imprisoned, was raised to great power in Egypt by the favour of God. A psalm speaks of a king in the same terms: “For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head” (Psalm 21:3).

“Him that was separate from his brethren” uses nâzîyr, one separated or consecrated. Joseph was separated in body when his brothers sold him, and he lived for years far from his family. In Egypt, among people who served other gods, he kept his integrity and his purity and stayed faithful to the LORD. God had set him apart for a purpose, as Joseph himself told his brothers when he said that God had sent him ahead of them to keep them alive (Genesis 45:7). Moses later blessed Joseph’s tribe in much the same terms (Deuteronomy 33:13–16), and God’s promise to his once-hated people in Isaiah fits Joseph well: “Whereas thou hast been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee, I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations” (Isaiah 60:15).

Benjamin was Jacob’s youngest son and Rachel’s second. Rachel died giving birth to him and named him Ben-oni, “son of my sorrow”, and Jacob changed his name to Benjamin, “son of my right hand”. His word comes straight after Joseph’s and before Jacob’s closing words, and it is one short verse.

“Ravin” is ṭâraph, to pluck off or pull to pieces, the tearing of a beast of prey. “Wolf” is zᵉʼêb, and the word “as” makes the line a simile: Benjamin will act like a wolf. Animal pictures were often used to describe the strength of a tribe or a people, and the wolf, a fierce hunter that runs in packs and guards its ground, is a picture of courage and might in war. “Devour” is ʼâkal, to eat, used figuratively for devouring or consuming, and here it pictures a full victory over the enemy.

“In the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.” Morning and night together take in the whole day, from the early strike to the sharing out of the plunder when the fighting is done. Benjamin would be a warlike tribe, quick to attack, tireless in battle and rewarded with spoil. Moses later gave the tribe a blessing of its own (Deuteronomy 33:12).

Jacob’s words over Joseph and Benjamin show us a God who is the spring beside which his people grow. Every good thing in Joseph’s portion comes from him: the strength in Joseph’s arms, the rain and springs of the land, and the children of the generations to come. He is the God of the fathers, who keeps his word from Abraham to Isaac to Jacob to Joseph, and he is the Almighty, who has the power to do all that he promises.

These verses also show him at work through suffering. Joseph’s archers aimed well and hurt him deeply, and still his bow held, because the Mighty One of Jacob held his hands. In God’s hands the bitterness of the pit and the prison became the means of saving many lives, as the cross of Christ did far more fully.

And he gives his people different gifts. Joseph is a fruitful bough and Benjamin a wolf, and both have their place in the one family of Israel. The God who shaped a fierce tribe for battle later took a Benjamite named Paul and turned his zeal to the gospel. What God gives, from the fruit of a well-watered tree to the strength of a fighter, he gives so that his blessing will run over the wall and reach others.