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.
49:2 Gather yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob; and
hearken unto Israel your father.
49:3 Reuben, thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my
strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power: 49:4
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.
49:5 Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their
habitations.
49:6 O my soul, come not thou into their secret; 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.
49:7 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.
49:8 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.
49:9 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? 49:10 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.
49:11 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: 49:12 His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth
white with milk.
49:13 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.
49:14 Issachar is a strong ass couching down between two burdens:
49:15 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.
49:16 Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel.
49:17 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.
49:18 I have waited for thy salvation, O LORD.
49:19 Gad, a troop shall overcome him: but he shall overcome at the
last.
49:20 Out of Asher his bread shall be fat, and he shall yield royal
dainties.
49:21 Naphtali is a hind let loose: he giveth goodly words.
49:22 Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well;
whose branches run over the wall: 49:23 The archers have sorely
grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him: 49:24 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:) 49:25 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: 49:26 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.
49:27 Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour
the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.
49:28 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.
49:29 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, 49:30 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.
49:31 There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife; there they buried
Isaac and Rebekah his wife; and there I buried Leah.
49:32 The purchase of the field and of the cave that is therein was
from the children of Heth.
49:33 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.