Genesis 49:1-28

English Standard Version

Jacob Blesses His Sons

49 ^(A)Then Jacob called his sons and said, “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you what shall happen to you ^(B)in days to come.

²“Assemble and listen, O sons of Jacob,
listen to Israel your father.

³“Reuben, you are ^(C)my firstborn,
    my might, and the ^(D)firstfruits of my strength,
    preeminent in dignity and preeminent in power.
⁴Unstable as water, you shall not have preeminence,
    because you ^(E)went up to your father's bed;
    then you defiled it—he went up to my couch!

⁵^(F)“Simeon and Levi are brothers;
    weapons ^(G)of violence are their swords.
⁶Let my soul come not into their council;
    ^(H)O my glory, ^(I)be not joined to their company.
For in their anger they killed men,
    and in their willfulness they ^(J)hamstrung oxen.
⁷Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce,
    and their wrath, for it is cruel!
I will ^(K)divide them in Jacob
    and scatter them in Israel.

⁸“Judah, ^(L)your brothers shall praise you;
    ^(M)your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies;
    ^(N)your father's sons shall bow down before you.
⁹Judah is ^(O)a lion's cub;
    from the prey, my son, you have gone up.
^(P)He stooped down; he crouched as a lion
    and as a lioness; who dares rouse him?
¹⁰The ^(Q)scepter shall not depart from Judah,
    nor the ruler's staff ^(R)from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;^[a]
    and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.
¹¹Binding his foal to the vine
    and his donkey's colt to the choice vine,
he has washed his garments in wine
    and his vesture in the blood of grapes.
¹²His ^(S)eyes are darker than wine,
    and his teeth whiter than milk.

¹³^(T)“Zebulun shall dwell at the ^(U)shore of the sea;
he shall become a haven for ships,
and his border shall be at Sidon.

¹⁴^(V)“Issachar is a strong donkey,
    crouching between the sheepfolds.^[b]
¹⁵He saw that a resting place was good,
    and that the land was pleasant,
so he bowed his shoulder to bear,
    and ^(W)became a servant at forced labor.

¹⁶^(X)“Dan shall ^(Y)judge his people
    as one of the tribes of Israel.
¹⁷Dan ^(Z)shall be a serpent in the way,
    a viper by the path,
that bites the horse's heels
    so that his rider falls backward.
¹⁸I ^(AA)wait for your salvation, O Lord.

¹⁹^(AB)“Raiders shall raid ^(AC)Gad,^[c]
but he shall raid at their heels.

²⁰^(AD)“Asher's food shall be rich,
and he shall yield royal delicacies.

²¹^(AE)“Naphtali is a doe let loose
that bears beautiful fawns.^[d]

²²“Joseph is ^(AF)a fruitful bough,
    a fruitful bough by a spring;
    his branches run over the wall.^[e]
²³The archers ^(AG)bitterly attacked him,
    shot at him, and harassed him severely,
²⁴yet ^(AH)his bow remained unmoved;
    his arms^[f] were made agile
by the hands of the ^(AI)Mighty One of Jacob
    (from there is ^(AJ)the Shepherd,^[g] ^(AK)the Stone of Israel),
²⁵^(AL)by the God of your father who will help you,
    by ^(AM)the Almighty^[h] ^(AN)who will bless you
    with blessings of heaven above,
blessings of the deep that crouches beneath,
    blessings of the breasts and of the womb.
²⁶The blessings of your father
    are mighty beyond the blessings of my parents,
    up to the bounties ^(AO)of the everlasting hills.^[i]
May they be ^(AP)on the head of Joseph,
    and on the brow of him who was set apart from his brothers.

²⁷^(AQ)“Benjamin is a ravenous wolf,
in the morning devouring the prey
and at evening ^(AR)dividing the spoil.”

Jacob's Death and Burial

²⁸All these are the twelve tribes of Israel. This is what their father said to them as he blessed them, blessing each with the blessing suitable to him.

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Footnotes

Genesis 49:10 By a slight revocalization; a slight emendation yields (compare Septuagint, Syriac, Targum) until he comes to whom it belongs; Hebrew until Shiloh comes, or until he comes to Shiloh
Genesis 49:14 Or between its saddlebags
Genesis 49:19 Gad sounds like the Hebrew for raiders and raid
Genesis 49:21 Or he gives beautiful words, or that bears fawns of the fold
Genesis 49:22 Or Joseph is a wild donkey, a wild donkey beside a spring, his wild colts beside the wall
Genesis 49:24 Hebrew the arms of his hands
Genesis 49:24 Or by the name of the Shepherd
Genesis 49:25 Hebrew Shaddai
Genesis 49:26 A slight emendation yields (compare Septuagint) the blessings of the eternal mountains, the bounties of the everlasting hills

Numbers 18

English Standard Version

Duties of Priests and Levites

18 So the Lord said to Aaron, “You and your sons and your father's house with you shall ^(A)bear iniquity connected with the sanctuary, ^(B)and you and your sons with you shall bear iniquity connected with your priesthood. ²And with you bring your brothers also, the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father, that they may ^(C)join you and ^(D)minister to you while you and your sons with you are before the tent of the testimony. ³They shall keep guard over you and ^(E)over the whole tent, ^(F)but shall not come near to the vessels of the sanctuary or to the altar ^(G)lest they, and you, die. ⁴They shall join you and keep guard over the tent of meeting for all the service of the tent, ^(H)and no outsider shall come near you. ⁵And you shall ^(I)keep guard over the sanctuary and over the altar, ^(J)that there may never again be wrath on the people of Israel. ⁶^(K)And behold, I have taken your brothers the Levites from among the people of Israel. ^(L)They are a gift to you, given to the Lord, to do the service of the tent of meeting. ⁷And ^(M)you and your sons with you shall guard your priesthood for all that concerns the altar and ^(N)that is within the veil; and you shall serve. I give your priesthood as a gift,^[a] and ^(O)any outsider who comes near shall be put to death.”

⁸Then the Lord spoke to Aaron, “Behold, ^(P)I have given you charge of the contributions made to me, all the consecrated things of the people of Israel. I have given them to you ^(Q)as a portion and to your sons as a perpetual due. ⁹This shall be yours of the most holy things, reserved from the fire: every offering of theirs, every grain offering of theirs and every ^(R)sin offering of theirs and every ^(S)guilt offering of theirs, which they render to me, shall be most holy to you and to your sons. ¹⁰In a most holy place shall you eat it. Every male may eat it; it is holy to you. ¹¹This also is yours: the contribution of their gift, all the ^(T)wave offerings of the people of Israel. I have given them to ^(U)you, and to your sons and daughters with you, as a perpetual due. ^(V)Everyone who is clean in your house may eat it. ¹²^(W)All the best of the oil and all the best of the wine and of the grain, ^(X)the firstfruits of what they give to the Lord, I give to you. ¹³The first ripe fruits of all that is in their land, ^(Y)which they bring to the Lord, shall be yours. ^(Z)Everyone who is clean in your house may eat it. ¹⁴^(AA)Every devoted thing in Israel shall be yours. ¹⁵^(AB)Everything that opens the womb of all flesh, whether man or beast, which they offer to the Lord, shall be yours. Nevertheless, ^(AC)the firstborn of man you shall redeem, and the firstborn of unclean animals you shall redeem. ¹⁶And their redemption price ^(AD)(at a month old you shall redeem them) you shall fix at five shekels^[b] in silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, ^(AE)which is twenty gerahs. ¹⁷^(AF)But the firstborn of a cow, or the firstborn of a sheep, or the firstborn of a goat, you shall not redeem; they are holy. You shall sprinkle their blood on the altar and shall burn their fat as a food offering, with a pleasing aroma to the Lord. ¹⁸But their flesh shall be yours, as ^(AG)the breast that is waved and as the right thigh are yours. ¹⁹^(AH)All the holy contributions that the people of Israel present to the Lord I give to you, and to your sons and daughters with you, as a perpetual due. ^(AI)It is a covenant of salt forever before the Lord for you and for your offspring with you.” ²⁰And the Lord said to Aaron, “You shall have no inheritance in their land, neither shall you have any portion among them. ^(AJ)I am your portion and your inheritance among the people of Israel.

²¹^(AK)“To the Levites I have given every tithe in Israel for an inheritance, in return for their service that they do, their service in the tent of meeting, ²²^(AL)so that the people of Israel do not come near the tent of meeting, ^(AM)lest they bear sin and die. ²³But ^(AN)the Levites shall do the service of the tent of meeting, ^(AO)and they shall bear their iniquity. It shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations, and among the people of Israel they shall have no inheritance. ²⁴For the tithe of the people of Israel, which ^(AP)they present as a contribution to the Lord, I have given to the Levites for an inheritance. Therefore I have said of them that they shall have no inheritance ^(AQ)among the people of Israel.”

²⁵And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ²⁶“Moreover, you shall speak and say to the Levites, ‘When you take from the people of Israel the tithe that I have given you from them for your inheritance, then you shall present a contribution from it to the Lord, ^(AR)a tithe of the tithe. ²⁷^(AS)And your contribution shall be counted to you as though it were the grain of the threshing floor, and as the fullness of the winepress. ²⁸So you shall also present a contribution to the Lord from all your tithes, which you receive from the people of Israel. And from it you shall give the Lord's contribution to Aaron the priest. ²⁹Out of all the gifts to you, you shall present every contribution due to the Lord; from each its best part is to be dedicated.’ ³⁰Therefore you shall say to them, ‘When you have offered from it the best of it, ^(AT)then the rest shall be counted to the Levites as produce of the threshing floor, and as produce of the winepress. ³¹And you may eat it in any place, you and your households, for it is ^(AU)your reward in return for your service in the tent of meeting. ³²And you shall ^(AV)bear no sin by reason of it, when you have contributed the best of it. But you shall not ^(AW)profane the holy things of the people of Israel, lest you die.’”