--- title: "Genesis 49 - Study King James Bible with clarkes commentary" description: "Read Genesis 49 with clarkes commentary commentary. 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 yoursel" image: "/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg" url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49" --- [ Read](/kjv/genesis/49)[ Commentary](/study/genesis/49)[ Interlinear](/interlinear/genesis/49) Audio 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 honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their selfwill 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 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: 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. [Genesis 48](/study/genesis/48) [Genesis 50](/study/genesis/50) ## Commentary To verse 1 Verse [Genesis 49:1](/kjv/genesis/49/1). ***That which shall befall you in the last days.*** — It is evident from this, and indeed from the whole complexion of these important prophecies, that the twelve sons of Jacob had very little concern in them, *personally* considered, as they were to be fulfilled in the last days, i. e., in times remote from that period, and consequently to their *posterity*, and not to *themselves*, or to their *immediate families*. The whole of these prophetic declarations, from [Genesis 49:2-27](/kjv/genesis/49/2-27) inclusive, is delivered in strongly *figurative* language, and in the poetic form, which, in every translation, should be preserved as nearly as possible, rendering the version line for line with the original. This order I shall pursue in the succeeding notes, always proposing the verse first, in as literal a translation as possible, line for line with the Hebrew after the *hemistich* form, from which the sense will more readily appear; but to the Hebrew text and the common version the reader is ultimately referred. 2. Come together and hear, O sons of Jacob! And hearken unto Israel your father. Bishop Newton has justly observed that Jacob had received a double blessing, *spiritual* and *temporal*; the promise of being *progenitor of the Messiah*, and the promise of the *land of* *Canaan*. The promised land he might *divide* among his children as he pleased, but the other must be confined to one of his sons; he therefore assigns to each son a portion in the land of Canaan, but limits the descent of the blessed seed to the tribe of *Judah*. Some have put themselves to a great deal of trouble and learned labour to show that it was a general opinion of the ancients that the soul, a short time previous to its departure from the body, becomes endued with a certain measure of the *prophetic gift* or *foresight*; and that this was probably the case with Jacob. But it would be derogatory to the dignity of the prophecies delivered in this chapter, to suppose that they came by any other means than *direct inspiration*, as to their main matter, though certain circumstances appear to be left to the patriarch himself, in which he might express his own feelings both as a *father* and as a judge. This is strikingly evident, 1. In the case of *Reuben*, from whom he had received the grossest insult, however the passage relative to him may be understood; and, 2. In the case of *Joseph*, the tenderly *beloved son* of his most *beloved wife Rachel*, in the prophecy concerning whom he gives full vent to all those tender and affectionate emotions which, as a *father* and a *husband*, do him endless credit. ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#website","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com","name":"Real Bible Believers","description":"RBB","publisher":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/search?q={search_term_string}","query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49#primaryimage","inLanguage":"en-US","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg","contentUrl":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg","width":672,"height":448,"caption":"Real Bible Believers"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49#webpage","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49","name":"Genesis 49 - Study King James Bible with clarkes commentary","isPartOf":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49#primaryimage"},"author":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509"},"description":"Read Genesis 49 with clarkes commentary commentary. 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 yoursel","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/","name":"Home"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study","name":"Study Bible"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary","name":"clarkes commentary"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":4,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis","name":"Genesis"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":5,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/genesis/49","name":"49"}}]},{"@type":["Person","Organization"],"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#personlogo","inLanguage":"en-US","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/android-chrome-512x512.png","contentUrl":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/android-chrome-512x512.png","width":512,"height":512},"logo":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#personlogo"},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/RBiblebeliever","https://www.facebook.com/RBibleBelievers"]}]} ```