The Pulpit Commentary — Genesis — Section 576

oruel :-the secoml synonym" wrnth," liter- bow down before thee. Fulfill€,l in the ele- ally, outpowrings, indicates the fnlncss and vation of the house of Judah to the throne, intensity of the tide of fury which by Simeon which owned as its subjecLs not simply and Levi was let loose upon the unsuspecting Judah's mother's chihlren, i. e. the tribes Shechemites-1 will divide them in Jacob, descended from Leah, but alsd hia father's, and scatter them in Israel. While for tho i. e. all the tribes of Israel. Judah is a sin (the deed, not the doers) Jacob has a curse, lion's whelp: from the prey, my son, thou for the sinners themselves he has o. well- art gone up : he stooped down, he couched merited chastisement. They had been con- down as a lion, and as an old lion; who federate in their wickedness, they should in sha.11 rouse him up 1 By a bold and striking future, when returning to occupy their Goel- figure Judah is compared to a young lion, assigned inheritance, be di~joincd. That ripening into its full strength and ferocity, this prediction was exactly fulfilled Scripture roaming through the forests in search of prey, testifies. .At the second census in the wilder- repairing to his mountain den (io: {3>..aarou ness, shortly before the conquest, the tribe civi/311!:, LXX.) when his booty has hccn of Simeon had become so reduced in its devoured, and there in quiet majesty, full of numbers (reckoning only 22,000 as against dignified repose, lying down or crouching in 76,500 in Judah) as to be the smallest of the his lair, and calmly resisting all attempts to twelvo (Numb. xxvi. 14); to be passed over disturb his leonine serenity. The effect of entirely in the last blessing of Moses (Deut. the picture is also heightened by the alterna- xxxiii.); to be accorded no independent allot- tive image of a. lioness, which is particularly ment of territory in Canaan on the completion fierce in defending its cubs, and which no of the conquest, having only a few cities one would ,entnre to assail when so em- granted to it within the borders of Judah ployed. The use of such figures to describe (Josh. xi:x. 1-9); and to be ultimatel;v ab, a strong and invincible hero is by no means sorbed in the more powerful and distingmshed infrequent in Scripture (vide Ps. vii. 3 ; lv:ii. tribe under whose protection and tutelage, 5; Isa. v. 29 ; Ezek. xi.x. 2-9). The eceptre so to speak, it had been placed (1 Chron. iv. shall not depart from Juda.h,-literally, er. 27). The tribe of Levi also was deprived of sceptre (i. e. au emblem of regal command, a separate inheritance, receiving only o. hence dominion or sovereignty; apxwv, number of cities scattered here and there LXX., Theodotion; ili.ovaia, Symmachus) among the possessions of their brethren shall not depart froin J,ulah-nor a law- (Josh. xxi. 1, 40) ; and, though by its giver from between his feet-literally, and election to tho priesthood the curse may be a legislator (sc. shall not depart) from be- said to have been turned into a blessing, yot tween his feet; Pi?.h?, the poel part. of i'i'.?.l'J, of this signal honour which was waiting Levi Jacob was completely silent, showing to cut, to cut into, hence to decree, to ordain, both that no prophecy was of any privato hnving the sense of one who decrees ; hence intorpretation (the seer seeing no further than leader, as in Judges v. 44, dux (Vulgnte), tho Holy Spirit helped him), and that Jacob ;,yoiJµwoc (LXX.), or lawgiver, as in Dent. spoko beforo the days of l\Ioses. It is nlmost xxxiii. 21 11.nd Isa. =xiii. 22 (Calvin, incredible that 11 late writer would have Dathius, Ainsworth, Rosenmiiller, Murphy, omitted to forecnst the lntter-day glory of Wordsworth, 'Speaker's Commentary'). In the tribe of Levi ; and this opinion is con- view, however, of what l\ppen.rs the require- firmed by observing the very different strain ment of tho parallelism, Pi?.h9 is regarded in which, nfter Levi's calling hnd been re- as not tho person, but the thing, that doter• vealed, the benediction of Moses himself mines or rules, a.nd hence as equivalent to proceeds (Dent. :xxxiii. 8-11). the mler's staff, or marshal's baton (Gesenius, Vers. 8-12.-Judah, thou art he whom Fiirst, Kril, Lange, Bleck, Tuch, Krilisch, thy brethren shall pra.iae-litcrnlly, Judah and others), in support of which is claimed tlwu, will paise thee thy brethren, the word the phrase "from between his feet," which ':J·l11' being a. palpable plo.y on i11~i1! (cf. is supJ?OBed to point to the Oriental custom, eh. xxix. 36). Leo.h praised Jehovah f~r his as depicted on the monuments, of monarchs, birth, and his brethren should extol him for when sitting upon their thrones, resting their his nobility of character, which even in his staves between their feet (cf. A~mcmnon, nets of sin couH not be entirely obscured 'Iliad,' ii. 46,101; La.yard's 'Nineveh and (eh. xxxvii. 26; xxxviii. 26), o.nd certainly Babylon,' p. 195). But the words may like- in his later days (eh. xliii. 8; xliv. 18-34) wise signify " from among his descend11.n ts," shone out with undiminished lustre. Thy "from nmong his children's children" hand shnll be in the neck of thine enemiea (Onkelos), ,., .-wv 1•~pwv n/rrou (LXX.). (i. e. putting his foes to /light, Judah should Until Shiloh come. 'l'his dillicult clause has grasp them by the neck, a prediction remark- been very variously rnmlcrc,1. l. Taking ably accomplished in the victories of David Shiloh ns the name (>fa place, Yil., Shiloh i11 and Solomon) ; thy father's children shall E\)hrnim (Josh. xviii. 1, 8, (>, 10; xix. 51; 52G THE BOOK OF GENESIS. [CH. :X.LIX. 1-33.