- And Jacob called his sons, and said to
them,
- Assemble yourselves, that I may tell
you what shall happen to you in the last
days. Gather yourselves together, and hear
me, sons of Jacob; hear Israel, hear your
father.
- Ruben, thou [a] art my first-born,
thou my strength, and the first of my children,
hard to be endured, hard and self-willed.
- Thou wast insolent like water,
burst not forth with violence, for thou
wentest up to the bed of thy father; then
thou defiledst the couch, whereupon thou
wentest up.
- Symeon and Levi, brethren,
accomplished the injustice of their cutting
off.
- Let not my soul come into their counsel,
and let not mine inward parts contend
in their conspiracy, for in their wrath they
slew men, and in their passion they houghed
a bull.
- Cursed be their wrath, for it was
willful, and their anger, for it was [b] cruel: I
will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them
in Israel.
- Juda, thy brethren have praised
thee, and thy hands shall be on the back of
thine enemies; thy father's sons shall do
thee reverence.
- [c] Juda is a lion's whelp:
from the tender plant, my son, thou art
gone up, having couched thou liest as a lion,
and as a whelp; who shall stir him up?
- A
ruler shall not fail from Juda, nor a prince
from his [d] loins, until there come the things
stored up for him; and he is the expectation
of nations.
- Binding his foal to the
vine, and the foal of his ass to the branch
of it, he shall wash his robe in wine, and his
garment in the blood of the grape.
- His
eyes shall be more cheering than wine, and
his teeth whiter than milk.
- Zabulon shall
dwell on the coast, and he shall be by a
haven of ships, and shall extend to Sidon.
- Issachar has desired that which is good;
resting between the inheritances.
- And
having seen the resting place that it was
good, and the land that it was fertile, he
subjected his shoulder to labour, and became
a husbandman.
- Dan shall judge his people,
as one tribe too in Israel.
- And let Dan
be a serpent in the way, besetting the
path, biting the heel of the horse (and the
rider shall fall backward),
- waiting for the
salvation of the Lord.
- Gad, a plundering
troop shall plunder him; but he shall
plunder him, pursuing him closely.
- Aser,
his bread shall be fat; and he shall yield
dainties to princes.
- Nephthalim is a
spreading stem, bestowing beauty on its
fruit.
- Joseph is a son increased; my
dearly loved son is increased; my youngest
son, turn to me.
- Against whom men
taking evil counsel reproached him, and the
archers pressed hard upon him.
- But their
bow and arrows were mightily consumed,
and the sinews of their arms were slackened
by the hand of the mighty one of Jacob;
thence is he that strengthened Israel from
the God of thy father;
- and my God helped
thee, and he blessed thee with the blessing
of heaven from above, and the blessing of
the earth possessing all things, because of
the blessing of the breasts and of the womb,
- the blessings of thy father and thy mother
-- it has prevailed above the blessing of the
lasting mountains, and beyond the blessings
of the everlasting hills; they shall be upon
the head of Joseph, and upon the head of
the brothers of whom he took the lead.
- Benjamin, as a ravening wolf, shall eat
still in the morning, and at evening he gives
food.
- All these are the twelve sons of
Jacob; and their father spoke these words
to them, and he blessed them; he blessed
each of them according to his blessing.
- And he said to them, I am added to my
people; ye shall bury me with my fathers
in the cave, which is in the field of Ephron
the Chettite,
- in the double cave which is
opposite Mambre, in the land of Chanaan,
the cave which Abraam bought of Ephron
the Chettite, for a possession of a sepulchre.
- There they buried Abraam and Sarrha
his wife; there they buried Isaac, and Rebecca
his wife; there they buried Lea;
- in the portion of the field, and of the cave
that was in it, purchased of the sons of
Chet.
- And Jacob ceased giving charges
to his sons; and having lifted up his feet on
the bed, he died, and was gathered to his
people.
[a] Or, thou my first-born, etc.,
nom. and voc. not being always regularly distinguished
in the LXX. See Heb. 1.8. o( Qeo\j.
[b] more lit. hardened or aggravated.
[c] The terminations of proper names are
occasionally varied.
[d] Gr. thighs.
[English translation of the Septuagint by Sir Lancelot Charles Lee
Brenton (1807-1862) originally published by Samuel Bagster & Sons,
Ltd., London, 1851]