1And Jacob called unto his sons , and said , Gather yourselves together , that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days . 2Gather yourselves together , and hear , ye sons of Jacob ; and hearken unto Israel your father . 3Reuben , thou art my firstborn , my might , and the beginning of my strength , the excellency of dignity , and the excellency of power : 4Unstable 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 . 5Simeon and Levi are brethren ; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations . 6O 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 . 7Cursed 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 . 8Judah , 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. 9Judah 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 ? 10The 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 . 11Binding 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 : 12His eyes shall be red with wine , and his teeth white with milk . 13Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea ; and he shall be for an haven of ships ; and his border shall be unto Zidon . 14Issachar is a strong ass couching down between two burdens : 15And 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 . 16Dan shall judge his people , as one of the tribes of Israel . 17Dan shall be a serpent by the way , an adder in the path , that biteth the horse heels , so that his rider shall fall backward . 18I have waited for thy salvation , O LORD . 19Gad , a troop shall overcome him: but he shall overcome at the last . 20Out of Asher his bread shall be fat , and he shall yield royal dainties . 21Naphtali is a hind let loose : he giveth goodly words . 22Joseph is a fruitful bough , even a fruitful bough by a well ; whose branches run over the wall : 23The archers have sorely grieved him , and shot at him , and hated him : 24But 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 :) 25Even 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 : 26The 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 . 27Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf : in the morning he shall devour the prey , and at night he shall divide the spoil . 28All 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.
The Prophetic Nature of the Blessings
29And 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 , 30In 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 . 31There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife ; there they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife ; and there I buried Leah . 32The purchase of the field and of the cave that is therein was from the children of Heth . 33And 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 .