Genesis 49:2

In youth those eyes were too keen for "his own things." Then they were opened to see clearly the future of his sons up to, and at, the end of days. Truly no prophecy comes from its own interpretation. No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man. Men spoke from God, carried along by the Holy Spirit, Who does not stop short of His glorious purpose for Christ in the latter day.

They were the sons of JACOB. They took their character from their poor father, the supplanter, whose up-and-down history is so well known. Even so, Jacob speaks with the conscious dignity God had given him: "Listen to ISRAEL your father." Jacob's own history foreshadows that of his descendants. At the beginning it was marked by deceit and sorrow; at the end it was graced by dignity and honour.

He speaks as "Israel their father" — that is, as a man of God in the true form of a prophet.

The last words of Jacob to his sons are often called "the blessings." What he said is rather a prophecy. He said the most about Judah, because from Judah was to come Shiloh, that is, the Messiah. Jacob's prophecy covers in a remarkable way the entire history of Israel — past, present and future.

In Genesis 49, we find Jacob still presented to us as a man of faith. He called his sons together to pronounce a blessing on them. He was conscious that in doing so he was speaking as a prophet, foretelling what would happen to them in the last days. We are therefore on safe ground when we take his words to refer to "the last days," and not just to the nearer future of the tribes.

Now at the age of 147 he called for all his sons to tell them their future. That future would reach much further than any of them would live to see, but it applies to each tribe, going on to "the last days" (v. 1). For each tribe borrows its character from the character of its head.

Now, under the Spirit and as the oracle of God, he had to retrace in their presence the ways of his sons in past days. He had to trace the fruit of those ways in days still to come. He had to do much of this with a wounded heart, and with memories that might well be deeply humbling. For these words about his sons were a kind of judgment on himself for his past carelessness about his children.

On the whole, I think we have a complete history of Israel in this way. First his failure: Reuben, Simeon, and Levi — corruption and violence, as already noted. Then Judah, God's purpose in His people, in connection with the royal line and Shiloh. This is plain enough. To Him the gathering of the peoples was to be.

Now the Spirit of God has come to guide us into "all truth" (John 16:13), and He has revealed the mysteries of Jacob's remarkable prophecy. We are now able to read there the history of the nation — what has already been fulfilled, and what still waits to be fulfilled. Above all we read of the true Shiloh who, as God's anointed, will gather Israel around Him in His kingdom.