What should we learn from the tribe of Reuben?

One thing more was laid up in the ark: "Aaron's rod that budded," which recalls a solemn epoch in the history of the people. In Numbers 16:1, etc., we read of Dathan and Abiram, of the tribe of Reuben, and Korah, of the tribe of Levi, who rebelled against divinely appointed authority — in Moses as leader and in Aaron as priest. The rebellion was formidable; two hundred and fifty princes of the people being connected with it. Dathan and Abiram belonged to the tribe of Reuben, which would naturally have had the leadership, being the first-born. But here, as so constantly in Scripture, the natural, the first-born, must give place to the spiritual — the new-born. Though to Reuben, the first-born, belonged "the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power," of him it is said, "Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel" (Gen. 49:3-4). The first Adam is an example of this, quickly followed by Cain, Esau and others — all pointing to this, that the fallen, unstable first man must give place to the Second Man, the only One who could stand before God, and who stands for the feeblest of those who put their trust in Him.

It was upon the firstborn that the judgment in Egypt had descended, but they were spared in Israel. The firstborn are types of human excellency, the sons who had natural claim to birth-right, the place of honor and rule. "He smote the firstborn of Egypt, the chief of all their strength," says the psalmist. "Reuben," says the dying patriarch, "thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity and the excellency of power," though he had to add, "Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel." Hence the firstborns in the book of Genesis lose the place of blessing. Cain, what is he? Ishmael gives place to Isaac; Esau to Jacob; Reuben to Joseph. "That which is first is natural, and afterwards that which is spiritual."

Reuben was the firstborn and in him more especially the might, the strength, the dignity and the power of Jacob should be seen. The very beginning of Jacob's strength and excellency were to be expressed in him. And what was expressed? Nothing but instability and self-gratification, which was defiling and an outrage on all natural decency. What a disappointment for Jacob to see this evil manifested as the beginning of his strength!

Here surely we have predicted that which marked Israel the nation all through their sad history, and particularly when they were tested under the law. Whether in the wilderness or in the land; whether under Moses or Joshua or the Judges or the Kings; their story is one long record of unstable fluctuations between the worship of Jehovah and of idols. They were defiled by their adulterous connection with false gods. And in contemplating this we must remember that they were the sample nation, selected that the test of man might be carried out in them. In their condemnation all the nations stand condemned; ourselves included as men in the flesh.

Of Leah's, the first-born is Reuben; but just as the might of nature which is fallen, he is necessarily deposed from his primacy: we have seen Joseph getting what Reuben loses here; the two are opposites. Reuben represents, not the flesh, — for God does not bless the flesh; but the dignity of nature, — of man as natural, now indeed fallen, but not necessarily fallen. And man's nobility lies essentially in that intelligent will, which alone is "will," and without which he would be the mere machine worked by other hands, or the boat adrift without oar or rudder. Reuben — "see a son" — is thus man in that which makes him the "offspring of God," His image, — not merely a cause, but a causer. Sin has come in, alas! and his will has become self-will — an independent energy with "vanity" stamped on it; a "bubbling over," as the word "unstable," said here of Reuben, really means, which scruples not to shame and defile the man himself, the source of it. Thus the will in man has lost its dignity, and become his degradation; and that which is his glory as man lowers him beneath the beast. For indeed his pre-eminence is necessarily connected with this power for self-debasement, which the beast has not.

*The word "unstable" means the boiling and swilling of water; the ebullition of the passion and force of nature which cannot be depended upon in the things of God. It ends here in positive evil.

That history of Reuben, as of the other tribes, we shall find in a prophetic summary in Jacob's dying words, where divine wisdom has given the moral of it, the character of Reuben as therein shown, and the lessons we are to derive from it. We may turn then with confidence to the words of this grand prophecy, with which we are already familiar, to gather aid in the understanding of what is now before us.

Reuben stands first then here as in Genesis, and Reuben's prince is Elizur the son of Shedeur. The first of these names is unquestionable in its meaning, as it is beautiful, — "God is a Rock." And this seems at once plain when connected with the character which Jacob gives to his first-born, "unstable, — boiling over — as water, thou shalt not excel." How grandly in opposition to the instability of Reuben is the rock-like stability of God! And it is the learning of this, and how to build upon it, that imparts stability to the unstable. In ourselves there is never strength, and the way of strength for us is to know this: "when I am weak, then am I strong." An Abraham with whom the body is now dead, needs — and finds because he needs — the Almighty God.

Jacob when dying said of Reuben "Thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power." This is what he was as the firstborn, for in himself he was 'unstable as water ' and he should not excel. Gen. 49:3-4. He forfeited his birth-right for defiling his father's bed, and it was given to Joseph, who in Ephraim and Manasseh had a double portion among the tribes. 1 Chr. 5:1. The law declared that if a man's first-born son was by a wife he hated, he must not put the son of another wife in his place: the first-born must have a double portion of all that the man possessed "for he is the beginning of his strength: the right of the first-born is his." Deut. 21:16-17. Esau is called a profane person for selling his birth-right: it was a privilege God had given him, and which he should have valued as such. Gen. 25:31-34; Heb. 12:16.

This order agrees with the rules of the birthright as they were set down by Moses later on (Deuteronomy 21:15-17). For the son of the loved wife could not be favoured at the expense of the first-born, who was the son of the unloved. The fact that Reuben did forfeit his birthright was entirely his own fault. He had gone up to his father's bed and committed adultery with Bilhah, his father's concubine and therefore he was deprived of his privileges (Genesis 35:22; Genesis 49:3-4; 1 Chronicles 5:1-2). The position linked with the birthright went to Judah, the fourth son of Leah (Simeon and Levi were passed over because of their violence against the inhabitants of Schechem: Genesis 34). The wealth linked with it, however — the first-born was entitled to a double portion of the inheritance — went to Joseph, the first son of Rachel, the loved one. Or rather it went to Ephraim and Manasseh, Joseph's sons, whom Jacob had blessed previously and more or less adopted as his own sons (Genesis 48). Thus Ephraim and Manasseh obtained a place of their own among the tribes of Israel (Deuteronomy 33:17). So we see that both Judah and Joseph are given a prominent place in the blessings of Jacob, Judah receiving the position of a ruler, and Joseph the wealth laid up for the first-born.

1891 230 "Now the sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel." (1 Chron. 5) As such he had a prominent place. For the firstborn, or he who stands in that place, takes precedence of the whole family, and through him the principal ancestral line is ordinarily traced. But Reuben is set aside, and the natural prominence of the birthright only sank him the lower when he lost it. When did the natural order ever maintain itself according to the righteous government of God? For so it is that the order of nature is not God's order, and nothing can meet the aberrance of nature but the sovereign mercy of God. And so it ever was since man fell. This mercy is seen in God's governmental ways; how much more in His ways of grace where as a fundamental principle, it is first "that which is natural, and afterwards that which is spiritual"! God gave the birthright to Joseph. Yet even here, showing the sovereignty of grace, the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright. Whose genealogy? Who so glorious, so exalted, as to set aside the honoured line of him that had the birthright from God, and to choose another? Thus seemingly contempt is poured upon the things that men value, but, really, carrying out His own purpose.

It is the genealogy of the Chief Ruler. In the wisdom of God the birthright and the chief rule are for a brief space separated. And necessarily so for the purposes of redemption. The birthright was Christ's when He came into the world, it belongs to Him personally. But if He had assumed the chief rule then, which then could only have been in judgment — if the Lord Jesus had taken the supremacy then, which is His officially, where would be the cross? where the glory of God, the highest glory, the glory of His grace? where redemption? He came at the first to be cut off and have nothing, and withal to be hated and rejected by His own, and not to take the kingdom; for when the people would have taken and carnally have made Him king, He departed from them. There was a prior, if not a deeper, question ere He could appear as Chief Ruler according to the counsels of God. It required a distinct type, such as Joseph is, to set forth the truth that the Chief Ruler, Whose was the birthright, should appear as One Whose birthright was denied. To three chosen witnesses He gave a glimpse of His own personal glory as the Only Begotten; and they have borne testimony, "and we beheld His glory, glory as of an Only-Begotten with Father" (John 1:14). But He the First Born, possessing every right in heaven and on earth, veiled His glory, for the fulfilling of the counsels of grace, and was cast out, rejected by His own people, as Joseph by his brethren.

Here we find the genealogy of the two and a half tribes which had chosen their portion beyond Jordan: Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh. But these tribes are not joined together on account of this circumstance alone; Reuben's place in the genealogy, as we have already seen, is determined by his sin. The birthright was his by right of birth, but it was taken from him (v. 1) and given to Joseph and his sons. As in all the rest of Scripture, Joseph is here a type of the Messiah rejected by his brethren, and subsequently receiving dominion over the nations. But our passage (vv. 1-2) explains why he does not come first here. His place is given to Judah, the stock of the kingship according to God's counsels: “Of him was the prince.” Once again we see here how Chronicles is consistent with its purpose to show the divine counsels as to the kingship. Yet, just as throughout in these chapters, the ways of the flesh are mentioned first (vv. 3-6), and they continue until the ten tribes are taken captive by Tilgath-Pilneser (cf. 2 Kings 15:29). It is true that Reuben's energy to enlarge his borders is emphasized (v. 10); but it is no longer the virtue we have seen in Caleb, springing from faith alone. The display of Reuben's activity has a purely human and earthly motive: “Their cattle were multiplied in the land of Gilead” (v. 9).