Genesis 49

1. And Jacob called to his sons and said, “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the last days.

2. Gather yourselves together and hear, sons of Jacob, and hearken to Israel your father.

3. Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity and the excellency of power.

4. Unstable Reckless or overboiling as water, you shall not excel because you went up to your father’s bed; then you defiled it. He went up to my couch.

5. Simeon and Levi are brothers; tools of violence are their weapons.

6. Oh my soul, do not come into their council. Let not my honor be united with their assembly, for in their anger they killed a man, and in their self-will they hamstrung oxen.

7. Let their anger be cursed, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel. I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.

8. Judah, may your brothers praise you. May your hand be on the neck of your enemies. May your father’s sons bow before you.

9. Judah is a lion’s whelp. My son, you have gone up from the prey. He stooped, he crouched like a lion; and like a lioness, who shall rouse him?

10. The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come. And to Him shall be the obedience of the people.

11. Binding His foal to the vine, and His donkey’s colt to the choice vine, He washed His garments in wine, and His clothes in the blood of grapes.

12. His eyes are more sparkling than wine, and His teeth are whiter than milk.

13. Zebulun shall live at the seashore. And he shall be a haven for ships, and his border beside Sidon.

14. Issachar is a strong donkey crouching down between the sheepfolds.

15. And he saw that rest was good and that the land was pleasant. And he bowed his shoulder to bear a burden, and became a tribute-servant.

16. Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel.

17. Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that bites the horse’s heels, so that its rider shall fall backward.

18. I have waited for Your salvation, O LORD.

19. Gad, raiders shall attack him, but he shall overcome at the last.

20. Out of Asher his bread shall be rich, and he shall yield royal dainties.

21. Naphtali is a deer let loose. He gives goodly words.

22. Joseph is a fruitful bough, a fruitful bough by a well, whose branches run over the wall.

23. The archers have fiercely attacked him and have shot at him, and hated him.

24. But his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob—from there is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel—

25. By the God of your father, Who shall help you. And may the Almighty bless you with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lies beneath, blessings of the breasts and of the womb.

26. The blessings of your father are greater than the blessings of my ancestors, to the utmost bound of the everlasting hills. They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him, the ruler, the leader who was separated from his brothers.

27. Benjamin is a wolf that tears in pieces. In the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.”

28. All these were the twelve tribes of Israel. And this is what their father spoke to them, and blessed them; everyone according to his blessing, he blessed them.

29. And he charged them and said to them, “I am to be gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite,

30. In the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, the field which Abraham bought from Ephron the Hittite for a burial site.

31. They buried Abraham and his wife Sarah there, and they buried Isaac and his wife Rebekah. And I buried Leah there—

32. The field was purchased, and the cave in it, from the sons of Heth.”

33. When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew his feet up into the bed. And he expired, and was gathered to his people.