| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | Berean Study Bible |
| 1[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 1Then Jacob called for his sons and said, “Gather around so that I can tell you what will happen to you in the days to come: |
| 2[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 2Come together and listen, O sons of Jacob; listen to your father Israel. |
| 3[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 3Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, excelling in honor, excelling in power. |
| 4[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 4Uncontrolled as the waters, you will no longer excel, because you went up to your father’s bed, onto my couch, and defiled it. |
| 5[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 5Simeon and Levi are brothers; their swords are weapons of violence. |
| 6[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 6May I never enter their council; may I never join their assembly. For they kill men in their anger, and hamstring oxen on a whim. |
| 7[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 7Cursed be their anger, for it is strong, and their wrath, for it is cruel! I will disperse them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel. |
| 8[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 8Judah, your brothers shall praise you. Your hand shall be on the necks of your enemies; your father’s sons shall bow down to you. |
| 9[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 9Judah is a young lion—my son, you return from the prey. Like a lion he crouches and lies down; like a lioness, who dares to rouse him? |
| 10[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 10The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes and the allegiance of the nations is his. |
| 11[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 11He ties his donkey to the vine, his colt to the choicest branch. He washes his garments in wine, his robes in the blood of grapes. |
| 12[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 12His eyes are darker than wine, and his teeth are whiter than milk. |
| 13[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 13Zebulun shall dwell by the seashore and become a harbor for ships; his border shall extend to Sidon. |
| 14[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 14Issachar is a strong donkey, lying down between the sheepfolds. |
| 15[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 15He saw that his resting place was good and that his land was pleasant, so he bent his shoulder to the burden and submitted to labor as a servant. |
| 16[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 16Dan shall provide justice for his people as one of the tribes of Israel. |
| 17[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 17He will be a snake by the road, a viper in the path that bites the horse’s heels so that its rider tumbles backward. |
| 18[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 18I await Your salvation, O LORD. |
| 19[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 19Gad will be attacked by raiders, but he will attack their heels. |
| 20[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 20Asher’s food will be rich; he shall provide royal delicacies. |
| 21[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 21Naphtali is a doe set free that bears beautiful fawns. |
| 22[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 22Joseph is a fruitful vine—a fruitful vine by a spring, whose branches scale the wall. |
| 23[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 23The archers attacked him with bitterness; they aimed at him in hostility. |
| 24[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 24Yet he steadied his bow, and his strong arms were tempered by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, in the name of the Shepherd, the Rock of Israel, |
| 25[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 25by the God of your father who helps you, and by the Almighty who blesses you, with blessings of the heavens above, with blessings of the depths below, with blessings of the breasts and womb. |
| 26[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 26The blessings of your father have surpassed the blessings of the ancient mountains and the bounty of the everlasting hills. May they rest on the head of Joseph, on the brow of the prince of his brothers. |
| 27[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 27Benjamin is a ravenous wolf; in the morning he devours the prey, in the evening he divides the plunder.” |
| 28[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 28These are the tribes of Israel, twelve in all, and this was what their father said to them. He blessed them, and he blessed each one with a suitable blessing. |
| 29[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 29Then Jacob instructed them, “I am about to be gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave in the field of Ephron the Hittite. |
| 30[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 30The cave is in the field of Machpelah near Mamre, in the land of Canaan. This is the field Abraham purchased from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site. |
| 31[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 31There Abraham and his wife Sarah are buried, there Isaac and his wife Rebekah are buried, and there I buried Leah. |
| 32[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 32The field and the cave that is in it were purchased from the Hittites.” |
| 33[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 33When Jacob had finished instructing his sons, he pulled his feet into the bed and breathed his last, and he was gathered to his people. |
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