Genesis 49:4

49:4 You are destructive ¹  like water and will not excel, ² 

for you got on your father’s bed, ³ 

then you defiled it – he got on my couch! ⁴ 

Genesis 49:1

The Blessing of Jacob

49:1 Jacob called for his sons and said, “Gather together so I can tell you ⁵  what will happen to you in the future. ⁶ 

Genesis 15:5

15:5 The Lord ⁷  took him outside and said, “Gaze into the sky and count the stars – if you are able to count them!” Then he said to him, “So will your descendants be.”

Nehemiah 13:26

13:26 Was it not because of things like these that King Solomon of Israel sinned? Among the many nations there was no king like him. He was loved by his God, and God made ⁸  him king over all Israel. But the foreign wives made even him sin!

Psalms 51:1

Psalm 51 ⁹ 

For the music director; a psalm of David, written when Nathan the prophet confronted him after David’s affair with Bathsheba. ¹⁰ 

51:1 Have mercy on me, O God, because of ¹¹  your loyal love!

Because of ¹²  your great compassion, wipe away my rebellious acts! ¹³ 

Matthew 1:6

1:6 and Jesse the father of David the king.

David was the father of Solomon (by the wife of Uriah ¹⁴ ),

[49:4]  ¹ tn The Hebrew noun פַּחַז (pakhaz) only occurs here in the OT. A related verb occurs twice in the prophets (Jer 23:32; Zeph 3:4) for false prophets inventing their messages, and once in Judges for unscrupulous men bribed to murder (Judg 9:4). It would describe Reuben as being “frothy, boiling, turbulent” as water. The LXX has “run riot,” the Vulgate has “poured out,” and Tg. Onq. has “you followed your own direction.” It is a reference to Reuben’s misconduct in Gen 35, but the simile and the rare word invite some speculation. H. Pehlke suggests “destructive like water,” for Reuben acted with pride and presumption; see his “An Exegetical and Theological Study of Genesis 49:1-28” (Th.D. dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1985).

[49:4]  ² tn Heb “Do not excel!” The Hiphil of the verb יָתַר (yatar) has this meaning only here. The negated jussive is rhetorical here. Rather than being a command, it anticipates what will transpire. The prophecy says that because of the character of the ancestor, the tribe of Reuben would not have the character to lead (see 1 Chr 5:1).

[49:4]  ³ sn This is a euphemism for having sexual intercourse with Jacob’s wives (see Gen 35:22).

[49:4]  ⁴ tn The last verb is third masculine singular, as if for the first time Jacob told the brothers, or let them know that he knew. For a discussion of this passage see S. Gevirtz, “The Reprimand of Reuben,” JNES 30 (1971): 87-98.

[49:1]  ⁵ tn After the imperative, the cohortative with prefixed vav (ו) indicates purpose/result.

[49:1]  ⁶ tn The expression “in the future” (אַחֲרִית הַיָּמִים, ’akharit hayyamim, “in the end of days”) is found most frequently in prophetic passages; it may refer to the end of the age, the eschaton, or to the distant future. The contents of some of the sayings in this chapter stretch from the immediate circumstances to the time of the settlement in the land to the coming of Messiah. There is a great deal of literature on this chapter, including among others C. Armerding, “The Last Words of Jacob: Genesis 49,” BSac 112 (1955): 320-28; H. Pehlke, “An Exegetical and Theological Study of Genesis 49:1-28” (Th.D. dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1985); and B. Vawter, “The Canaanite Background of Genesis 49,” CBQ 17 (1955): 1-18.

[15:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:26]  ⁸ tn Heb “gave.”

[51:1]  ⁹ sn Psalm 51. The psalmist confesses his sinfulness to God and begs for forgiveness and a transformation of his inner character. According to the psalm superscription, David offered this prayer when Nathan confronted him with his sin following the king’s affair with Bathsheba (see 2 Sam 11-12). However, the final two verses of the psalm hardly fit this situation, for they assume the walls of Jerusalem have been destroyed and that the sacrificial system has been temporarily suspended. These verses are probably an addition to the psalm made during the period of exile following the fall of Jerusalem in 586 b.c. The exiles could relate to David’s experience, for they, like him, and had been forced to confront their sin. They appropriated David’s ancient prayer and applied it to their own circumstances.

[51:1]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “a psalm by David, when Nathan the prophet came to him when he had gone to Bathsheba.”

[51:1]  ¹¹ tn Or “according to.”

[51:1]  ¹² tn Or “according to.”

[51:1]  ¹³ tn Traditionally “blot out my transgressions.” Because of the reference to washing and cleansing in the following verse, it is likely that the psalmist is comparing forgiveness to wiping an object clean (note the use of the verb מָחָה (makhah) in the sense of “wipe clean; dry” in 2 Kgs 21:13; Prov 30:20; Isa 25:8). Another option is that the psalmist is comparing forgiveness to erasing or blotting out names from a register (see Exod 32:32-33). In this case one might translate, “erase all record of my rebellious acts.”

[1:6]  ¹⁴ sn By the wife of Uriah, i.e., Bathsheba (cf. 2 Sam 11:3).