BERESHITH (GENESIS) 49

Gen 49:1 And Ya‛aqoḇ called his sons and said, “Gather together, so that I
declare to you what is to befall you in the last days:
Gen 49:2 “Gather together and hear, you sons of Ya‛aqoḇ, and listen to
Yisra’ĕl your father.
Gen 49:3 “Re’uḇĕn, you are my first-born, my power and the beginning of
my strength, the excellency of exaltation and the excellency of power.
Gen 49:4 “Boiling like water, you do not excel, because you went up to your
father’s bed, then you defiled it – he went up to my couch.
Gen 49:5 “Shim‛on and Lĕwi are brothers, their weapons are implements of
violence.
Gen 49:6 “Let my being not enter their council, let my esteem not be united
to their assembly; because they slew a man in their displeasure, and they
lamed an ox in pleasure.
Gen 49:7 “Cursed be their displeasure for it is fierce, and their wrath for it
is cruel! I divide them in Ya‛aqoḇ and scatter them in Yisra’ĕl.
Gen 49:8 “You, Yehuḏah, your brothers praise you; your hand is on the neck
of your enemies; your father’s children bow down before you.
Gen 49:9 “Yehuḏah is a lion’s cub; from the prey you have gone up, my son!
He bowed down, he crouched like a lion. And like a lion, who does rouse
him?
Gen 49:10 “The sceptre shall not turn aside from Yehuḏah, nor a Lawgiver
from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and to Him is the obedience of
peoples.
Gen 49:11 “Binding his donkey to the vine, and his donkey’s colt to the
choice vine, he washed his garments in wine, and his robes in the blood of
grapes.
Gen 49:12 “His eyes are darker than wine, and his teeth whiter than milk.
Gen 49:13 “Zeḇulun dwells at the seashore, he is for a haven for ships, and
his border is unto Tsiḏon.
Gen 49:14 “Yissasḵar is a strong donkey lying down between two burdens,
Gen 49:15 and he saw that a resting place was good, and that the land was
pleasant, and he inclined his shoulder to bear a burden, and became a subject
to slave labour.
Gen 49:16 “Dan rightly rules his people as one of the tribes of Yisra’ĕl.
Gen 49:17 “Dan is a serpent by the way, an adder by the path, that bites the
horse’s heels so that its rider falls backward.
Gen 49:18 “I have waited for your deliverance, O יהוה !
Gen 49:19 “Gaḏ, a raiding band raids him, but he raids its heel.
Gen 49:20 “Bread from Ashĕr is rich, and he gives delicacies of a
sovereign.
Gen 49:21 “Naphtali is a deer let loose, he gives words of elegance.
Gen 49:22 “Yosĕph is an offshoot of a fruit-bearing tree, an offshoot of a
fruit-bearing tree by a fountain, his branches run over a wall.
Gen 49:23 “And the archers have bitterly grieved him, shot at him and hated
him.
Gen 49:24 “But his bow remained in strength, and the arms of his hands
were made strong by the hands of the Mighty One of Ya‛aqoḇ – from there is
the Shepherd, the Stone of Yisra’ĕl –
Gen 49:25 from the Ĕl of your father who helps you, and by the Almighty
who blesses you with blessings of the heavens above, blessings of the deep
that lies beneath, blessings of the breasts and of the womb.
Gen 49:26 “The blessings of your father have excelled the blessings of my
ancestors, up to the limit of the everlasting hills. They are on the head of
Yosĕph, and on the crown of the head of him who was separated from his
brothers.
Gen 49:27 “Binyamin is a wolf that tears, in the morning he eats prey, and at
night he divides the spoil.”
Gen 49:28 All these are the twelve tribes of Yisra’ĕl, and this is what their
father spoke to them. And he blessed them, he blessed each one according to
his own blessing.
Gen 49:29 And he commanded 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 Ḥittite,
Gen 49:30 in the cave that is in the field of Maḵpĕlah, which is before
Mamrĕ in the land of Kena‛an, which Aḇraham bought with the field of
Ephron the Ḥittite as a possession for a burial site.
Gen 49:31 There they buried Aḇraham and Sarah his wife, there they buried
Yitsḥaq and Riḇqah his wife, and there I buried Lĕ’ah –
Gen 49:32 the field purchased, and the cave which is in it, from the sons of
Ḥĕth.”
Gen 49:33 And when Ya‛aqoḇ ended commanding his sons, he drew his feet
up into the bed and breathed his last, and was gathered to his people.