Genesis 48:1-2
‘It came to pass after these things, that someone told Joseph: “Behold your father is sick!”…. He took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. And someone told Jacob and said: “Behold, your son Joseph is coming to you!” And Israel (or Jacob) strengthened himself, and sat upon the bed.” Genesis 48:1-2.
Calvin commented: “Moses now passes to the last acts of Jacob’s life…. In being made the father of the fathers of the Church, he fulfilled — in the immediate prospect of death — the prophetic office respecting the future state of the Church which had been enjoined upon him…. With this holy man…, God had establish His Covenant…, so that the succession of grace would flow down….
“Joseph, being informed of his father’s sickness, immediately went to see him…. Jacob, having heard of his arrival, attempted to raise his feeble and trembling body…to do him honour….
“The reasons why Joseph was so desirous of seeing his father and so prompt to discharge all the other duties of filial piety, was that he regarded it as a greater privilege to be a son of Jacob than to preside over a hundred kingdoms…. In bringing his sons with him, he acted as if he would emancipate them from the country (Egypt) in which they had been born — and restore them to their own stock….
“His father, however, rising before him — pays him becoming honour for the kindness received at his hand…. By so doing, he fulfils his part in the prediction….
(Said Jacob;) “‘As for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died…in the land of Canaan…. I buried her there, on the way to Ephrath (Bethlehem)!…. He mentions the death and burial of his wife Rachel, in order that the name of his mother might prove a stimulus to the mind of Joseph….
“‘And he blessed Joseph, and said…: “God Who fed me all my life long unto this day, the Angel Who redeemed me from all evil — bless the lads (Efraim and Manasseh)!’…. Jacob knew that a dispensation of the grace of God was committed to him, in order that he might effectually bless his grandchildren…. They were not only called witness of celestial grace, but were also entrusted with the dispensation of spiritual gifts….
“‘God…fed me all my life…; the Angel redeemed me!’…. He (Jacob) so joins ‘the Angel’ to God, as to make Him His equal. Truly, he offers Him divine worship, and asks the same things from Him as from God…. It is necessary that Christ should here be meant, Who does not bear in vain the title of ‘Angel’….
“‘And let my name, be named on them!’…. Ephraim and Manasseh….be added to the society of the patriarchs!…. The Lord would complete in them, what he had promised to the patriarchs!”
Thus, the end drew near — of Jacob’s blessed sickness unto death.
