Deuteronomy 33:17 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

His glory is like the firstling of his bullock Or the prime and fairest bullock of the herd. For things that excel in their kind are called firstborn in Scripture. The beauty and strength of this tribe are compared to this stately creature, and a bullock being the best emblem of power among the beasts of the pasture, it seems to be here used to denote the superior honour and dignity of the house of Joseph above the rest of the tribes of Israel. Indeed, a bullock, as Bochart shows, was formerly used as an image of kingly power and dignity, and therefore seems here to denote the kingdom which Ephraim should obtain in Jeroboam and his successors. His horns are like the horns of unicorns A horn is a common Scripture emblem of power and force. So this is a further description of the house of Joseph. With them he shall push the people together That is, throw down all that oppose him, particularly the Canaanites; to the ends of the earth That is, of the land of Canaan. The ten thousands of Ephraim, and the thousands of Manasseh Or, such are, &c.; that is, these blessings belong to the two numerous branches of the house of Joseph. Here he ascribes to Ephraim ten thousands, and to Manasseh only thousands; thus foreshowing, that Ephraim the younger was to be the more numerous of the two, as Jacob had before prophesied of them.