Genesis 34:30 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Bible Comments

Ye have troubled me, to make me to stink That is, you have rendered me and my family odious among the inhabitants of the land. Abraham and Isaac had been much respected, though strangers in the country, and their wise, righteous, and benevolent conduct, and that of their families, had gained honour to their religion: but Jacob was apprehensive, and not without reason, that these shameful proceedings of his sons would cause him and his religion to be execrated among these Canaanites, whose crimes they had exceeded. Well might he say, they had troubled him! Well might he always keep their conduct in remembrance and mention it with indignation on his death-bed, for nothing could be more treacherous, base, and cruel. I shall be destroyed, I and my house Indeed, what else could he expect, but that, numerous and formidable as the Canaanites were, they would unite together against him, and that he and his little family would be an easy prey to them? He knew, indeed, that God had promised to preserve his house; but he might justly fear that these vile practices of his children would amount to a forfeiture, and cut off the entail. When sin is in the house, there is reason to fear ruin at the door.

Genesis 34:30

30 And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, Ye have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites: and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me; and I shall be destroyed, I and my house.