CRITICAL NOTES.—
Genesis 49:4. Unstable as water.] Heb. Boiling over as water. Another form of this word is rendered lightness, in Jeremiah 23:32; Zephaniah 3:2, referring to the character of false prophets. The image points to the heated passions which led Reuben into disgrace. Thou shalt not excel.] He shall have no share in the dignity and privileges of the firstborn—the birthright supremacy. The double portion was transferred to Joseph, the chieftainship to Judah, and the priesthood to Levi.
Genesis 49:6. In their self-will they digged down a wall.] The LXX has, they have hamstrung oxen. “The true rendering refers to a process of wantonly cutting the tendons of oxen so as to make them useless. In Chron. Genesis 34:28, the carrying off of the cattle is mentioned. This wanton cruelty was doubtless added.” (Jacobus.)—
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Genesis 49:5-7
THE BLESSING OF SIMEON AND LEVI
I. Their sin.
1. Immoderate revenge. (Genesis 49:5-6.) They were justified in feeling anger, and even in avenging the outrage upon the family honour. They must have been less than men had they been indifferent. And as religious men they were bound to feel a righteous indignation. In that state of society, when there were no regular modes of trial, the avenger of blood was an instrument of justice. It is the excess of their anger that is blamed. “For it was fierce.” “For it was cruel.” Not content with taking vengeance upon the man who did the deed, they slew a whole tribe of men.
2. Cruelty to unoffending beasts. They wantonly cut the tendons of animals so as to make them useless. This was an uncalled for ferocity.
3. Their cruelty was deliberate. They were, indeed, “brethren” both in sympathy and co-operation. They supported and counselled each other in their cruel designs. They had their “secret,” their “assembly.” They were men capable of framing dark plots. They wrought iniquity by a law.
II. Their penalty.
1. To be disavowed by the good. “O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united.” Jacob could not prevent their deed, but he would have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness.
2. Their deed is branded with a curse. He curses their wrath and their cruelty, not their persons.
3. They are condemned to moral and political weakness. “I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.” The penalty was appropriate. As they had worked together in wickedness, they are to be divided. Simeon’s tribe was weak, his territory scattered. Levi was likewise scattered in Israel, and had no territorial allotment; yet his was a privileged tribe, being the tribe of priests. The penalty is by grace transmuted into blessing. “The Lord keeps the execution of the sentence in His own hands. Simeon’s sons continue to be like himself—doing the same works. On them the sentence falls with unmitigated severity. In the tribe of Levi there are indications of a better mind. And the sentence is graciously sanctified.”—(Candlish.)
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Genesis 49:5. His two next sons were guilty of a crime still worse than Reuben’s. If it did not wound their father in a part so tender, it gave him not less pain, and exposed him to greater mischief. If a merciful providence had not wonderfully preserved him, he and all his family must have been destroyed, in consequence of the revenge of the enraged Canaanites.—(Bush).
Genesis 49:6. Time had not changed Jacob’s feelings with regard to the crime of his sons. His soul had the same abhorrence of the act now, as it had then.
Genesis 49:7. There is a kind of anger which deserves not to be cursed, but to be blessed. Such was the anger of Moses when he came down from the Mount, and seeing the idolatries of the camp of Israel, broke the tables of the law which he held in his hands. But the anger of Simeon and Levi was entitled neither to commendation nor apology. Sharp rebuke is necessary for those who have greatly offended.—(Bush).