Of my pilgrimage— The life of a believer is no other than a pilgrimage; while distant from his heavenly country, he has no abiding city. This is the beautiful idea, under which the language of sacred Scripture represents life in general. It is peculiarly applicable to the lives of the patriarchs, but to none of them so much as to the life of Jacob. For what could be more truly a pilgrimage, than that of this holy man, always tossed from place to place, in Mesopotamia, in Canaan, in AEgypt, from Succoth, from Sichem, from Beth-el, from Hebron? Their lives were a proof and confession of a future state: thus they declared themselves, pilgrims and strangers on the earth, desiring a better country, that is, an heavenly, Hebrews 11:13; Hebrews 11:40.
An hundred and thirty years— We are not to suppose that Moses relates all the conversation which passed between Pharaoh and Jacob: but what he has related, is extremely important to fix the sacred Chronology; for the age of Jacob, when he came into AEgypt, serves to discover the age of each of his sons, and to verify the different capital epochs of the sacred history. Jacob lived seventeen years after his arrival in the land of Goshen, and died, aged one hundred and forty-seven, a life, though long in comparison of ours, yet short, compared with Abraham's, who lived one hundred and seventy-five years, and Isaac's, who lived one hundred and eighty. In this light his days were few and evil, full of toils and griefs, and embittered with many calamities.