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Then fhall the lofs of the fall be repaired, paradife be restored, and the tree of life shall yield her fruit again; and the leaves thereof fhall be for the healing of the nations.

DISSERTATION III.

The Bleffing of Judah, Gen. xlix.

WHEN Jacob drew near his end, he called his fons together, and bleffed them, every one according to his bleffing, benedictionibus fuis propriis; i. e. giving to each a peculiar bleffing. The part relating to Judah ftands thus:

Ver. 8. Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren fhall praife: thy hand fhall be in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children fhall bow down before thee.

9.

Ver. Judah is a lion's whelp: from the prey, my fon, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion; who shall ronfe

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Ver. 10. The fceptre fhall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him fhall the gathering of the people be.

Ver. 11. Binding his foal unto the vine, and his afs’s colt unto the choice vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes.

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There is no prophecy in the Old Testament that has undergone fo many interpretations and critical difquifitions as this now before us. It would make a volume to report exactly the various fentiments of learned men upon this fubject. They who defire to be acquainted with them, may confult Huetius, Mr. Le Clerc, and Mr. Saurine.

It may be thought, perhaps, great prefumption to attempt any thing upon this paffage, after so much pains bestowed on it by men of great figure in learning: but as I have no intention to make fhew of much learning, or much reading, but only to offer a plain natural fenfe of the most important paffage in this prophecy, which feems to me to arise from the very ftate and circumftances of things, at the time this prophecy was delivered, I hope it will not be thought the effect of vanity or oftentation.

There is a paffage in the book Ecclefiafticus, which will ferve as a key to open to us the nature of the bleffings beftowed on the twelve tribes by their father Jacob. This author, the Son of Sirach, obferves, that God gave his covenant to Abraham, eftablished it with Ifaac, and made it reft upon the head of Jacob. Thus far the entire bleffing, and all the parts of it, vested in fingle perfons only: but in the next step there is an alteration; for God divided Jacob's portions, among the twelve tribes did he part

e Demonftratio Evangelica, Cap. iv. Prop. 9. Comment. in locum.

e Difcours Hiftoriques, &c. Difc. 41.

Ecclus. xliv. 19, &c.

& Ver. 23.

them. There is no queftion but that this paffage relates to the fettlement and the bleffing of the tribes by Jacob, in the xlviiith and xlixth of Genefis; and it fhews us, that the feveral bleffings, given to the several tribes, are but parts or portions of the bleffing which Jacob received from Ifaac; Ifaac from Abraham; and Abraham immediately from God. In this view then, the feveral bleffings mentioned in the xlixth of Genefis, and limited to the feveral tribes, muft, be confidered as an expofition of the original bleffing given to Abraham: and the bleffing from which the others are derived muft limit and determine the sense of the particulars; which cannot be extended beyond the bounds of the first promise.

Setting afide the authority of the Son of Sirach, it is reasonable to think that this was the cafe from the custom and practice in Abraham's family, in which the bleffing of the father was regularly conveyed to the fon. And when we fee Jacob bleffing all his children, what can we suppose else, but that he is tranfmitting to his pofterity the bleffing which he himself received. If we look to the beginning of the xlviiith of Genefis, where Jacob adopts Ephraim and Manaffeh, the two fons of Jofeph, and conftitutes them heads of tribes in his family, and confequently entitles them to a fhare, among his own fons, of the land of Canaan; there will be no room to doubt of this matter. For Jacob founds his right of allotting the land of Canaan, in the manner he does, upon God's grant of that land to himfelf: Jacob faid unto Jofeph, God Almighty appeared unto me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me, and faid unto me, Behold, I will make thee fruitful, and multiply

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