February 11, 2018: Day 48 – Genesis 48

Here we find the blessing of the sons of Joseph by Jacob.  We read that Joseph hears that his father is ill so he goes too see him and brings his boys along too.  It seems like this is the first time that Jacob is in the presence of his grandsons through Joseph.  He tells Joseph that he didn’t expect to see him again, and now he not only sees him but his children  as well.  When he blesses Ephraim and Manasseh we find that he puts his right hand on the younger boy which signals a special favor and a special blessing.

Joseph tries to correct his father thinking that since he can’t see well he has mistaken the two, while in fact his father knew exactly what he was doing.  He says no Joseph, it is Ephraim, the younger, who will receive the same blessing as I received, the same blessing as my ancestors Isaac and Abraham received. Joseph should have expected that since Isaac was the younger, Jacob was  the younger, and he himself, Joseph, was the younger next to Benjamin.  And so we see that the progeny and the promise continues through more generations.  It seems to skip a generation from that of Jacob to that of the children of Joseph while none of the children of Jacob receive that same blessing.  Those blessings are coming up in the next chapter.