9 And Jacob said, The years of my wanderings have been a hundred and thirty; small in number and full of sorrow have been the years of my life, and less than the years of the wanderings of my fathers.
When you are not certain what will take place tomorrow. What is your life? It is a mist, which is seen for a little time and then is gone.
Your rules have been melodies to me, while I have been living in strange lands.
Let my prayer come to your ears, O Lord, and give attention to my cry, make an answer to my weeping: for my time here is short before you, and in a little time I will be gone, like all my fathers.
You have made my days no longer than a hand's measure; and my years are nothing in your eyes; truly, every man is but a breath. (Selah.)
My loved ones, I make this request with all my heart, that, as those for whom this world is a strange country, you will keep yourselves from the desires of the flesh which make war against the soul;
For here we have no fixed resting-place, but our search is for the one which is to come.
By faith he was a wanderer in the land of the agreement, as in a strange land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, who had a part with him in the same heritage: For he was looking for the strong town, whose builder and maker is God. And by faith Sarah herself had power to give birth, when she was very old, because she had faith in him who gave his word; So that from one man, who was near to death, came children in number as the stars in heaven, or as the sand by the seaside, which may not be numbered. All these came to their end in faith, not having had the heritage; but having seen it with delight far away, they gave witness that they were wanderers and not of the earth. For those who say such things make it clear that they are searching for a country for themselves. And truly if they had kept in mind the country from which they went out, they would have had chances of turning back. But now their desire is for a better country, that is to say, for one in heaven; and so it is no shame to God to be named their God; for he has made ready a town for them.
You send man back to his dust; and say, Go back, you children of men. For to you a thousand years are no more than yesterday when it is past, and like a watch in the night. ... In the morning it is green; in the evening it is cut down, and becomes dry. We are burned up by the heat of your passion, and troubled by your wrath. You have put our evil doings before you, our secret sins in the light of your face. For all our days have gone by in your wrath; our years come to an end like a breath. The measure of our life is seventy years; and if through strength it may be eighty years, its pride is only trouble and sorrow, for it comes to an end and we are quickly gone. Who has knowledge of the power of your wrath, or who takes note of the weight of your passion? So give us knowledge of the number of our days, that we may get a heart of wisdom.
See how short my time is; why have you made all men for no purpose? What man now living will not see death? will he be able to keep back his soul from the underworld? (Selah.)
Put the question now to the past generations, and give attention to what has been searched out by their fathers: (For we are but of yesterday, and have no knowledge, because our days on earth are gone like a shade:)
For we, as all our fathers were, are like men from a strange country before you, who have got a place for a time in the land; our days on the earth are like a shade, and there is no hope of going on.
Now Barzillai was a very old man, as much as eighty years old: and he had given the king everything he had need of, while he was at Mahanaim, for he was a very great man. And the king said to Barzillai, Come over with me, and I will take care of you in Jerusalem. And Barzillai said to the king, How much of my life is still before me, for me to go up to Jerusalem with the king? I am now eighty years old: good and bad are the same to me; have meat and drink any taste for me now? am I able to take pleasure in the voices of men or women in song? why then am I to be a trouble to my lord the king?
Now after these things, the death of Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, took place, he being then a hundred and ten years old.
And Moses at his death was a hundred and twenty years old: his eye had not become clouded, or his natural force become feeble.
And I made an agreement with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their wanderings.
So Joseph came to his death, being a hundred and ten years old: and they made his body ready, and he was put in a chest in Egypt.
Now the years of Abraham's life were a hundred and seventy-five. And Abraham came to his death, an old man, full of years; and he was put to rest with his people.
And Nahor was twenty-nine years old when he became the father of Terah: And after the birth of Terah, Nahor went on living for a hundred and nineteen years, and had sons and daughters:
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Genesis 47
Commentary on Genesis 47 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 47
Ge 47:1-31. Joseph's Presentation at Court.
1. Joseph … told Pharaoh, My father and my brethren—Joseph furnishes a beautiful example of a man who could bear equally well the extremes of prosperity and adversity. High as he was, he did not forget that he had a superior. Dearly as he loved his father and anxiously as he desired to provide for the whole family, he would not go into the arrangements he had planned for their stay in Goshen until he had obtained the sanction of his royal master.
2. he took some of his brethren—probably the five eldest brothers: seniority being the least invidious principle of selection.
4. For to sojourn … are we come—The royal conversation took the course which Joseph had anticipated (Ge 46:33), and they answered according to previous instructions—manifesting, however, in their determination to return to Canaan, a faith and piety which affords a hopeful symptom of their having become all, or most of them, religious men.
7. Joseph brought in Jacob his father—There is a pathetic and most affecting interest attending this interview with royalty; and when, with all the simplicity and dignified solemnity of a man of God, Jacob signalized his entrance by imploring the divine blessing on the royal head, it may easily be imagined what a striking impression the scene would produce (compare Heb 7:7).
8. Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art thou?—The question was put from the deep and impressive interest which the appearance of the old patriarch had created in the minds of Pharaoh and his court. In the low-lying land of Egypt and from the artificial habits of its society, the age of man was far shorter among the inhabitants of that country than it had yet become in the pure bracing climate and among the simple mountaineers of Canaan. The Hebrews, at least, still attained a protracted longevity.
9. The days of the years of my pilgrimage, &c.—Though a hundred thirty years, he reckons by days (compare Ps 90:12), which he calls few, as they appeared in retrospect, and evil, because his life had been one almost unbroken series of trouble. The answer is remarkable, considering the comparative darkness of the patriarchal age (compare 2Ti 1:10).
11. Joseph placed his father and his brethren … in the best of the land—best pasture land in lower Egypt. Goshen, "the land of verdure," lay along the Pelusiac or eastern branch of the Nile. It included a part of the district of Heliopolis, or "On," the capital, and on the east stretched out a considerable length into the desert. The ground included within these boundaries was a rich and fertile extent of natural meadow, and admirably adapted for the purposes of the Hebrew shepherds (compare Ge 49:24; Ps 34:10; 78:72).
13-15. there was no bread in all the land—This probably refers to the second year of the famine (Ge 45:6) when any little stores of individuals or families were exhausted and when the people had become universally dependent on the government. At first they obtained supplies for payment. Before long money failed.
16. And Joseph said, Give your cattle—"This was the wisest course that could be adopted for the preservation both of the people and the cattle, which, being bought by Joseph, was supported at the royal expense, and very likely returned to the people at the end of the famine, to enable them to resume their agricultural labors."
21. as for the people, he removed them to cities—obviously for the convenience of the country people, who were doing nothing, to the cities where the corn stores were situated.
22. Only the land of the priests bought he not—These lands were inalienable, being endowments by which the temples were supported. The priests for themselves received an annual allowance of provision from the state, and it would evidently have been the height of cruelty to withhold that allowance when their lands were incapable of being tilled.
23-28. Joseph said, Behold, &c.—The lands being sold to the government (Ge 47:19, 20), seed would be distributed for the first crop after the famine; and the people would occupy them as tenants-at-will on the payment of a produce rent, almost the same rule as obtains in Egypt in the present day.
29-31. the time drew nigh that Israel must die—One only of his dying arrangements is recorded; but that one reveals his whole character. It was the disposal of his remains, which were to be carried to Canaan, not from a mere romantic attachment to his native soil, nor, like his modern descendants, from a superstitious feeling for the soil of the Holy Land, but from faith in the promises. His address to Joseph—"if now I have found grace in thy sight," that is, as the vizier of Egypt—his exacting a solemn oath that his wishes would be fulfilled and the peculiar form of that oath, all pointed significantly to the promise and showed the intensity of his desire to enjoy its blessings (compare Nu 10:29).
31. Israel bowed himself upon the bed's head—Oriental beds are mere mats, having no head, and the translation should be "the top of his staff," as the apostle renders it (Heb 11:21).