Seder 43: Genesis 49---Blessings for the Sons of Jacob

 At the end of his life Jacob called his sons together, saying, "Gather around, that I may tell you what will happen to you in days to come" (Gen 49:1).  

The Hebrew phrase for "in days to come" be'akherit hayyamim, a phrase appearing 14 times in the Old Testament.  (the others are Num 24:14; Deut 4:30; 31:29; Is 2:2; Jer 23:20; 48:47; 49:39; Ezek 38:16; Dan 2:28; 10:14; Hos 3:5; Mic 4:1).  Many of these passages clearly have an eschatological context.

In this case, Jacob's inspired blessings often point to the future of the tribes of Israel in the Promised Land---e.g., the scattering of Simeon and Levi among the other tribes.  But they do in at least one case reach far ahead in the future.  The blessing of Judah (vv 8-12) predicts that a line of kings will come from Judah, culminating in one called Shiloh (see KJV).  

There is more than one possibility for the meaning of "Shiloh".  (This is not the town of Shiloh, or Neal Diamond's imaginary friend Shilo.)  It may mean "tribute to him" (see NRSV), or it may mean "the one to whom it belongs (see NIV).  Both of these possibilities are consistent with a reference to the coming Messiah, and indeed, Gen 49:10 is seen as a Messianic prophecy in both Jewish and Christian traditions.  Targum Onkelos in Gen 49:10 says "until Messiah comes, to whom belongs the kingdom".  Gen 49:9-10 is the source for the presentation of the risen Jesus as the lion of Judah in Rev 5.  

The poetry in Gen 49 is often cryptic.  There is lots of wordplay on the names of Jacob's sons.  The dominant themes are royalty, prosperity, and abundance.  

John Sailhamer and his students often point out that there are four major poetic passages in the Pentateuch---the others being Exod 15, Num 24, and Deut 32-33---and all contribute to the proclamation of the Gospel.  See for example Kevin Chen's wonderful book, The Messianic Vision of the Pentateuch, or Michael Rydelnik's The Messianic Hope.

In a sermon at Church of the Messiah on Feb 6, 2021, Rob Wilson examined the blessings of Gen 49.  

Seder 18: Another Messianic Connection in Psalm 110---verse 3b

The Old Testament chapter most often referenced in the New Testament is Psalm 110.  The New Testament references are to verse 1 (about the position of David's Lord on the divine throne at God's right hand) and verse 4 (about the special priesthood of David's Lord patterned after that of Melchizedek).

Verse 3b also adds to the Messianic import of the psalm.  In the ESV, translated from the Masoretic Text, it reads: "from the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be yours."

It's not clear at all what this means.  But the Septuagint has a definite Messianic thrust:  "From the womb, before the morning star, I brought you forth."  This translation seems to imply that David's Lord is a Son of God with ancient origins.

On the importance of the Septuagint in bringing out the full Messianic implications of the Old Testament, a good source is Michael Rydelnik's book The Messianic Hope.  In connection with Ps 110:3b, Rydelnik notes that some scholars believe the Masoretes arranged the vowel pointing in order to obscure the messianic implications of the verse.

At any rate, in the Hebrew consonantal text, there is an important word link between Ps 110:3b and Psalm 2:7:  "The LORD said to me, 'You are my Son; today I have begotten you.' "  This verse identifies the Davidic Messiah as a unique Son of God.  The word for "begotten" is common to Psalm 2:7 and Psalm 110:3.

We see a pairing of Psalm 2 and Psalm 110 in some New Testament passages---in Heb 1:5,13; Heb 5:5-6.  There is further evidence in Luke 22:69-70 that this connection was part of Jewish understanding in the days of Jesus.  For more discussion, see the paper "Hebrew-Only Exegesis:  A Philological Approach to Jesus' Use of the Hebrew Bible," by R. Steven Notley and Jeffrey P. Garcia, pp 349-376 in The Language Environment of First Century Judaea, Brill, 2014.

Ps 110:3b, as translated in the Septuagint, was important to early Christians.  For example, Justin Martyr used it to argue in Dialogue with Trypho, chapter 63, "does not this declare to you that [he was] from of old, and that the God and Father of all things intended for him to be begotten by a human womb?"