The Death of Jacob and Joseph

Life. 4850

The pastures in Goshen were rich and plentiful. The Israeli settlers quickly settled into the new places.

Jacob lived another seventeen years, and when he felt death approaching, he asked Joseph to bury him in the tomb of Machpelah, next to Abraham and Isaac. Before his death, Jacob adopted Manasseh and Ephraim. Blessing them, he predicted that the younger brother would be larger than the elder. Then, having gathered all his sons, he blessed them and foretold to each of them the fate of their descendants. From them must come twelve tribes, which will return to the promised land and receive their inheritances there. Jacob deprived his firstborn son Reuben of his birthright because he "raged like water" and defiled his father's bed. Simeon and Levi were also not worthy of the birthright for their hardness of heart and deceit. Jacob predicted that their descendants would be scattered among the people of Israel. Jacob transferred the birthright to his fourth son, Judah, pronouncing the prophetic words about the birth of the Savior from the tribe of Judah: "The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the lawgiver from his loins, until the Mediator comes, and to Him shall be the obedience of the nations" (Gen. 49:10). The meaning of these words is this: The tribe of Judah will rule over the people of God until the promise of the Lord is fulfilled.

After blessing his sons, Jacob lay down on his bed and died, His remains were embalmed according to Egyptian custom, the funeral rite lasted forty days, after which the whole of it. Egypt mourned for him for seventy days. Then the body of Jacob was solemnly transferred to the promised land and buried in the family tomb of Machpelah, where Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebekah and Leah were already buried.

After the death of their father, the brothers were very afraid that Joseph would take revenge on them for the evil they had done him. When Joseph learned of this, he invited his brothers to him, forgave them their sin, and weeping, he said: "Do not be afraid, for I fear God; behold, you have plotted evil against me; but God has turned it into good" (Gen. 50:1920).

Little is reported in the biblical narrative about Joseph's subsequent life. It is only said that he waited for more grandchildren and died when he was one hundred and ten years old. Before his death, he expressed a fervent wish: when the Jewish people return to Canaan with God's help, they should take their remains with them. Joseph was also embalmed and placed in a coffin according to the old Egyptian custom. The life of Patriarch Joseph, the beloved son of Jacob, sold by his brothers, who endured much and without complaint in slavery, who set an example of moral purity and became the savior of his people, prefigures the earthly life of the beloved son of God the Father, sent to earth, who humbled Himself by taking the "form of a servant" betrayed by Judas, who suffered "unto death on the cross" (Phil. 2:78) and became the Savior of mankind.

The Situation of the Jews in Egypt after the Death of Joseph

Ref. 1

Years passed; Joseph and his brothers died. Jacob's family multiplied rapidly and soon became a whole nation, which was called Israelite, after the patriarch of Israel, and Jewish, after the patriarch Eber.

This people, according to the number of the twelve sons of Jacob, was divided into twelve tribes or tribes. All of them lived in tents in the land of Goshen and were engaged in cattle breeding. At first, the Israelites zealously preserved the faith of their fathers, but then gradually fell under the influence of Egyptian religions and became idolaters. For their apostasy from faith in one God - the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Lord punished the Jewish people by the fact that they soon became slaves of the Egyptians.

It happened as follows. When Joseph reached the pinnacle of political power, Egypt was ruled by the Hyksos pharaohs, i.e., the Semites. They seized power in Egypt by force and were in power from about 1720 to 1552 B.C. But then in Egypt there was a national uprising against the Hyksos - the invaders. The Hyksos were expelled from Egypt, and the dynasty of Egyptian pharaohs again came to power. Hating the Hyksos, the Egyptian pharaoh poured out all his hatred on the Jews, since they were related by blood to the Hyksos and could at any time go over to the side of the enemies of Egypt. At least, that's what Pharaoh himself thought.

Seeing how rapidly this tribe was multiplying, he said to his officials: "Behold, the people of the children of Israel are numerous and stronger than we; let us outwit him so that he does not multiply; otherwise, when war comes, he also will unite with our enemies, and take up arms against us, and come out of [our] land" (Exodus 1:10).

At that time, the pharaoh was building his capital Ramesses in the Nile Delta, as well as Piphom, a city of granaries and military warehouses. Unarmed Israelis were a rich source of cheap labor. By order of the pharaoh, the Jews were herded into the construction sites in droves and forced to knead clay and make bricks. So they worked from day to day. day, from dawn to dawn, under the unbearably scorching rays of the sun, and the overseers drove them with sticks.