Monday, August 7, 2023

Gerard Van Groningen on the worship of Judah by his brothers in Genesis 49:8

  

Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise: thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall bow down before thee. (Gen 49:8)

 

Judah’s brothers are to “bow down” before him. The verb ‘šataḥ takes on various nuances of meaning in its different verbal forms. The hithpael form in the text means to prostrate oneself before a superior. The term, in the setting of the cult, means “worship.” It can also refer to spiritual adultery. Jacob used the term to indicate submission to a ruling person, a monarch. Thus Judah, not Joseph, was held before the brothers as the royal one in their midst. Moreover, the brothers were not to share directly in that royal preeminence; they were to acknowledge it and, in various ways, to benefit from Judah’s domination over them. (Gerard Van Groningen, Messianic Revelation in the Old Testament, 2 vols. [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1990 repr., Eugene, Oreg.: Wipf and Stock, 1997], 1:171)

 

Blog Archive