August 15, 2013
Genesis 49-Part 3
Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. Genesis 49:5
LET IT GLOW
Do you sometimes feel not useful? Maybe friends are busy this week with a project, family is getting ready for school, and you are doing nothing. this isn't the case with me. I was busy cooking for a meeting and workers on our new building. Get involved in activities. No matter your age, you can be useful to others. Get up and go.
We are reading about the 12 sons of Jacob who become the 12 tribes of Israel.
Simeon and Levi are the second and third sons that Jacob speaks to before his death. Jacob reveals their character and predicts their history. These two sons were the sons of Leah. They had four other brothers and one sister mentioned in scripture-Reuben, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, and Dinah.
Simeon means hearing, which reveal that God had heard how much Leah was hated. Levi means attachment, expressing Leah's desire that Jacob would ultimately become attached to her. (Falwell)
You will recall that Leah was the older unmarried sister to Rachel. Their father deceived Jacob by giving him Leah instead of his beloved Rachael for his wife. Jacob had already worked 7 years in order to marry Rachel, so he worked another 7 years to actually get her as his wife. (chapter 29)
And when the Lord saw Leah was not loved, He opened her womb, but Rachael was barren.
(Gen. 29:31 NIV)
I wonder, if Jacob loved Rachael so much, why did he keep having sex with Leah. Anyway, this is how God produced the 12 tribes of Israel (Jacob). He had these two sisters and their 2 servant women as their mothers. That's the background of Simeon and Levi, for those who may be visiting your first time.
These two guys would have grown up in the same tent and played together. I'm sure they were close brothers. It is often the case, when siblings are close in age. Mine were both older than me, so I don't relate to this situation.
LET IT GROW
That seemed to be the only good that Jacob could say about these two sons of his, they were brethren.
Now he tells us about the other side of them, referring to chapter 34.
Simeon and Levi are described as:
- using their swords as weapons of violence,
- Jacob not wanting to enter their council, nor join their assembly,
- they killed men in their anger,
- they hamstrung oxen as they pleased. (Hamstrung means to cut the leg tendons as a means of destroying the animal's usefulness.)
Their sister Dinah was raped by Shechem, a Hivite. Her two brothers deceived Shechem's family into being circumcised before they would agree to give Dinah to this man. While the men were recovering, Simeon and Levi killed all the males in Shechem's city. They took the animals, wealth, and women and children captive. Needless to say, Jacob was upset with the actions of his two sons.
Liberty Bible Commentary has this to say about Simeon and Levi:
What these two men did not lead away as plunder they destroyed in the fierceness of their anger. They were to be divided and scattered. When Simeon was numbered as a tribe in Numbers 26:14, they were the weakest; and when Moses blessed the tribes, he left them out in Deuteronomy 33:8. Levi received forty-eight cities that were scattered throughout the allotment of the other tribes (Joshua 21:1-42). In Exodus 32:26 they were the only tribe that stood for what was right. Simeon was given an inheritance within the inheritance of Judah. Both of these tribes will enter the messianic kingdom, according to Ezekiel 44 and Revelation 7.
Jacob described them as cruel, angry, and self-willed.
Have we ever been that way? I have been the latter two.
Levi's tribe went on to become the priests of the nation of Israel. What grace! This meant that they had no land to inherit, though.
Simeon's numerical decline is seen when we compare Numbers 1:23 (59,300) with Numbers 26:14 (22,200). (Wiersbe)
Jacob said, "Cursed their anger, so fierce, and their fury, so cruel! I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel. (NIV, verse 7)
Although Levi was one who destroyed the usefulness of oxen, God did not destroy Levi's usefulness in His kingdom work, using his male descendants as priests.
LET IT GO
Keep my anger under control.
Don't be self-willed, but God-willed.
Seek God's grace.
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