As we continue to study Jacob’s prophecy of the last days of Israel, we continue in the context that his son’s names are mentioned, but the prophecy only moderately concerned them and their present descendants. Instead, the prophecy is about the later nation of Israel, as seen through the particular sons named. In our present study Jacob mentions Simeon and Levi. These two men, remember, were not only responsible for the deaths of two Canaanite princes, Shechem and his father, Hamor, but also the deaths of their whole community, the village of Shechem, which was probably made up of an entire family, similar to Israel being made up of Jacob’s family, his sons, their wives and their little ones. Shechem admired Dinah, Jacob’s daughter by Leah, and he defiled her, but wanted his father to arrange a marriage between him and Dinah.
Jacob was still mourning Joseph, whom he presumed dead, so the brothers handled the marital arrangements, and in the process, they betrayed the covenant, which was made between them and Shechem. They slew him, his father and all the males of their village, spoiling their livestock and their goods, and took their wives and little ones as slaves (Genesis 34:25-29).
On his deathbed, Jacob addressed Simeon and Levi together (Genesis 49:5), recalling their wicked behavior in the matter of Dinah’s defilement (Genesis 34:30), in which they remained unrepentant (Genesis 34:31). Jacob saw his sons, as men who were alike, and they were cruel to those they knew. Jacob’s description may be an indicator of whose idea it was to take Joseph and slay him (Genesis 37:19-20), for Joseph chose Simeon to keep back in chains, while he sent his other nine brethren back to Jacob, holding him hostage in the matter of bringing Benjamin to Egypt with them, the next time they sought to buy grain (Genesis 42:18-24).
Simeon and Levi conspired how they might destroy Shechem and his family, and David spoke of such wicked men, whose words were spoken in secret, words of insurrection, whereby snares were made in the hope of destroying the innocent (Psalm 64:1-6), especially good men of rank, who might make a good difference in society. It was men of such wicked character who laid in wait for Jesus, from the very beginning of his ministry (Mark 3:1-6), hoping to slay him. In fact, it was a plot made in secret, which ultimately had Jesus slain (John 11:45-53, 57; cp. Luke 22:3-6).
Jacob prayed that Simeon’s and Levi’s similar character wouldn’t become the predominant element in the character of his descendants (Genesis 49:6). Jacob mourned over the possibility of his reputation becoming like theirs (cp. Genesis 34:30), for they not only murdered a man, but before doing so, they destroyed any means of his defending himself.
Therefore, Jacob cursed their anger and their cruelty, and the text has it: “I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel!” (Genesis 49:7). However, this doesn’t seem true. The pronoun them isn’t in the Hebrew of either phrase.[1] Therefore, a literal rendering would be: “I will divide Jacob, and scatter Israel!” (verse-7). In reality, Levi was scattered among his brethren, but this was due to their faithfulness to Moses and the Lord. Simeon was never scattered. Nevertheless, immediately after the death of Solomon, Israel was divided into two nations. Afterward, when the Lord destroyed both kingdoms, he brought a remnant of Judah back to Jerusalem, but the northern kingdom together with most of Judah became the Diaspora and were scattered throughout the world, and remain so, to this day. Moreover, in AD 70 Judah, the southern kingdom was destroyed and the scattering of all of Israel began at that time, and that lasted for nearly 2000 years.
In the first century AD, Jesus, himself, mourned over the cruelty of his people, Israel, saying: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you would have none of it!” (Matthew 23:37). Thus, the reason for the scattering of Israel was the cruelty they expressed against good people, showing the character of the nation was similar to the wicked character, which both Simeon and Levi expressed toward men who had good intentions toward them, and they betrayed and slew them, and they expressed no remorse over their doing so (cp. Genesis 34:31).
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[1] From what I’m able to understand the pronoun them is usually understood from the text, but it is an interpretation by the translator who seeks to make the phrase clearer in the language of the reader. While this is usually helpful, at times it covers the real meaning of the text.
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