Holly Bible - KJV with Concise Commentaries by Z Selam - HTML preview
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Jacob's removal, Ge 35:21. He also, as his fathers, sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange country, and was not long in a place. Immediately after the story of Rachel's death he is here called Israel (Ge 35:21, 22), and not often so afterwards: the Jews say, "The historian does him this honour here because he bore that affliction with such admirable patience and submission to Providence." Note, Those are Israels indeed, princes with God, that support the government of their own passions. He that has this rule over his own spirit is better than the mighty. Israel, a prince with God, yet dwells in tents; the city is reserved for him in the other world.
The Sons of Jacob
22 And it came to pass, when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went
and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine: and Israel heard it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve:
The sin of Reuben. A piece of abominable wickedness it was that he was guilty of (Ge 35:22), that very sin which the apostle says (1Co 5:1) is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife. It is said to have been when Israel dwelt in that land; as if he were then absent from his family, which might be the unhappy occasion of these disorders. Though perhaps Bilhah was the greater criminal, and it is probable was abandoned by Jacob for it, yet Reuben's crime was so provoking that, for it, he lost his birthright and blessing, Ge 49:4. The first-born is not always the best, nor the most promising. This was Reuben's sin, but it was Jacob's affliction; and what a sore affliction it was is intimated in a little compass, and Israel heard it. No more is said--that is enough; he heard it with the utmost grief and shame, horror and displeasure. Reuben thought to conceal it, that his father should never hear of it; but those that promise themselves secresy in sin are generally disappointed; a bird of the air carries the voice.
23 the sons of Leah; Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, and Simeon, and Levi,
and Judah, and Issachar, and Zebulun: