◄ Genesis 50:12 ►














Pulpit Commentary Homiletics
Walking With God
Genesis 5:24
J.F. Montgomery
Whole chapter a reproof of the restless ambitions of men. Of these long lives the only record is a name, and the fact, "he died." Moral of the whole, "Dust thou art" (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:50). Yet a link between life here and life above. Enoch translated (Hebrews 11:5). The living man passed into the presence of God. How, we need not care to know. But we know why. He "walked with God." Who would not covet this? Yet it may be ours. What then was that life? Of its outward form we know nothing. But same expression (Genesis 6:9) tells us that Noah's was such. Also Abraham's, "the friend of God" (Genesis 17:1); and St. Paul's (Philippians 1:21); and St. John (1 John 1:3) claims "fellowship with the Father" not for himself only (cf. John 14:23).

I. ESSENTIAL FEATURES OF A WALK WITH GOD. Not a life of austerity or of contemplation, removed from interests or cares of world. Noah's was not; nor Abraham's. Nor a life without fault. Elijah was "of like passions as we are;" and David; and St. John declares, 1 John 1:8-10.

1. It is a life of faith, i.e. a life in which the word of God is a real power. Mark in Hebrews 11. how faith worked in different circumstances. To walk with God is to trust him as a child trusts; from belief of his fatherhood, and that he is true. With texts before us such as John 3:16; 1 John 1:9; 1 John 2:2, why are any not rejoicing? Or with such as John 4:10; Luke 11:13, why are any not asking and receiving to the full? God puts no hindrance (Revelation 3:20). But

(1) too often men do not care. To walk with God is of less importance than to be admired of men.

(2) If they do care, they often will not take God's way. The simple message (2 Corinthians 5:20; 1 John 5:11) seems too simple. They look for feelings, instead of setting God's message before them and grasping it.

2. To walk with God implies desire and effort for the good of men. In an ungodly world Enoch proclaimed the coming judgment (Jude 1:14; cf. Acts 24:25). Spiritual selfishness often a snare to those who have escaped the snare of the world. It is not the mind of Christ. It springs from weakness of faith. Knowing the gift so dearly purchased, so freely offered to all, our calling is to persuade men. Not necessarily as teachers (James 1:19), but by intercession and by loving influence.

III. ENOCH WAS TRANSLATED. But apostles and saints died. Yet think not that their walk with God was less blessed. Hear our Lord's words (John 11:26), and St. Paul (2 Timothy 1:10). Hear the apostle's desire (Philippians 1:23). Enoch walked with God on earth, and the communion was carried on above. Is not this our Savior's promise? (John 14:21-23; John 17:24). Death is not the putting off that which is corruptible; it is separation from the Lord. Assured that we are his forever, we may say, "O death, where is thy sting?" - M.

Biblical Illustrator
Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father.
Genesis 50:1-13
The honour paid to the departed Jacob
T. H. Leale.
I. PRIVATE.

1. The tears of his family.

2. The respect paid to last wishes.

II. PUBLIC.

(T. H. Leale.)

Ceremonies after death
M. M. Kalisch, Ph. D.
The order of the ceremonies alluded to, and on the whole agreeing with classical and monumental records, was as follows:

1. When the extinction of the vital breath could no longer be doubted, the relatives began a preliminary mourning, perhaps observed during the day of death only (ver. 1), and consisting in public lamentations, in covering the head and the face with mud (or dust), girding up the garments, and beating the breasts.

2. Then the body was delivered up to the embalmers, who, in the case of Jacob, completed their work in forty days (ver. 3), though it more frequently required seventy.

3. Simultaneously with the operations of embalming commenced the chief or real mourning, which, lasting about seventy days (ver. 3), usually ended together with the process of mummification, but which, in the instance of the patriarch, exceeded it by thirty days.

4. The body, after having been enclosed in a case of wood or stone (ver. 26), was then either deposited in the family vaults (ver. 13), or placed in a sepulchral chamber of the house of the nearest relative (ver. 26).

(M. M. Kalisch, Ph. D.)

Three modes of embalming
M. M. Kalisch, Ph. D.
1. If the most expensive mode, estimated at one talent of silver, or about £250, was employed, the brain was first taken out through the nostrils, partly with an iron (or bronze) hook, and partly by the infusion of drugs; then an appointed dissector made with a sharp Ethiopian stone, a deep incision (generally about five inches long) in the left side, at a part before marked out by a scribe; but having scarcely performed this operation, he hastily fled, persecuted by those present with stones and imprecations, as one who was guilty of the heinous crime of violently mutilating the body of a fellow-man. Then one of the embalmers, holy men, who lived in the society of the priests, and enjoyed unreserved access to the temples, extracted through the incision all intestines, except the kidneys and the heart; every part of the viscera was spiced, rinsed with palm-wine, and sprinkled with pounded perfumes. The body was next filled with pure myrrh, cassia, and other aromatics, with the exception of frankincense; sewed up, and steeped in natrum during seventy days, after the expiration of which period it was washed, and wrapped in bandages of linen cloth covered with gum. By this procedure all the parts of the body, even the hair of the eyebrows and eyelids, were admirably preserved, and the very features of the countenance remained unaltered.

2. The cost of the second mode of embalming amounted to twenty mince, or about; £81. No incision was made, nor were the bowels taken out; but the body was, by means of syringes, filled with oil of cedar at the abdomen, and steeped in natrum for seventy days. When the oil was let out, the intestines and vitals came out in a state of dissolution, while the natrum consumed the flesh, so that nothing of the body remained except the skin and the bones; and this skeleton was returned to the relatives of the deceased. The possibility of an injection, as here described, without the aid of incisions, has been doubted; and, in some cases, incisions have indeed been observed near the rectum.

3. A third and very cheap method, employed for the poorer classes, consisted merely in thoroughly rinsing the abdomen with syrmaea, a purgative liquor (perhaps composed of an infusion of senna and cassia), and then steeping the body in natrum for the usual seventy days.

(M. M. Kalisch, Ph. D.)

People
Abel, Canaanites, Egyptians, Ephron, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Machir, Mamre, Manasseh, Mizraim, Pharaoh
Places
Canaan, Egypt, Goshen, Jordan River, Machpelah, Mamre, Rameses
Topics
Charged, Commanded, Orders, Sons, Thus
Outline
1. The mourning for Jacob.
4. Joseph gets leave of Pharaoh to go to bury him.
7. The funeral.
15. Joseph comforts his brothers, who crave his pardon.
22. His age.
23. He sees the third generation of his sons.
24. He prophesies unto his brothers of their return.
25. He takes an oath of them concerning his bones.
26. He dies, and is put into a coffin.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Genesis 50:12-13

     5095   Jacob, life

Library
Joseph's Faith
'Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.'--GENESIS l. 25. This is the one act of Joseph's life which the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews selects as the sign that he too lived by faith. 'By faith Joseph, when he died, made mention of the departing of the children of Israel; and gave commandment concerning his bones.' It was at once a proof of how entirely he believed God's promise, and of how earnestly he longed …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A Coffin in Egypt
'They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.' --GENESIS l. 26. So closes the book of Genesis. All its recorded dealings of God with Israel, and all the promises and the glories of the patriarchal line, end with 'a coffin in Egypt'. Such an ending is the more striking, when we remember that a space of three hundred years intervenes between the last events in Genesis and the first in Exodus, or almost as long a time as parts the Old Testament from the New. And, during all that period, Israel …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A Calm Evening, Promising a Bright Morning
'And Joseph returned into Egypt, he, and his brethren, and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father. And when Joseph's brethren saw that their father was dead, they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us, and will certainly requite us all the evil which we did unto him. And they sent a messenger unto Joseph, saying, Thy father did command before he died, saying, So shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin; …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Worst Things Work for Good to the Godly
DO not mistake me, I do not say that of their own nature the worst things are good, for they are a fruit of the curse; but though they are naturally evil, yet the wise overruling hand of God disposing and sanctifying them, they are morally good. As the elements, though of contrary qualities, yet God has so tempered them, that they all work in a harmonious manner for the good of the universe. Or as in a watch, the wheels seem to move contrary one to another, but all carry on the motions of the watch: …
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

Genesis
The Old Testament opens very impressively. In measured and dignified language it introduces the story of Israel's origin and settlement upon the land of Canaan (Gen.--Josh.) by the story of creation, i.-ii. 4a, and thus suggests, at the very beginning, the far-reaching purpose and the world-wide significance of the people and religion of Israel. The narrative has not travelled far till it becomes apparent that its dominant interests are to be religious and moral; for, after a pictorial sketch of …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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