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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Genesis 49:18 - 49:18
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But this manifestation of strength, which Jacob expected from Dan and promised prophetically, presupposed that severe conflicts awaited the Israelites. For these conflicts Jacob furnished his sons with both shield and sword in the ejaculatory prayer, “I wait for Thy salvation, O Jehovah!” which was not a prayer for his own soul and its speedy redemption from all evil, but in which, as Calvin has strikingly shown, he expressed his confidence that his descendants would receive the help of his God. Accordingly, the later Targums (Jerusalem and Jonathan) interpret these words as Messianic, but with a special reference to Samson, and paraphrase Gen 49:18 thus: “Not for the deliverance of Gideon, the son of Joash, does my soul wait, for that is temporary; and not for the redemption of Samson, for that is transitory; and not for the redemption of Samson, for that is transitory; but for the redemption of the Messiah, the Son of David, which Thou through Thy word hast promised to bring to Thy people the children of Israel: for this Thy redemption my soul waits.”
(Note: This is the reading according to the text of the Jerusalem Targum, in the London Polyglot as corrected from the extracts of Fagius in the Critt. Sacr., to which the Targum Jonathan also adds, “for Thy redemption, O Jehovah, is an everlasting redemption.” But whilst the Targumists and several fathers connect the serpent in the way with Samson, by many others the serpent in the way is supposed to be Antichrist. On this interpretation Luther remarks: Puto Diabolum hujus fabulae auctorem fuisse et finxisse hanc glossam, ut nostras cogitationes a vero et praesente Antichristo abduceret.)