"And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Say unto thy brethren, This do ye; lade your beasts, and go, get you unto the land of Canaan; and take your father and your household, and come unto me: and I will give you the good of the land of Egypt, and ye shall eat the fat of the land. Now thou art commanded, this do ye; take you wagons out of the land of Egypt for your little ones, and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. Also regard not your stuff; for the good of all the land of Egypt is yours." (Genesis 45:17-20)
"And Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beersheba, and offered sacrifices unto the god of his father Isaac. And God spake unto Israel in the visions of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I. And He said, I am God, the God of thy father: fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes. And Jacob rose up from Beersheba: and the sons of Israel carried Jacob their father, and their little ones, and their wives, in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry him. And they took their cattle, and their goods, which they had gotten in the land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, Jacob, and all his seed with him: his sons, and his sons' sons with him, his daughters, and his sons' daughters, and all his seed brought he with him into Egypt." (Genesis 46:1-7)
"All the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt, which came out of his loins, besides Jacob's sons' wives, all the souls were threescore and six; and the sons of Joseph, which were born him in Egypt, were two souls: all the souls of the house of Jacob, which came into Egypt, were threescore and ten." (Genesis 46:27)
Jacob has determined to go see Joseph, but he must obviously be having some serious qualms about being in or perhaps moving to Egypt. We know this because the Lord speaks to him but calls him by the name of Jacob, always indicative of the fleshly man, versus calling him by the name of Israel, indicative of the man of faith.
Nevertheless, Jacob does go down to Egypt (for God has promised He will bring him home again) and he takes with him every single member of his family, minus Joseph and his sons who are already there. But his entire lineage alive at that time amounted to seventy persons. In the King James version of the Bible, the word "seventy" is often stated as "threescore and ten." This passage tells us that Jacob had seventy souls that came out of his loins, in other words, direct descendants of Jacob.
That is an amazing number of descendants from only two generationsand it is also amazing that Jacob was blessed enough by the Lord to be able to see all of these seventy descendants for himself.
But I want to look at the biblical number 70 for a moment (both when it is stated as "70" and also as "threescore and ten") for this specific number seems to have some significance. And so let's see if we can determine what that significance is.
After the flood the world was repopulated by the descendants of Noah who numbered: 70. (Genesis 10)
There were "seventy men of the elders of Israel" chosen by God and given the Spirit with which Moses himself was endued, in order to help Moses administer justice while they were in the wilderness. (Numbers 11:16)
In Exodus 15:27, we see the Israelites coming to Elim "where were twelve wells of water, and threescore and ten palm trees.." This is interesting seeing as how there are twelve tribes of Israel and they have 70 elders.
In the Book of Judges, we are told of "threescore and ten kings having their thumbs and their great toes cut off" by Adonibezek; and the same is done to him. (Judges 1:7)
Also in the Book of Judges, Abimelech
used "threescore and ten pieces of silver" to hire men to kill "his brethren the sons of Jerubbaal, being threescore and ten persons." (Judges 9:4)
When Hezekiah reopened the doors of the temple, "the number of the burnt offerings, which the congregation brought, was threescore and ten bullocks…" (2 Chronicles 29:32)
The Lord allowed Israel to be held captive in Babylon as a result of having neglected the Sabbath for 70 years; their captivity continued "until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfill threescore and ten years." (2 Chronicles 36:21) Did you know that this is the specific reason that Israel went into Babylonian captivity: not honoring the Sabbath?
Jesus "appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come." (Luke 10:1)
Jesus advocated that we forgive our brothers not seven times but "seventy times seven" times. (Matthew 18:22)
The number 70 then appears to be a number that indicates God's administration, not in heaven, but specifically here on earth, concerning mankind. In fact, Psalm 90:10 says that under normal circumstances "The days of our years are threescore years and ten…" Seventy becomes the number of years in a generation. Man himself is under God's administration.
Just an interesting side note.
Here's one more interesting side note:
During the listing in Genesis 46 of the descendants of Jacob we find this short line: "And the sons of Dan; Hushim." (Genesis 46:23)
Hushim was not the name of Dan's son. Hushim literally means "who makes haste" but is in this passage referring to all the sons of Dan who are not listed here at all; it is as though what is being said is "them" It is a slighting; a sign of disrespect that we are just starting to see, but that will continue throughout scripture giving Dan a very bad reputation; perhaps prophetically with good reason for they will be the ones later on who introduce idolatry into the Promised Land.
Have a happy and grateful Thanksgiving! Back on Monday.
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