No 20

(The tribes of Simeon and Levi)

These two tribes did not receive a blessing from their father Jacob but rather they were given a curse. We read in Genesis 49:5 & 7 “Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.” Earlier in the book of Genesis in chapter 34, these two brothers had done something that brought a curse to Jacob’s family. They had destroyed a group of people through trickery because the son of the prince of this people had slept with Jacob’s daughter, Dinah and wanted to have her as his wife. Levi and Simeon had agreed to this on one condition – that the whole city become Jewish with circumcision for the males. When the circumcision had been performed, Simeon and Levi attacked that city and destroyed it.

How were they punished? The tribe of Simeon got smaller and smaller. In the book of Numbers we read that the Simeonites went from 59,300 in Numbers 1:23 to 22,200 in Numbers 26:14. Levi would have been punished in the same way but the Levites stood with Moses when he came down from the mountain and found the Children of Israel had built an idol in the form of a golden calf and yelled “Who is on the Lord’s side” (Exod 32:26). They were excluded in the numbering of the tribes (Num 1:47) and instead of diminishing in size, the Levites were assigned the task of the priesthood (Num 1:50). They were given cities within the tribes of Israel (Numbers 35), including the 6 cities of refuge that we saw last week. The prophecy by Jacob in Genesis 49 stands true “I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.”