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Genesis 46:1
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Jacob’s Journey to Egypt

1 So Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to aBeersheba, and offered sacrifices bto the God of his father Isaac.  
2 Then God spoke to Israel ain the visions of the night, and said, “Jacob, Jacob!” And he said, “Here I am.”  
3 So He said, “I am God, athe God of your father; do not fear to go down to Egypt, for I will bmake of you a great nation there.  
4 aI will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also surely bbring you up again; and cJoseph will put his hand on your eyes.”  
5 Then aJacob arose from Beersheba; and the sons of Israel carried their father Jacob, their little ones, and their wives, in the1 carts bwhich Pharaoh had sent to carry him.  
6 So they took their livestock and their goods, which they had acquired in the land of Canaan, and went to Egypt, aJacob and all his descendants with him.  
7 His sons and his sons’ sons, his daughters and his sons’ daughters, and all his descendants he brought with him to Egypt.
8 Now athese were the names of the children of Israel, Jacob and his sons, who went to Egypt: bReuben was Jacob’s firstborn.  
Commentaries:
Forerunner Commentary
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What Does Genesis 46:1 Mean?



Genesis 46:1-7

By their own choice, the family of Israel went into a self-imposed exile, from Canaan to Egypt. We see in verse 3 that God Himself wanted this to occur. He had plans for Israel, and the Israelites had to go through this period of Egypt as part of that plan. They did not realize at the time that this voluntary sojourn in Egypt would lead to their forced slavery. Several generations would pass until the time they would be put under bitter bondage, when the Pharaoh would go so far as to call for all the sons of Israel to be killed after their birth.

It was only by God's mighty power in the Exodus that they were ever able to leave Egypt; they could not have done it on their own. In their minds, they were half-Egyptian by that time, perhaps even more. They really did not want to leave. Sure, they loved the idea of freedom, but as soon as they left Egypt, they wanted to go back.

It is ironic how hard it was for them to return to Canaan because they had forgotten that their real homeland was in the land of Canaan, not in Egypt. They had taken the place of their exile as home. They had become so enmeshed in the culture of Egypt that they considered it their own. We see this when, only a month out, they forced Aaron to bring some of that culture back into their lives in the form of a Golden Calf.

Richard T. Ritenbaugh
How to Survive Exile

Related Topics: Bondage | Bondage to Satan | Bondage to Sin | Bondage, Release from | Bondage, Spiritual | Exile | Golden Calf | Sin, Bondage to | Slavery | Spiritual Bondage


 
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