Was Jacob a Father of Nations?

Genesis 48:19 reads, "And his father [i.e., Jacob] refused, and said, I know it, my son [i.e., Joseph], I know it: he also shall become a people, and he also shall be great: but truly his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become a multitude of nations." A reader asks, "Was Jacob/Israel also the ancestor of nations other than Israel (Gen. 48:19)? If so, were they all Jewish/Israelitish and Hebrew speaking or not?"

The aged Jacob has just pronounced the blessing on Joseph’s two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. This blessing of Joseph’s two sons was done separately from the blessing of the other eleven sons. This blessing was undoubtedly before Jacob’s blessing of his other sons, because Joseph received part of the birthright blessing. Judah received that part of the blessing that made him lord of his brethren, and that most important part of the blessing, the covenant promise: Christ came from Judah. But Joseph received the double portion of his father’s inheritance because Joseph had two tribes among the twelve tribes: Manasseh and Ephraim.

Joseph brought Manasseh to a spot where Jacob could put his right hand on Manasseh’s head, and Joseph placed Ephraim where Jacob could reach him with his left hand. Joseph did this because Manasseh was the firstborn and ordinarily the firstborn received the birthright. The blessing of Jacob with his right hand gave to the one being blessed the pre-eminence. But when Jacob blessed the two boys, he crossed his arms so that his right hand was on Ephraim’s head and his left hand on Manasseh’s head. He did this because Ephraim, though not the firstborn, would occupy a place of pre-eminence over Manasseh. Joseph attempted to change the blessing so that the firstborn would have the pre-eminence, apparently thinking that Jacob made a mistake due to poor vision. But Jacob insisted on giving Ephraim the pre-eminence. And so it proved to be as Jacob’s prophecy was fulfilled. In fact, the Northern Kingdom was sometimes given the name Ephraim, indicating that Ephraim had a certain pre-eminence in Israel.

A better translation of "and his seed shall become a multitude of nations" is "and his seed shall become a fulness of people." It was a further explanation of "his younger brother shall be greater than he." That is, the tribe of Ephraim would be greater in number than the tribe of Manasseh. Throughout Scripture, Ephraim is more prominent than Manasseh.

Ephraim is not the father of a multitude of nations, for that designation belonged only to Abraham. The name Abraham means father of nations (17:5-6). In a certain sense, Isaac and Jacob could also be called fathers of nations, for the covenant blessing of the birthright went from Abraham to Isaac to Jacob to Judah and eventually to David, Solomon and Christ Himself. Yet the name especially fits Abraham and not those in the line of Christ who followed him.

There is a good reason why only Abraham could rightly bear that name and be what his name meant. With Abraham, God revealed a new truth with regard to His everlasting covenant, which He established with His elect people in Christ. That truth is the wonder that God saves His elect in the line of generations. While prior to Abraham God had also established and maintained His covenant in a line of generations, God had never explicitly made this clear to His people. Already in Paradise, God had told Adam and Eve that there would be war between the seed of the serpent and the seed of Christ (3:15). That suggests God’s work of realizing His covenant from the generations of His people. But God had never made a point of that stupendous truth. God did this explicitly when He told Abraham, "I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant" (17:7).

It is, of course, here that we have the crux of our controversy with Baptists: Who are the seed of Abraham? Baptists (and the Pharisees of Jesus’ day [John 8:33, 39, 53]) say the Jew only is the seed of Abraham. And, so Baptists teach, that in the new dispensation, only believers are the seed of Abraham.

As such, this is true, but Baptists mean that one can become a child of Abraham only by believing in Christ. And so children of believers, who are too young to believe, cannot be children of Abraham. The Scriptures speak differently.

Already in the old dispensation, God established His covenant in the line of generations. That means, first of all, that only in the line of generations did Christ come into the world. In fact, Christ is always centrally the seed of Abraham. When God said to Abraham, "I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee," Galatians 3:16 tells us that the meaning of what God said to Abraham was, "I will establish my covenant between Me and thee and Christ."

The distinction Scripture makes is not between children and adults, but between elect and reprobate (Rom. 9:6-13). The seed of Abraham are those who belong to Christ. These elect and redeemed people of God are to be found in the line of generations. This is true throughout the whole of history. Never, in all Scripture, is the "seed of Abraham" used to designate a Jew who is merely a natural descendant of Abraham. The term always refers to the elect children of God. Of course, they are also believers, for those whom God elected also receive from Him the gift of faith. But they are elect from the moment of conception, and they constitute the true seed of Abraham (Rom. 2:28-29; 4:16-18).

Whether one is Jew or Gentile, rich or poor, master or slave, male or female, adult or child (or baby)—those who are elect are children of Abraham. Abram is rightly called Abraham, father of many nations, for the redeemed are gathered from every nation under heaven.