When Jacob “gathers his sons around to tell them what will happen to them in days to come” in Genesis 49:1, he says in verse 9, “You are a lion’s cub, O Judah.”
And when Moses pronounced blessings on the Israelite tribes just before his death in Deuteronomy 33:1, he says in verse 22, “Dan is a lion’s cub,” so in nature and strength Judah and Dan are brother lions. They’re both called “cubs,” but the adult lions of the future are in the making.
They made a great team too. When the Israelites traveled as a troop, they had the lion cub Judah leading them at the front and the lion cub Dan at the back, making sure no stragglers were left behind. Between the two lion cubs, therefore, Israel had both a rear guard to fend off a surprise attack from behind, and a spear head up front to take on all comers who dared to stand in their way as they moved forward.
God also used the collaboration between Judah and Dan when choosing one man from each tribe to team up and lead in the building of the tabernacle in Exodus 35. He chose Bezalel from Judah, “filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts – to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver and bronze, to cut and set stones and work in wood” (30-33). To Oholiab from Dan he gave “the ability to teach others,” and together with Bezalel they led and taught a highly skilled team of “craftsmen, designers, embroiderers in blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen, and weavers….to whom the Lord had given ability” (35:34 to 36:1).
So again the pair of lion cubs combined forces to play an essential part together in Israel. It looks like a pattern emerging, and of God’s choosing too – which Scripture hints at again when describing Israel’s boundaries in Canaan as being “from Dan to Beersheba” (Judges 20:1). Dan was the northern most boundary (Joshua 19:40-48), and Beersheba in the region of Simeon and Judah the furthest south (Joshua 15:20-28, 19:1-2). Just like the Israelite tribes travelling through the wilderness were between Judah at the front and Dan at the back, so all the tribes in Canaan were between Dan in the north and Judah in the south.
Is there any further significance, then, in God combining Dan and Judah? Yes, in what Jacob predicted for the two of them in Genesis 49 that shows “The need for both justice and law”….(next blog)
