Benjamin, the twelfth son of Jacob, and his second son by Rachel, was off to a rough start. Age had taken its toll on his mother and she died after “great difficulty” in giving birth to him, Genesis 35:17. So Benjamin grew up without his mother.
Which made Jacob very sensitive about protecting him. So when Joseph wanted Benjamin sent to Egypt, Jacob refused to send him, because “If harm comes to him on the journey it’ll bring my grey head down to the grave in sorrow” (42:38).
So Benjamin was very much the protected boy. He was especially favoured by Joseph too (43:34, 45:22), and in Deuteronomy 33:12 Moses added yet another blessing on Benjamin, that because God loved Benjamin so much, he and his family could “rest secure” being “shielded by God all day long” and “resting between God’s shoulders,” as if God was always carrying Benjamin in his arms.
But when it came to Jacob predicting Benjamin’s future in Genesis 49:27, it sounds oddly conflicting, because he said Benjamin would become “a ravenous wolf” of all things. The youngest son and smallest tribe – and the most favoured by God – becoming a ferocious killer.
But in that violent culture the descendants of Benjamin the ravenous wolf would be the salvation of Israel on several occasions. It was Ehud, for instance, the left-handed Benjamite in Judges 3:12-30, who took it upon himself to rescue the Israelites from eighteen years of tyranny by Eglon, the obese king of Moab, and his Ammonite and Amalekite cronies (12-14). Ehud wasn’t the least bit squeamish either, about sinking his sword into Eglon all the way up to the hilt and beyond (21-22). He then led the Israelites into battle, striking down ten thousand of the strongest Moabite soldiers and bringing peace to Israel for eighty years (27-30).
And then there’s the Benjamite king Saul who, after “assuming rule over Israel,” in 1 Samuel 14:47-48, “fought against their enemies on every side and wherever he turned he inflicted punishment on them. He fought valiantly, delivering Israel from the hands of those who’d plundered them.” So it seems God had a purpose in the Benjamites being ravenous wolves that “devoured the prey and divided the plunder” in Genesis 49:27. And especially when we see the repercussions “When the wolf wasn’t the wolf”….(next blog)
