3. ‘Reuben, you are my firstborn,my might, the first sign of my strength,excelling in honour, excelling in power.
4. Turbulent as the waters, you will no longer excel,for you went up onto your father’s bed,onto my couch and defiled it.
5. ‘Simeon and Levi are brothers –their swords are weapons of violence.
6. Let me not enter their council,let me not join their assembly,for they have killed men in their angerand hamstrung oxen as they pleased.
7. Cursed be their anger, so fierce,and their fury, so cruel!I will scatter them in Jacoband disperse them in Israel.
8. ‘Judah, your brothers will praise you;your hand will be on the neck of your enemies;your father’s sons will bow down to you.
9. You are a lion’s cub, Judah;you return from the prey, my son.Like a lion he crouches and lies down,like a lioness – who dares to rouse him?
10. The sceptre will not depart from Judah,nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,until he to whom it belongs shall comeand the obedience of the nations shall be his.