Calvin: Commentary on Harmony of the Law, Vol. 1

Exodus 1

Exodus 1:1-7

1. Now these are the names of the children of Israel, which came into Egypt: every man and his household came with Jacob.

1. Haec sunt nomina filiorum Israel qui venerunt in Aegyptum cum Jahacob: quisque cum familia sua venit.

2. Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah,

2. Reuben, Simeon, Levi, et Jehudah,

3. Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin,

3. Issachar, Zabulon, et Benjamin,

4. Dan, Nephthali, Gad, and Asher.

4. Dan and Naphtali, Gad et Asher.

5. And all the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls: for Joseph was in Egypt already

5. Fuerunt autem omnes animae egressae ex femore Jahacob, septuaginta animae, Joseph autem erat in Aegypto.

6. And Joseph died, and all his brethren, and all that generation.

6. Mortuus vero est Joseph, et omnes fratres eius, et tota aetas illa.

7. And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them.

7. Porto creverunt filii Israel, et aucti sunt, et multiplicati et roborati quamplurimum; adeo ut plena ipsis esset terra.

1. These are the names It is the intention of Moses to describe the miraculous deliverance of the people, (from whence the Greeks gave the name to the book;) but, before he comes to that, he briefly reminds us that the promise given to Abraham was not ineffectual, that his seed should be multiplied

"as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea-shore." (Genesis 22:17.)

This, then, is the commencement of the book, -- that although their going down from the land of Canaan into Egypt might have seemed at the time as it were the end and abolition of God's covenant, yet in his own time he abundantly accomplished what he had promised to his servant as to the increase of his descendants. However, he only mentions by name the twelve patriarchs who went down with their father Jacob, and then sums up the whole number of persons, as in two other passages. (Genesis 46:27, and Deuteronomy 10:22.) The calculation is perfectly accurate, if Jacob is counted among the thirty and six souls in the first catalogue. For it is a far-fetched addition of the Rabbins to count in Jochebed the mother of Moses, to complete the number; and it is not probable that a woman, who was afterwards born in Egypt, should be reckoned among the men whom Jacob brought with him. If any object that the seventy are said to have…