Genesis 48:5

This clearly shows [that Jacob makes Ephraim and Manasseh his own]. Since Jacob had twelve sons, to whom the twelve tribes owed their existence, he distributed the two sons of Joseph into two tribes; and so the tribes became thirteen as the tribe of Joseph was divided between his two sons. And therefore Paul himself, the apostle, was related to these events. After being chosen among the tribes, he was counted the thirteenth after the apostles, and so he was sent to the Gentiles as apostle.

(Verse 5.) And now behold, your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine, Ephraim and Manasseh, just as Reuben and Simeon shall be mine. But any children born to you after them shall be yours. They shall be called by the names of their brothers. If anyone doubted that seventy persons, the children of Israel, had entered Egypt, and that at the time when Jacob entered Joseph had not nine but only two sons, this is confirmed in the present chapter. Indeed, Jacob himself speaks, saying that he had two sons, not nine. And what he says, 'Ephraim and Manasseh shall be mine, just as Reuben and Simeon,' that means, just as Reuben and Simeon were two tribes and were called by their own names, so Ephraim and Manasseh shall be two tribes, and they shall produce two peoples, and thus they shall inherit the land of promise, just like my sons. But the remaining sons, he says, whom you will bear after my death, showing that they were not yet born at that time, shall be yours.

And we the last became the first through faith, and the nation of the Gentiles inherited the glory of the firstborn. They obtained that honor through obedience and faith. And Christ himself testified about them by saying, "A people whom I did not know served me, with their ear's hearing they obeyed me." Even though we were born from a mother of different kinds, since the church was called among different nations, Christ is sufficient for us as a mediator, who unites us to God the Father, and ascribes some to the lot of the saints, and gives them the right glory and declares us to be a holy generation. But see how through Jacob's love for Joseph he placed the sons of Joseph among his own sons. And so we are also beloved in Christ, and after we were born again through him in a spiritual generation, we are received by the Father, as I have already said, and added to the saints who preceded us. In fact, if we have been called children of God the Father, we also must be under the power and control of the one who led us and united us to him, that is, Christ. See how the holy Jacob received Ephraim and Manasseh among his own sons: "As for the offspring born to you after them, they will be yours." You understand now that even though we are called children of God, nonetheless we will be children of Christ. And this is, I believe, what he says to the Father in another passage: "Those whom you gave me from the world were yours, and you gave them to me, and I have been glorified in them."

Joseph was eager to receive the blessing (Gen. XLVIII, 1 et seq.). Finally, he presented his sons Manasseh and Ephraim, whom Jacob blessed. And because he had twelve sons, and the thirteenth was to be the apostle Paul, as if a later chosen one, the thirteenth Tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim were sanctified in both, so that Paul would not be found outside the number of the paternal Tribes, who was an outstanding preacher of the Old and New Testament and could easily prove his inheritance of the paternal blessing.

), not only my grand-children, but as my own children." Though they were born in Egypt, and their father was then separated from his brethren, which might seem to have cut them off from the heritage of the Lord, yet Jacob takes them in, and owns them for visible church members.

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens+odd-straight-quotes