God’s Word for You
Acts 7:11-16 Seventy-five in all
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Friday, December 13, 2019
11 “Then a famine came all through Egypt and Canaan, bringing great suffering, and our fathers could not find food. 12 It was when Jacob heard that there was bread in Egypt that he sent our fathers down the first time. 13 On their second visit, Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family. 14 Then Joseph sent for his father Jacob and his whole family, seventy-five in all. 15 Then Jacob went down to Egypt, and there he and our fathers died. 16 Their bodies were brought back to Shechem and placed in the tomb that Abraham had bought from the sons of Hamor at Shechem for its value in silver.
As Stephen continues to relate the details of the history of Israel in Egypt, a parallel is made with the covenant of circumcision which is also found in the sacrament of baptism. Just as the news of Joseph’s true identity, revealed to his family and to Pharaoh, changes the status of the family in Pharaoh’s eyes and brings on an invitation for everyone to live under Pharaoh’s care in Egypt, so also circumcision brought a change in status to the Hebrews as God invited them into his care. And baptism, too, reveals the true nature of Christ, who washed away our sins and now, through the washing of baptism, has invited us into God’s family and continuing care.
The reason they went down to Egypt was to find food. Bread was the staple food everywhere, and Egypt had grain in vast supply, thanks to Joseph’s planning based on dreams given by God to Pharaoh. The word Stephen uses here for “grain” is not sita “grain,” but sition, “bread, meal (made from grain).” This rare word only occurs here in the New Testament, but also in Proverbs 30:22 in the Greek translation of the Old Testament.
Returning to the historical account, Stephen reminds us that when Jacob and the patriarchs died, their bodies were carried back to Canaan so that they could be buried in the land of the promise. Jacob was buried, as Stephen says, in the Cave of Machpelah, but Joseph was buried at Shechem in land purchased by Jacob from the descendants of Hamor (Joshua 24:32). Since there was a dispute about worship in New Testament times between the Jews of Jerusalem and the Samaritans at Shechem (John 4:22), Stephen tactfully leaves out the detail about where Joseph was buried. This is the only passage of Scripture that says that all of the patriarchs (Joseph’s brothers) were buried in Canaan. One external source (Josephus) says that this was in Hebron, which is south of Bethlehem in Judah.
A famous issue we must focus some attention on is Stephen’s number “seventy-five” for the whole number of Jacob’s family. Moses says something different: “With the two sons who had been born to Joseph in Egypt, the members of Jacob’s family, which went to Egypt, were seventy in all” (Genesis 46:27). Moses repeats himself, not just once, but twice (Exodus 1:5; Deuteronomy 10:22). In two of these places (Genesis 46 and Exodus 1), the Greek Septuagint has numbered the group at 75 (perhaps Deuteronomy 10:22 slipped past unnoticed). To compensate for the discrepancy, the Greek Septuagint also has a different number earlier in Genesis 46:27, saying that “Nine sons were born to Joseph in Egypt.” There are different ways of making Moses’ 70 into Stephen’s 75.
1, Genesis 46:26 says that 66 souls went to Egypt with Jacob; adding Joseph and his two sons (Ephraim and Manasseh) and Jacob himself brings the number to 70, and then adding Ephraim’s two sons (Shuthelah and Tahan), a grandson (Edan or Eran, son of Tahan) and the two sons of Manasseh (Machir and Gilead), the total comes to 75. However, these extra names are also only found in the Greek Septuagint of Genesis 46:20, and therefore there is some doubt as to their authenticity. These names do not precisely match the listing of Joseph’s descendants in Numbers 26 nor in 1 Chronicles 2.
2, Using the number 66 from Genesis 46:26 and adding the “nine children” of Joseph in the Septuagint’s Genesis 46:27, seventy-five souls are neatly accounted for without needing to count Jacob as one of Jacob’s descendants.
3, Stephen is not making his own count. He simply quotes the Greek translation (the Septuagint) because that’s the Bible he knew (remember that Stephen and the other “seven” were Greek-speaking Hellenistic Christians).
The third option is my own conclusion, and (I’m happy to say) the choice of Professor Richard Balge, who came to the same conclusion in his People’s Bible volume, and which I did not consult until I had made up my own mind. Professor Balge says: “The Hebrew text is the inspired text and the translators (of the Septuagint) should not have changed the number to seventy-five. Stephen was not endorsing their error. He was simply quoting a translation which he and other Grecian Jews regularly used” (Acts p. 76).
Luther says: “It is an evident error or a piece of malice that they (the Septuagint translators) dared set down nine for the two souls born to Joseph in Egypt. And in Deuteronomy 10:22 only 70 souls are expressly mentioned. Augustine tries to excuse them and thinks that a mystery or some hidden wisdom is concealed under this. Therefore, I do not know whether this error was committed through the fault of the interpreters or because of ignorance or falsification on the part of the copyists. The text speaks clearly about the souls who entered Egypt, and even though Ephraim was born in the second year of plenty and Jacob migrated to his son in the second year of the famine, it is nevertheless impossible for a boy eight years old to have a wife and grandsons whom they considered (see the Septuagint’s names in Genesis 46:20). Accordingly, it seems that the translators of the Septuagint were too daring or that some rascal falsified their book. For one must not cover up this error. And there are also other passages in which they talked idly either out of ignorance or out of dishonesty. Therefore, I do not consider them authoritative.” (LW Vol. 8 p. 88-89).
Why be concerned whether there were seventy people or seventy-five along on the trip down to Egypt? It’s because we know that God keeps track of us and everything about us. Even if some men descended from Joseph could not keep track of their own grandfathers, God does. He counts our tears (Psalm 56:8); he numbers the very hairs of our heads (Luke 12:7). He knows everyone who belongs to him, and no one can snatch us from his hands.
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Ulm, Minnesota. To receive God’s Word for You via e-mail, please visit the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church website.