Hebrews 11:20–22

Hebrews 11:20 — Isaac: Blessing by faith, not by sight The author's choice to highlight Isaac's blessing of Jacob and Esau (Gen 27; 28:1–4) is precise and deliberate. By human reckoning, this was the scene of Jacob's deception — and yet the author of Hebrews interprets it entirely through the lens of faith. The phrase "even concerning things to come" (καὶ περὶ μελλόντων) is the crux: Isaac's blessing was not a transaction about the present but a prophetic act reaching forward into God's economy. The Greek particle καί ("even") signals something surprising — that the blessing held, that it was efficacious, despite being extracted under conditions of deceit. Catholic tradition has never read this as an endorsement of Jacob's trickery; rather, it recognizes that God's providential purpose was accomplished through and beyond human frailty. Isaac's trembling but irreversible declaration — "I have blessed him — yes, and he shall be blessed" (Gen 27:33) — becomes a type of the irrevocable nature of divine election. The two blessings, though differentiated (Jacob's primatial, Esau's contingent), both point toward futures that neither patriarch nor son would see in their lifetimes.

Hebrews 11:21 — Jacob: Worship at the threshold of death Jacob's act is two-layered: the blessing of Ephraim and Manasseh (Gen 48) and the act of worship, "leaning on the top of his staff." The Hebrews author draws on the Septuagint (LXX) version of Genesis 47:31, which reads "he bowed in worship over the head of his staff" (ἐπὶ τὸ ἄκρον τῆς ῥάβδου αὐτοῦ), whereas the Masoretic Hebrew reads "he bowed at the head of the bed" — a difference arising from how the unvocalised consonants מטה (matteh) are read: "staff" or "bed." The Hebrews author's use of the LXX reading is theologically significant: the staff was a symbol of pilgrimage, of the sojourner's identity. Jacob, at death's door, worships with the implement of a wanderer — a man who knows he has not yet arrived. The deliberate crossing of his hands to place his right hand on the younger Ephraim (Gen 48:14), overriding Joseph's protest, repeats the pattern of primogeniture overturned by divine election — a pattern running from Abel to Isaac to Jacob himself. Jacob's blessing of "each of the sons of Joseph" (ἕκαστον) emphasises the individual character of faith's transmission; the covenant is not absorbed into a tribe but entrusted personally.

Hebrews 11:22 — Joseph: Faith inscribed on his bones Of all the acts highlighted in this chapter, Joseph's is perhaps the most striking in its material specificity. On the threshold of death, Joseph does not prophesy dramatically or perform a priestly rite; he makes a practical instruction about where to bury his corpse (Gen 50:24–25; cf. Exod 13:19). Yet the author of Hebrews reads this as the supreme expression of faith. Joseph names the Exodus — "the departure (ἔξοδον) of the children of Israel" — before it happens, across approximately four centuries of enslavement. His bones become a pledge, a standing commitment, a promissory note staked in the earth of Canaan. He does not ask merely to be remembered; he asks to be carried. His skeleton will make the journey he cannot. The Greek ἐξοδοῦ (departure/exodus) is the same root as the book of Exodus and, in Luke 9:31, describes Christ's own "departure" at the Transfiguration. This verbal echo is not accidental in typological reading: Joseph's bones point forward to the true Exodus accomplished by Christ.

Typological and spiritual senses Read together, these three men illustrate faith functioning specifically as prospective trust — belief in a promise not yet realized. Each act occurs "at the end" (ἀποθνήσκων, "dying," in vv. 21–22) or in old age — the moment when human resources are exhausted and only faith remains. The Fathers identified in this triad a theology of death transfigured: these men die into the promise, not away from it.

Catholic theology illuminates this passage with particular richness through three lenses: the theology of blessing, the communion of saints, and eschatological hope.

The theology of blessing: The Catechism teaches that blessing is fundamentally a divine act that, through human mediation, communicates God's own life (CCC 1078–1082). Isaac and Jacob do not merely offer good wishes; they mediate a grace that belongs to God. This is consistent with the Catholic understanding that patriarchal blessings are proto-sacramental — visible signs through which invisible divine realities are communicated. St. John Chrysostom, in his Homilies on Hebrews (Homily 27), marvels that Isaac blessed "with such authority as if he were lord of everything," concluding that faith gave him a dominion over the future that was genuinely divine in character.

The communion of saints and hope: The Catechism's treatment of the "cloud of witnesses" (Heb 12:1) draws directly on this section of chapter 11, presenting the patriarchs as active members of a living tradition of faith that the Church inherits (CCC 2683). Origen observed that Joseph's command about his bones meant that he was "already, in hope, dwelling in the land of promise" (Homilies on Genesis). This anticipates the Catholic doctrine that the saints are united with the living Church across time — their acts of faith remain present and generative for us.

Typology and the Exodus: The Second Vatican Council's Dei Verbum §15 affirms that the Old Testament retains "permanent value" precisely because it foreshadows the mystery of salvation in Christ. Joseph's reference to the ἔξοδον prefigures not only the historical Exodus under Moses but the definitive Exodus of Christ — his Passover from death to resurrection (cf. Luke 9:31). St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Commentary on Hebrews, notes that all three patriarchs act "in virtue of the divine promise," which is the formal object of faith itself (Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 1, a. 7).

Contemporary Catholics are regularly invited to make acts of faith that will bear fruit only after their deaths — in the lives of their children, in parishes they help build, in vocations they nurture. These three patriarchs model something deeply counter-cultural: the willingness to invest with total seriousness in a future one will never personally inhabit.

Isaac's blessing despite deception challenges the common tendency to withdraw our generosity when circumstances are impure or disappointing. Jacob's worship while leaning on a pilgrim's staff is a vivid image for elderly or dying Catholics — the posture of a sojourner who has not yet arrived, worshipping anyway. His act can inspire Catholics facing terminal illness to make concrete, forward-looking acts of blessing over their families rather than retreating into passivity.

Joseph's request about his bones is perhaps the most practically challenging: he asked his family to carry the weight of his hope with them for four hundred years. Catholic parents, grandparents, teachers, and priests are called to a similar act — entrusting to others the continuation of a journey they cannot complete. Praying for grandchildren not yet born, supporting seminarians one will never see ordained, funding a school building one will never enter — these are Josephine acts of faith, faith inscribed on the bones of one's legacy.