Genesis 48:14
And Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim’s head, who was the younger, and his left hand upon Manasseh’s head, guiding his hands wittingly; for Manasseh was the firstborn. And Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim’s head, who was the younger, and his left hand upon Manasseh’s head, guiding his hands wittingly; for Manasseh was the firstborn.
This crossing belongs to the history of Joseph and his brothers told in Genesis 42-50, opening after the seven years of dearth began just as Joseph had predicted, when dearth lay upon all lands yet bread remained in Egypt. Famine reached Canaan where Jacob lived, so ten of Jacob's sons journeyed to Egypt to buy grain and bowed with their faces to the earth before Joseph the ruler, whom they did not recognize because his Hebrew name had been changed and he no longer looked like the youth they had sold, though he knew them. Laying hands reverently upon the head was the Jewish custom by which a father blessed his children. Israel's action here is an example of that practice.
He placed his hands upon their heads deliberately. The form was significant as an acknowledged way of asking God to bestow His blessing upon those devoted to the specific work to which they had been appointed and which God had chosen for them. It carries the same meaning as when the ministers at Antioch laid their hands upon Paul and Barnabas, also called Saul, for the specific work God had chosen them to do.
The gesture expressed blessing and conveyed no power by the act itself. Like the hand of one with priestly authority laid upon the head of an animal devoted to sacrifice, the act added no new grace or qualification but set the seal of blessing and designation upon a commission already given by God.