Origen, on Gen 46:4

“I will go down with thee thither, and will bring thee back again from thence: Joseph also shall put his hands upon thy eyes.”

“But I think a still greater mystery lies hidden in this passage. For this statement disturbs me: "I will make a great nation of you, and I will go down with you into Egypt, and I will recall you from there in the end." Who is it who is made "into a great nation" in Egypt and is recalled "in the end"? To the extent that it pertains to that Jacob of whom one supposes it to be said, it will not appear true. For he was not recalled from Egypt "in the end," since he died in Egypt. But it will be absurd if someone says Jacob was recalled by God in that his body was carried back. But if it is accepted, it will not be true that "God is not the God of the dead but of the living." It is not proper, therefore, that these words be understood of a dead body but that they apply to the living and vigorous.Let us consider therefore whether there may be depicted in this statement a figure of the Lord who descends into this world and is made "into a great nation," that is, the church of the Gentiles, and after all things were completed, returned to the Father. Or, whether it is a figure of "the first-formed man" who descends to the struggles of this world after he was cast out of the delights of paradise. The struggle with the serpent was set before him when it is said, "You shall watch for his head, and he shall watch for your heel," and again, when it is said to the woman, "I will put enmity between you and him, and between your seed and his seed." Nevertheless God does not desert those placed in this struggle but is always with them. He is pleased with Abel; he reproaches Cain; he is present with Enoch, when he is invoked. He commands Noah to construct an ark of salvation in the flood; he leads Abraham "from the house of his father" and "from his kinsmen"; he blesses Isaac and Jacob; he leads the sons of Israel out of Egypt. He writes the law of the letter through Moses. He completes what was lacking through the prophets. This is what it means to be with them in Egypt. But regarding the statement "I will recall you from there in the end," I think this means, as we said above, that at the end of the ages his only-begotten Son descended even into the nether regions for the salvation of the world and recalled "the first-formed man" from there. For what he said to the thief, "This day you shall be with me in paradise," understand not to have been said to him alone but also to all the saints for whom he had descended into the nether regions. In this man, therefore, more truly than in Jacob the words "I will recall you from there in the end" will be fulfilled.”

Imported from an open dataset — not yet checked against the printed edition.