And forty days were fulfilled for him. We have shown already that Moses is speaking of a ceremonial mourning; and therefore he does not prescribe it as a law, or produce it as an example which it is right for us to follow. For, by the laws, certain days were appointed, in order that time might be given for the moderating of grief in some degree; yet something also was conceded to ambition. Another rule, however, for restraining grief is given to us by the Lord. And Joseph stooped, more than he ought, to the perverted manners of the Egyptians; for the world affects to believe that whatever is customary is lawful; so that what generally prevails, carries along everything it meets, like a violent inundation. The seventy days which Moses sets apart to solemn mourning, Herodotus, in his second book, assigns to the embalming. But Diodorus writes that the seasoning of the body was completed in thirty days. Both authors diligently describe the method of embalming. And though I will not deny that, in the course of time, the skill and industry in practicing this art increased, yet it appears to me probable that this method of proceeding was handed down from the fathers. [1]

Footnotes

1 - It would appear that the mourning for Jacob was a kind of royal mourning. "On the death of every Egyptian king, a general mourning was instituted throughout the country for seventy-two days." -- Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, by Sir J. G. Wilkinson, vol. 1, p. 255. -- Ed.

Forty days - The body it appears required this number of days to complete the process of embalming; afterwards it lay in natron thirty days more, making in the whole seventy days, according to the preceding accounts, during which the mourning was continued.

And forty days were fulfilled for him; for so are fulfilled the days of those which are embalmed: and the Egyptians mourned for him (b) threescore and ten days.
(b) They were more excessive in lamenting than the faithful.

Forty days were fulfilled for him,.... Were spent in embalming him:
for so are fulfilled the days of those that are embalmed; so long the body lay in the pickle, in ointment of cedar, myrrh and cinnamon, and other things, that it might soak and penetrate thoroughly into it: and so Diodorus Siculus (d) says, that having laid more than thirty days in such a state, it was delivered to the kindred of the deceased:
and the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days; during the time of their embalming him; for longer than seventy days the body might not lie in the pickle, as before observed, from Herodotus. According to Diodorus Siculus (e), the Egyptians used to mourn for their kings seventy two days: the account he gives is, that"upon the death of a king, all Egypt went into a common mourning, tore their garments, shut up their temples, forbid sacrifices, kept not the feasts for seventy two days, put clay upon their heads (f), girt linen clothes under their breasts; men and women, two or three hundred together, went about twice a day, singing in mournful verses the praises of the deceased; they abstained from animal food, and from wine, and all dainty things; nor did they use baths, nor ointments, nor lie in soft beds, nor dared to use venery, but, as if it was for the death of a beloved child, spent the said days in sorrow and mourning.''Now these seventy days here are either a round number for seventy two, or two are taken from them, as Quistorpius suggests, to make a difference between Jacob, and a king of theirs, who yet being the father of their viceroy, they honoured in such a manner. Jarchi accounts for the number thus, forty for embalming, and thirty for mourning; which latter was the usual time for mourning with the Jews for principal men, and which the Egyptians added to their forty of embalming; see Numbers 20:29.
(d) lBibliothec. l. 1. p. 82. (e) lbid. p. 65. (f) Vid. Pompon. Mela de Situ Orbis, l. 1. c. 9.

the Egyptians mourned, &c. It was made a period of public mourning, as on the death of a royal personage.

He observed the ceremony of solemn mourning for him. Forty days were taken up in embalming the body, which the Egyptians had an art of doing so curiously, as to preserve the very features of the face unchanged. All this time, and thirty days more, seventy in all, they either confined themselves and sat solitary, or when they went out, appeared in the habit of close mourners, according to the decent custom of the country. Even the Egyptians, many of them, out of the respect they had for Joseph, put themselves into mourning for his father.