Lehi now bestows a personal blessing on Joseph, a blessing that reflects his prophetic foreknowledge of his descendants’ agonies. He cannot bless Joseph that his descendants will escape that destruction but only that they will not be “utterly” destroyed. It is a bitter-sweet blessing, since it recognizes their all-but-certain destruction. Regardless of how we understand the final demise of the Nephites (into which the Josephites were politically and religiously subsumed), Joseph’s physical descendants will survive the political devastation. Here is another evidence that the labels “Nephite” and “Lamanite” are broader than mere tribal affiliation.