Part 1 of an overview of the story of Jacob in Genesis 25-34 with some commentary. Check out part two here.
In Genesis Chapter 25, Abraham sent his sons from his second wife, Keturah (after Sarah’s death), to the east with their inheritance. Then Abraham dies at the age of 175, leaving everything to Isaac, his son from his first wife, Sarah. Abraham is buried by Isaac (Abraham’s son from his first wife Sarah) and Ishmael (Abraham’s firstborn from his servant Hagar) in the cave of Machpelah in Hebron with Sarah. This occurred when Isaac was 75 and Ishmael was 89, and Jacob and Esau were 15 years old. After ending the saga of Abraham, this chapter gives the genealogy of Ishmael and his 12 sons, and Ishmael’s saga is wrapped up here, stating that he dies at 137 (48 years after Abraham’s death). Ishmael is the father of the Ishmaelites, and they occupied the region from Havilah to Shur, east of Egypt, in the direction of Asshur. There, they lived in open hostility toward all their relatives.
Then the chapter gives a flashback to 15 years before Abraham’s death, to the time of the birth of Jacob and Esau. Isaac and Rebekah got married when Isaac was 40, and they had no children for 20 years because she was barren. Then, when Isaac was 60, he prayed to God for his wife to conceive, and she gave birth to the twins, Esau and Jacob. While she was pregnant with them, they struggled in the womb, and when Rebekah asked God about it, God prophesied to her that there would be contention between the two and Jacob would win. Esau was named Esau because of his hairy body. Jacob means “heel” or “supplant” because he was holding on to Esau’s heel when Esau was born, and it was prophesied that he would supplant or replace Esau. The chapter returns to the present after Abraham’s death, and Esau has just returned exhausted and hungry from hunting, while Jacob is cooking a red lentil stew. Jacob would only give him some if he gave up his birthright, and Esau agreed to do so. Esau didn’t value his birthright much since he gave it up for lentil stew and some bread. Esau’s name would later change to Edom (father of the Edomites), which means red, since the stew he traded his birthright for was red, and when he was born, his skin was a reddish color. Later on, in Genesis 32:22-28, Jacob wrestles with a messenger of God (an angel) and receives the name Israel, which becomes his permanent name from God. This is confirmed in Genesis 35:9-10, when he returns from Paddan-Aram (where he obtained wives) to Bethel, where his father had lived.
In Chapter 26, famine hits the Negev, and Isaac, who is at least 75, moves to Gerar, where King Abimelech ruled. Isaac repeated the tricks of his father by lying and saying his wife was his sister out of fear that someone would kill him for her, but Abimelech found out Isaac was lying. God blessed Isaac that year and made him very rich in crops and livestock. The Philistines were jealous of Isaac and filled up his father’s wells with dirt, sending Isaac away to the Gerar Valley. Isaac and the Philistines had strife over water rights for a while until Abimelech made a treaty with Isaac, like he did with his father Abraham, and they even named the place of the oath Beersheba (just like the Oath between Abimelech and Abraham). Later, when Esau and Jacob were 40 (and Isaac was 100), Esau married two Hittite women, Judith, the daughter of Beeri, and Basemath, the daughter of Elon, but his parents disapproved of them.
Comment: The Philistines initially only respected Abraham when Abimelech made the oath with him, and when he died, they sealed up the wells because they didn’t care for Isaac. God, however, moved on Isaac’s behalf and gave him the same favor that his father had with the Philistines in Gerar.
In Chapter 27, Esau was a hunter, and Isaac took pride in that, making him Isaac’s favorite son. At this time, Esau (and Jacob) are around 77 years old at most, making Isaac 137. Isaac is starting to go blind, so he figures it is time to pass on the blessing before he dies. One day, he promised Esau the blessing if he went out and brought him some wild game and prepared his favorite dish. As Esau went out to do it, Rebekah overheard and devised a scheme to trick Isaac into giving Jacob the blessing instead. She had Jacob bring her two young goats, and she would prepare Isaac’s favorite meal. Jacob is concerned that Isaac will see through the plan and curse him instead because, even though he is blind, he will know from feeling Jacob’s skin that he is not his hairy brother Esau. Rebekah says not to worry and that she will take any curse against him from Isaac. While preparing the meal, she removed the hairy goat skins and had Jacob bind them to his arms and neck, and then gave Jacob some of Esau’s clothes, which smelled like the wilderness. Jacob took the meal from Isaac, pretending to be Esau.
At first, Isaac didn’t believe him. He was suspicious because the meal was prepared too quickly, and Jacob’s voice didn’t match Esau’s. Jacob said God put the game right in front of him, so he got the game immediately. The smell of Esau’s clothes and the texture of the goat hair helped sell Jacob’s lie. Isaac ate the meal and gave Jacob the blessing, saying that he would be “blessed with an abundant harvest of grain and new wine from the dew of heaven and richness of the earth and that he would rule over other nations including his brother, and all who curse him will be cursed and those who bless him will be blessed”. Then shortly afterward, Esau arrived with the freshly cooked game he had hunted. Isaac realized what had happened and told Esau that Jacob had taken the blessing, and Esau was bitter and angry at Jacob for tricking him twice. He begged Isaac for a blessing, and Isaac gave him a simple blessing that said Esau would “live by the sword and would not inherit the abundance of the dew of heaven or the richness of the earth as Jacob would, and Jacob would rule over him, but Esau would break free eventually”. Esau threatened to kill Jacob after their father died. However, Rebekah had a plan for Jacob to escape to the house of her brother Laban in Haran, while Esau calms down. Rebekah will have him go there under the guise of getting wives from among her relatives. Then she starts her campaign by complaining about Esau’s Hittite wives to Isaac.
Comment: Esau’s “blessing” was that he would be a servant of his brother and eventually break free. This is fulfilled when King David subjugates Edom, and they revolt at the time of King Jehoram. The Edomites are subjugated to David in 2 Samuel 8:11-14. Joab, David’s commander, attempted to kill off almost all the males in Edom, but a man named Hadad and some royal officials escaped to Egypt. Later in Solomon’s reign, Hadad left Egypt to start a revolt in Edom against Israel, becoming a thorn in Solomon’s side (1 Kings 11:14-25). This was because Solomon had turned the nation away from God’s laws. Later on, it is noted that the Edomites were still subjugated and had no king just a deputy (1 Kings 22:47), and the King of Judah used them to help him and the king of Israel fight off the Moabites (2 Kings 3) who were previously subjected by David (2 Samuel 8:11-12). However, in 2 Kings 8:20-22, the Edomites finally threw off the yoke of Judah and Israel.
In Chapter 28, Isaac sends Jacob off to Paddan-aram (Haran) to get wives from among Rebekah’s nieces. Esau realized that his father disapproved of his wives after seeing him send Jacob off to get wives from among his cousins, so he went to the Ishmaelites and got Mahalath, Ishmael’s daughter, from her brother Nebaioth. Jacob sleeps in the wilderness at a place called Luz and has a dream of a ladder of angels from heaven going up and down. God reiterated his promise to Abraham, his grandfather, and Isaac, his father, that Jacob’s descendants would inherit the land of Canaan. When Jacob awoke, he made an altar to God, and he recognized the place where he had slept as a holy site, naming it Beth-El, meaning “house of God.” Jacob dedicated himself to God and promised to give him 10% of everything he owned.
Comment: One note is that at the time Jacob flees to Paddan-aram to live with Laban, he and Esau are 77 years old. Ishmael died 48 years after Abraham died. Jacob and Esau were 15 when this happened, so they were 63 (and Isaac was 123) when Ishmael died. This is why Nebaioth, Ishmael’s oldest son, is mentioned when Esau goes to get a third wife from the Ishmaelites. Ishmael has been dead for 14 years, and his oldest son would be the one to give his daughter away to a man for marriage.
In Chapter 29, Jacob arrives in Paddan-aram, and he meets some shepherds who are waiting at a well for watering their livestock. Jacob asks them if they know Nahor, and they do, and that they were waiting on his great-granddaughter to come with her father’s flock so they could water the flocks together. Rachel, the daughter of Laban, the grandson of Nahor, arrives, and Jacob is captivated by her. He moves the stone from the well so that she can water her flock and tells her that he is her cousin, descended from Isaac and Rebekah. She reports this to her father, Laban. Jacob tells Laban his story, and Laban agrees to take him in and pay Jacob to work for him. Jacob wants to marry Rachel, and Laban agrees to give him Rachel in marriage if he works for him for seven years. Rachel had an older sister named Leah, but she wasn’t as attractive to Jacob as Rachel. After seven years of work, Laban arranged the wedding for Jacob and Rachel, but before the consummation that night, Laban sent Leah instead of Rachel, and Jacob slept with her without realizing it. He confronted Laban about his trickery the next morning. Laban claimed it was customary for the older daughters to get married first and promised to give him Rachel after the bridal week, in exchange for another seven years of work, of course. Jacob agreed to work another seven years and married both sisters, and they each came with their own maids, Zilpah and Bilhah, respectively. Since seven years had passed since he left his father’s house, Jacob was 84 when he married Leah and Rachel. Jacob showed more favor and affection for Rachel than Leah because she was his favorite wife. God saw how Jacob was treating Leah and made Rachel barren, while Leah was fertile and gave him four sons: Reuben (“seen her misery”), Simeon (“heard her cries”), Levi (“feeling affection”), and Judah (“praise”).
The first part of Chapter 30 spans the next seven years, beginning when Jacob is 84 and concluding when he is 91 years old. Leah gives Jacob four sons. Rachel grows jealous of the fact that Leah is having children, and she isn’t, so she gives Jacob her maid, Bilhah, to have children for her. Bilhah had two sons from Jacob, and Rachel named them Dan (“judged” or “vindicated”) and Naphtali (“her struggle”). Leah wasn’t having any more children and grew jealous of Rachel’s cheating by using her maid Bilhah, and decided to do the same with her own maid Zilpah. Zilpah had two sons from Jacob, and Leah named them Gad (“good fortune”) and Asher (“happy”).
One day, Reuben found some mandrakes during the harvest and gave them to his mother, Leah. Mandrakes were a plant whose roots were believed to aid in childbirth. Rachel asked for her Mandrakes and, in exchange, would let Leah sleep with Jacob that night. Leah got pregnant again with a fifth son, Issachar (“reward”), and later a sixth son, Zebulun (“honor”). The last child we know of that comes from Leah is a daughter named Dinah. Rachel felt ashamed and disgraced that she had no natural children. God showed her mercy, and she became pregnant with Joseph (“added another son”). Joseph was born when Jacob was 91 years old and had now finished the 14 years of work for Laban and wished to go home. Laban didn’t want him to leave as he considered Jacob a good luck charm because of the blessing on him. Laban wants to pay him to stay, so Jacob agrees to take any speckled and spotted goats and black sheep from his flock. Laban removes all the speckled flock animals and gives them to his sons so that Jacob can’t leave. God gives Jacob a way out using bark from poplar, almond, and plane trees. He puts them near where the flocks drank, which is where they also mated. This caused them to give birth to speckled and spotted goats, as well as black sheep. Jacob separated those flock animals and continued this trick to make more spotted animals. He bred them so that the healthier, stronger animals would become spotted, allowing him to keep them, while the weaker animals would be the unspotted ones for Laban. Jacob made himself very rich this way.
In Chapter 31, it is revealed that Jacob had been doing the speckled flock trick for six years. This means he worked for Laban for 20 years in servitude, and Jacob was now 97 years old. Laban’s sons realized what Jacob was doing and started grumbling about it, and Laban’s attitude towards Jacob changed. God tells Jacob to leave that year, and God promised to protect him. Jacob told Rachel and Leah about how their father had been cheating him by constantly changing the terms of their agreement, but God had blessed him in the process. He revealed that God had told him in a dream about a method of manipulation through breeding that would put the wealth in Jacob’s hands, and it would bless him for all the trouble Laban had caused. Rachel and Leah agreed to leave because their father had eliminated their inheritance and reduced their rights to those of foreign women, and had wasted all the money Jacob had given him for the bride price. They said all the wealth God has given Jacob legally belongs to them and their children anyway, so they are better off without their father. Jacob leaves Paddan-aram with his family, servants, and livestock for Gilead in secret. While Laban is far away shearing sheep, Rachel secretly steals some of Laban’s idols. After three days, Laban realized what Jacob had done and went after Jacob with a band of his relatives, but God warned Laban in a dream that Jacob was protected and Laban couldn’t harm him. When Laban caught up with Jacob in Gilead, he confronted him for sneaking off with his daughters without saying goodbye and stealing his idols, and even told Jacob that if it weren’t for God’s protection, he would kill him. Jacob was not aware of the stolen idols and had no idea what Laban was talking about. Laban was allowed to search Jacob’s family’s possessions. Rachel was sitting on them, and when Laban came to search her belongings, she claimed she was menstruating and she didn’t want to get up, so he let her be and never found them.
Jacob scolded Laban for mistreating him for the past 20 years. Jacob said he had never stolen from him and had done good work. When a wild animal ate Laban’s livestock, Jacob dealt with the loss himself, paying for all of Laban’s lost animals. Jacob says Laban changed his wages 10 times, as he worked in the scorching heat for 14 years for his daughters and six more years for his flock. If it weren’t for God’s favor, Laban would have sent Jacob away empty-handed. Laban claimed that the daughters and grandchildren were his, but he agreed to make a covenant with Jacob where neither would harm the other, and he made Jacob swear not to marry any other wives. Jacob had everyone gather some stones and put them in a pile, and they had a covenant meal in front of it; Jacob then offered sacrifices. To commemorate the event, Laban called the place Jegar-sahadutha (meaning “witness pile” in Aramaic), and Jacob called it Galeed (meaning “witness pile” in Hebrew). The piles of stones functioned as ceremonial witnesses to the covenant. Laban kissed his daughters and grandchildren goodbye and left Jacob in peace.
In Chapter 32, Jacob is visited by messengers of God (angels) and names the place Mahanaim, meaning two camps, because it was his camp and God’s camp. Jacob sent his own messengers ahead of him to meet Esau, who was living in Seir, to inform Esau that he was coming. Esau sent the messengers back and said they were on their way to meet Jacob in the middle, and they reported that Esau was traveling with 400 men. This scared Jacob, so he decided to appease him by sending three waves of gifts of livestock with servants ahead of him. He prayed to God to give him favor with Esau and protect him from Esau’s fury. Jacob sent his wives, children, and prized possessions across the Jabbok River and isolated himself from them. That night, he wrestled with a man (presumably an angel) until dawn. The man popped Jacob’s hip out of its socket and told Jacob to let him go, but Jacob held on and refused to let him go until the man blessed him. The man gave him the new name, “Israel,” because he “wrestled with God.” The man blessed Jacob and departed, and Jacob named the place Peniel, meaning “face of God.”
Comment: Jacob wrestled with someone who was believed to have the “face of God.” Some have speculated that this could be a pre-incarnate Christ. There are other instances in the Old Testament where a humanoid is referred to as the Lord, like the leader of the three men who visit Abraham in Genesis 18.
Chapter 33 picks up right after Chapter 32, and Jacob sees Esau coming and organizes his wives and children, with the maids and their children first, then Leah and her children, and Rachel and Joseph last. Just in case Esau attacks, he wants Rachel and Joseph to have the best chance of escape. Jacob then runs ahead and bows down to Esau seven times. Esau runs to him and hugs him, and they wept together. Esau inquired about the women and children, as well as the gifts, and Jacob introduced his family, insisting that Esau take the gifts of livestock. Esau invited him to come to Seir with him, and Jacob said he needed to go at his own pace for the sake of the young children and animals. So Esau went ahead, while Jacob stopped to rest and built shelters along the way for his young animals, and he called the place Succoth (“shelters”). Jacob eventually arrived at Shechem and bought a plot of land outside the city from the local clan leader, Hamor, the father of Shechem. Then Jacob built an altar and called it El-Elohe-Israel (“God, the God of Israel”).
In Chapter 34, prince Shechem spotted Dinah (Leah’s daughter) in the city and raped her. He then became infatuated with her and tried to win her affection. He asked his father to purchase her as a wife from Jacob. Hamor, Shechem’s father went to meet with Jacob to discuss Dinah, but her brothers came in from the field to the meeting, they just found out she was raped and were angry with Shechem. Hamor tried to smooth things over by offering a mutual exchange of marriages between daughters on both sides, as well as access to land and trade, and Hamor offered to let them live amongst the people of Shechem as citizens instead of foreigners. Shechem himself agreed to pay any dowry they asked. Dinah’s brothers hatched a scheme to exact revenge for their sister. They said that all of the men of Shechem would have to be circumcised first for the Israelites to live amongst them and intermarry. Shechem was highly respected in town since he was the son of Hamor and convinced the men to get all circumcised in exchange for the Israelite daughters and livestock. Three days after they all get circumcised and are still recovering, Simeon and Levi take advantage and attack the town. They killed all of the men while they were too weak to fight back, and they rescued Dinah. Then the other sons of Jacob go in and plunder the town of its wealth, livestock, and even take captives of the wives and children. Jacob was furious because he was afraid of what the Canaanites and Perizzites might do in response to what they did to Shechem. Simeon and Levi retorted that they deserved it for what they did to their sister.