READ IT! - Introduction to Genesis 29-35

Readings for this week

Monday: Genesis 29

Tuesday: Genesis 30

Wednesday: Genesis 31

Thursday: Genesis 32

Friday: Genesis 33

Saturday: Genesis 34

Sunday: Genesis 35

Introduction to Genesis 29-35

Genesis 29

Jacob came to the land of the “eastern peoples” and there he found a well with some shepherds at it. When his cousin Rachel arrived, he removed the stone covering from the well and watered her flock. Rachel’s father Laban welcomed Jacob into his home.

Laban had two daughters, Rachel and Leah, and Leah was the oldest. Jacob was in love with Rachel and he made a deal with Laban to work for him for seven years in exchange for his daughter.

At the end of the seven years, on the wedding night, Laban dressed Leah up as the bride, and when Jacob woke up in the morning – there she was!

Jacob demanded an explanation for the trick. Laban explained that it was customary to marry the older daughter before the younger one, and that if he wanted Rachel, too, he would give her to him, but he needed to agree to work for another seven years. And so Jacob agreed to this deal.

And Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah, but both sisters turned out to be barren. But God saw that Leah was not loved, and he had compassion on her and allowed her to have children.

Leah births Reuben, whose name means “He has seen my misery,” saying "God has seen my misery."

Leah births Simeon, whose name means “One who hears,” saying "God has heard that I am not loved."

Leah births Levi, whose name means “Attached,” saying "maybe my husband will become attached to me now."

Leah births Judah, whose name means “Praise,” saying essentially "forget about what my husband thinks of me, I'm going to praise God this time."

Genesis 30

Rachel gets jealous her sister's kids, and gives Jacob her slave girl Bilhah to have kids on her behalf.

Bilhah births a boy that Rachel names Dan, whose name means “He has vindicated,” saying "God has vindicated me from this unjust situation with my sister and my husband."

Bilhah also births a boy that Rachel names Naphtali, whose name means “Struggle,” saying "I've beaten my sister in this struggle for my husband's affection."

Leah gets jealous of Rachel again, and gives Jacob her own slave girl, Zilpah, to further the baby-making process along.

Zilpah births a boy that Leah names Gad, whose name means “Good fortune,” saying "Another boy! What good fortune!"

Zilpah also births a boy that Leah names Asher, whose name means “Happy,” saying "Oh! This makes me so happy!"

Later, Rachel gets jealous of Leah’s mandrake flowers (thought to be an aphrodisiac at the time), and exchanges bed-time with Jacob for them.

Leah, however, gets pregnant again and births Issachar, whose name means “Reward,” saying "God is rewarding me for giving my slave girl to my husband."

Leah births Zebulun, whose name means “Honor,” saying "Look at all my sons! I will now be an honored woman!"

At some point, Leah also births a girl named Dinah.

God feels sorry for Rachel, who has still remained barren up to this point, and he heals her womb.

Rachel births Joseph, whose name means “May He add!” saying "Give me another one, God!"

Jacob asked his father-in-law Laban if he could take his wives and his kids back to his homeland in Canaan, but Laban wanted him to stay and he told him to name his price for staying.

Jacob said he wanted all of the speckled and striped sheep from Laban’s flock and so Laban gave them to him, and whenever a speckled or spotted lamb was born from all the flocks, it was given to Jacob.

Jacob then schemed to get all of Laban’s flocks by only letting Laban’s sheep mate with sheep that were speckled or had stripes, so that typically only lambs with these characteristics were born.

Jacob even goes so far as to set up sticks in front of the flocks with spots or stripes carved onto them in order to help the flocks to think about spotted and striped things while they copulate... which sounds kind of superstitious or even stupid today... but back then that seemed like it might be a pretty good technique …and Jacob became wealthy because of these schemes.

Genesis 31

But Laban and his sons began to treat Jacob and his family so poorly that Jacob decided to up and move his family out of there.

So While Laban was off shearing his sheep, Jacob loaded up all of his family, herds, and possessions and took off for Canaan. Additionally, Rachel stole her father’s “household gods” before they ran.

After three days Laban found out, and chased Jacob all the way to Gilead.

Laban then began searching everybody’s tents one by one. When Laban came to Rachel’s tent, she hid the gods by sitting on them and told him she couldn’t stand up because she was on her period.

Laban never found his gods... but that is too be expected, since they didn't seem to be very powerful gods in the first place... powerless, in fact, to free themselves from being desecrated by Rachel's menstrual cycle it seems.

So Jacob and Laban made a covenant together and promised never to harm each other again as God was their witness, and Laban left after saying good-bye to his daughters and grandkids.

Genesis 32

Jacob then sent messengers to his brother Esau to let him know that he had decided to return home. When the messengers came back, they warned Jacob that Esau was on his way with 400 men.

Jacob was afraid and divided his family up into different groups, hoping that if Esau attacked one group, the others might escape.

Jacob crossed over the river into the wilderness and he spent the night alone, and the text says that a man wrestled with Jacob all night long.

At dawn, the man tried to leave, but Jacob demanded that he give him his blessing first. And the man renamed Jacob to “Israel,” saying it is “because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”

“Israel” means “he struggles with God.”

And the man blessed him and was suddenly gone.

Jacob named the place where he saw the man “Peniel,” saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”

“Peniel” means “face of God.”

This is the story of how Jacob became Israel - how he struggled with God and overcame. But it is also the story of an entire nation - one chosen to have a special relationship with God, one that would change them forever. This story is a taste of how one man and one nation were chosen by God - and how they struggled with this God that they didn't understand. And this story is also about us, and how we have struggled with God, how we have overcome, and how God has forever left his mark on us. We are Israel.

Genesis 33

At dawn, Jacob looked up, and saw Esau coming with his 400 men!

Jacob, thinking death was near, approached Esau alone and bowed seven times.

But Esau ran up to Jacob, hugged and kissed him, and they both wept.

Jacob and Esau agreed to meet up later in Esau’s homeland, Seir, but after Esau left, Jacob moved his family someplace else because he was still a little bit afraid of Esau. And Jacob and his family settled near the city of Shechem.

Genesis 34

Sometime later, a guy from the city of Shechem, whose name was Shechem, raped Jacob’s daughter, Dinah, and Jacob’s sons were furious when they found out.

But then Shechem and his father show up and offer Jacob and his sons any price to pay for Dinah to be his bride. And so Jacob’s sons tricked the people of Shechem into entering into a covenant of circumcision with them.

After three days, while all the men were still pain from their little procedure, Levi and Simeon came into town and slaughtered every male they could find, and rescued Dinah. The rest of Jacob’s sons then carried off all the loot.

Jacob was angry with Simeon and Levi, and told them that their family was now a “stench” in the nostrils of all their neighbors, and that what they had done could lead to all their neighbors gaining up on them and wiping them out.

And they bluntly responded, “Should he have treated our sister like a whore?”

Genesis 35

God then spoke to Jacob and told to him to go back to Bethel – the place where they had first met.

Later, they left Bethel and on the way Rachel went into labor but began to have complications.

The midwife said to her, “Don’t despair, for you have another son.” ...indicating that the baby was being born breach, which tended to go very poorly for the mother, especially in the time before C-sections. 

As Rachel was dying, she named her son “Ben-Oni,” which means “son of my trouble” or “son of my sorrow.”

After Rachel died, Jacob changed his son’s name to Benjamin, which means “son of my right hand” or “son of my strength.”

And Jacob buried Rachel.

And as if things couldn’t get any worse, sometime after they moved on, Reuben slept with his father’s concubine Bilhah, and Jacob found out about it ...and yeah… this will probably come back to haunt Reuben later on.

Later Jacob returned to his father Isaac at Mamre, and Isaac died at the age of 180, and chapter 35 ends with Jacob and Esau burying their father together.

Read Genesis 29

Then Jacob continued on his journey and came to the land of the eastern peoples. There he saw a well in the open country, with three flocks of sheep lying near it because the flocks were watered from that well. The stone over the mouth of the well was large. When all the flocks were gathered there, the shepherds would roll the stone away from the well’s mouth and water the sheep. Then they would return the stone to its place over the mouth of the well.

Jacob asked the shepherds, “My brothers, where are you from?”

“We’re from Harran,” they replied.

He said to them, “Do you know Laban, Nahor’s grandson?”

“Yes, we know him,” they answered.

Then Jacob asked them, “Is he well?”

“Yes, he is,” they said, “and here comes his daughter Rachel with the sheep.”

“Look,” he said, “the sun is still high; it is not time for the flocks to be gathered. Water the sheep and take them back to pasture.”

“We can’t,” they replied, “until all the flocks are gathered and the stone has been rolled away from the mouth of the well. Then we will water the sheep.”

While he was still talking with them, Rachel came with her father’s sheep, for she was a shepherd. When Jacob saw Rachel daughter of his uncle Laban, and Laban’s sheep, he went over and rolled the stone away from the mouth of the well and watered his uncle’s sheep. Then Jacob kissed Rachel and began to weep aloud. He had told Rachel that he was a relative of her father and a son of Rebekah. So she ran and told her father.

As soon as Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister’s son, he hurried to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his home, and there Jacob told him all these things. Then Laban said to him, “You are my own flesh and blood.”

After Jacob had stayed with him for a whole month, Laban said to him, “Just because you are a relative of mine, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.”

Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel had a lovely figure and was beautiful. Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, “I’ll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.”

Laban said, “It’s better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me.” So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.

Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife. My time is completed, and I want to make love to her.”

So Laban brought together all the people of the place and gave a feast. But when evening came, he took his daughter Leah and brought her to Jacob, and Jacob made love to her. And Laban gave his servant Zilpah to his daughter as her attendant.

When morning came, there was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? I served you for Rachel, didn’t I? Why have you deceived me?”

Laban replied, “It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one. Finish this daughter’s bridal week; then we will give you the younger one also, in return for another seven years of work.”

And Jacob did so. He finished the week with Leah, and then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife. Laban gave his servant Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her attendant. Jacob made love to Rachel also, and his love for Rachel was greater than his love for Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years.

When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he enabled her to conceive, but Rachel remained childless. Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.”

She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Because the Lord heard that I am not loved, he gave me this one too.” So she named him Simeon.

Again she conceived, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Now at last my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” So he was named Levi.

She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “This time I will praise the Lord.” So she named him Judah. Then she stopped having children.