Chuck Larsen

Rachel was beautiful alright and Jacob loved her dearly. Leah was rather plain and was basically unloved. God as much as said so and he chose to bless her specially with children whereas Rachel had none. Guzik is correct, he says, “Despite Rachel’s great beauty, she also was near despair. No doubt, Leah often said, ‘If I only had my sister’s beauty and the love of my husband, I would be happy.’ No doubt, Rachel often said, ‘If I only had sons like my sister.’ Beautiful or plain, we all have our problems.¹ Even beautiful women have their problems. Rachel, beautiful but barren, struggled with her sister for the continued affection of Jacob. Leah gave birth to four sons in a row; Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah. Her struggle with Leah becomes so severe that In Genesis 30:1 Rachel screams to Jacob “give me children or I die!” As if Jacob can control who conceives and who does not. Jacob reminds her that he’s not in God’s place thus telling her that her problem is not with him, it’s really with God.

Rachel tries to fulfill her desire for children by using her hand maiden, Bilhah, who gives Jacob two sons. Rachel asks Jacob for him to go into Bilhah so she might deliver me a son “on my knees.” Unfortunately most translations ignore that phrase. On my knees refers to the custom where the husband impregnated the surrogate while the surrogate reclined on the lap of the wife, and how she might even recline on the wife as she gave birth. The symbolism clearly showed the child was legally the child of the mother, not the surrogate, who was merely in the place of the wife in both conception and birth. The Handbook for translators doesn’t think the phrase should be taken literally. It says, “That she may bear upon my knees is the literal Hebrew figurative expression and refers to the practice of obtaining children through the service of another woman, or of recognizing the child that is born as legally one’s own. In 50:23 Joseph’s grandchildren were “born upon his knees,” a way of saying that he acknowledged them as legitimate. In this case Rachel proposes to make Bilhah’s offspring her own, and thus she is to become the adoptive mother.”²

Regardless, the text says that Rachel is the one who named them. She named the first one “Dan,” which means “vindicated.” She thinks that somehow the birth of this surrogate son gives her the edge in her struggle with her plain but productive sister Leah. Then she names Bilhah’s second son, Naphthali. This literally means “my struggle.” Boice observes, “Some commentators refer this to Bilhah’s struggle in childbirth, which Rachel claims as her own. But this is not it at all. Rachel is struggling with Leah, and the additional baby is only another weapon in her arsenal. She is really hitting Leah over the head with him.” Jacob had made it clear that Rachel’s struggle was truly with God. He determines the lot of us all. When you don’t like it, you rebel against God. I believe God was using Rachel’s barrenness to humble her. Beautiful women sometimes grow up getting whatever they want and sometimes need to be reminded of their place. It’s easy to see the beautiful women as less spiritual as others. But as Boice observes, “It would be good if some women who are less favored outwardly could see that God is also concerned about those who are beautiful. The plain girls envy the beautiful ones, but the beautiful ones have problems of their own, and God does not look down on them as you or I might do.”

¹ David Guzik, Genesis, David Guzik’s Commentaries on the Bible (Santa Barbara, CA: David Guzik, 2013), Ge 30:1–4.

² William David Reyburn and Euan McG. Fry, A Handbook on Genesis, UBS Handbook Series (New York: United Bible Societies, 1998), 684.

Jacob got the blessing his father, Isaac, had intended for Esau. He got it by trickery. You might remember that “trickery” might even be the word that defines his name. Jacob means deceiver or trickster. There seems to be an interesting progression of Jacob’s deception. It begins by listening to his mother. He then impersonates his brother. Then he lies to his father. He then goes to the awful length of bringing the name of the Lord God into the deception. When Isaac questions the quickness of his returning with the food, Jacob says “because the Lord your God granted me success.” I don’t expect God smiled down on that. There’s always a progression. It begins with listening. Genesis 3, the first sin, began the same way. Eve listened to the serpent and Adam listened to his wife.

It’s interesting that a “kiss” is involved in the deceit. Genesis 27:26-27 tells us, “Then his father Isaac said to him (Jacob), Come near and kiss me, my son’ (thinking it was Esau) So he (Jacob) came near and kissed him.” Butler observes “Jacob had very affectionate manners in beguiling Isaac. His deceitful kissing of Isaac is one of the deceitful kisses recorded in the Bible. Joab kissed Amasa before he murdered him (II Samuel 20:9); the harlot kissed the young man before she destroyed his morals (Proverbs 7:13), and Judas betrayed Christ with a kiss (Matthew 26:48, 49). The devil has used kissing for ages to deceive and destroy.”¹

Faith Hill sings a song “This Kiss.” In the later chorus to the song she sings, “It’s the way you love me. It’s a feeling like this. It’s centrifugal motion. It’s perpetual bliss. It’s that pivotal moment. It’s, ah, subliminal. This kiss, this kiss (it’s criminal)…” Louis Armstrong also had a song about a kiss. It contained the phrase “A kiss is just a kiss.” Is it really? Jacob was to receive a couple kisses in his later life that might be compared to the one he gave his father to deceive him. Laban kissed Jacob and tricked him into marrying Leah instead of Rachel. Esau kissed Jacob when he returned to Canaan as well and their relationship remains strained as long as Edom existed. (King Herod was the last Edomite, descendant of Esau, mentioned in the Bible. Remember, a kiss is not always a kiss.

¹John G. Butler, Analytical Bible Expositor: Genesis (Clinton, IA: LBC Publications, 2008), 265.

Things are going along for Adam and Eve in the Garden in their state of innocence. But Chapter three is going to bring into the picture. God’s enemy. There is no warfare without a foe and it’s in Chapter 1 of Genesis three that we meet the foe. The text says, “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.” The Hebrew word for “Naked” that we encountered at the end of chapter two of Genesis, sounds like the Hebrew word for “crafty” which is used to described Satan. It’s like our English words, “hear” and “here.” They are homonyms but have different meanings. According to Niehaus, “The author apparently uses this homonym and its wordplay purposefully: It is precisely the sinless quality of physical and spiritual nakedness without shame that is about to be lost as a result of the serpent’s craftiness. The serpent is also later identified as ‘that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray’ (Rev. 12:9). He leads astray by means of lies, and he is in fact the ‘father of lies’ (John 8:44). He trades in sin, which is deceptive (Heb. 3:13).”^[1]

What or who is this “serpent.” Various explanations for the serpent compete for our understanding. It has been interpreted as a mythological character related to magical powers or taken as a symbol of human curiosity, the fertility cult, or of chaos/evil. Still others have proposed that the voice of the snake is the inner person. The voice is none other than the woman’s thoughts.  The traditional opinion among Jewish and Christian interpreters is that the serpent is Satan’s instrument. Luther explained: ‘The devil was permitted to enter beasts, as he here entered the serpent. For there is no doubt that it was a real serpent in which Satan was and in which he conversed with Eve.’”^[2] Luther’s idea is most appealing to me because we see that the Demons could possess humans in the Gospels. Jesus even casts them out of someone and sends them into a herd of swine. Further, we see Satan himself speaking through Peter in his attempt to dissuade Jesus from heading to the cross. And it is Satan who is at work in Judas prompting the great betrayal.

Paul recognizes the “craftiness” of Satan in his comment in 2 Corinthians 2:14 where he warms his readers that Satan disguises himself as an “angel of light.” Proverbs speaks of Satan as the roaring lion, wandering around looking to feed on the souls of men. Satan is cunning, crafty, devious and treacherous. He did not present himself as our cartoons might today as a hideous creature with horns, a forked tail carrying a pitchfork. Culver says, “He is wicked, threatening and dangerous, for he is likened to a roaring lion (1 Peter 5:8) and said to be a murderer and liar (John 8:44). Believers are told to beware of him, and to be sober and vigilant against him. This is because he is ‘subtle,’ that is, cunning, deceitful, everything a successful tempter needs to be. This, of course, Eve did not know. One wonders why the Lord God had not warned her of him. At any rate it was precisely the serpent’s deceit, making evil appear good, desirable, and beautiful, that gave him victory over Eve. And the Bible does not fail to make that point for our benefit.”^[3] To always be alert to the wiles of the Devil, Jesus exhorted his followers in Matthew 10:16, “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” When something God says is bad is reasonably presented to us as good, watch out!

^[1] Niehaus, Jeffrey J. 2014. Biblical Theology: The Common Grace Covenants. Vol. 1. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.

^[2] Mathews, K. A. 1996. Genesis 1-11:26. Vol. 1A. The New American Commentary. Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

^[3] Culver, Robert Duncan. 2005. Systematic Theology: Biblical and Historical. Ross-shire, UK: Mentor.

When Eleazar explained his mission to Rebekah’s parents, they called their daughter and left the decision up to her. Genesis 24:58 says, “And they called Rebekah and said to her, ‘Will you go with this man?’ She said, ‘I will go.’” Rebekah had a servant’s heart without doubt. The offer to water Eleazar’s camels proves that. Boice says, “A camel drinks more than twenty gallons of water, especially after a long day’s journey in hot lands. Here were ten camels. Would her pitcher hold a gallon? If so, she must have made two hundred trips from the spring to the watering trough. It would have taken several hours.” Her servant’s heart is obvious, but there’s another trait she has that is extremely attractive. This is a woman of great faith and trust in God. When her parents vacillated about her immediate departure they put the question to her.

I expect Laban and Bethuel (Her parents) were a little fearful facing the departure of their daughter not knowing if they would ever see her again. There is no record that they ever did. I expect they ask Rebekah to stop, think this over, consider the seriousness of this decision, honey! But Rebekah said “I will go.” Abraham gets all the credit for being the man of faith because he left his home in Haran to travel to the Land God would show him – not knowing what to expect. If Father Abraham is the “father of faith” Rebekah must be the “mother of faith.” She left her home and family when she was no more than a girl, bound for what only God knew. She had only the promise of Eleazar.

Many compare Eleazar to God’s spirit. The Holy Spirit is God’s emissary sent to bring us to his son, Jesus Christ, for a great wedding day. He woos us. He makes big promises. He gives us gifts. He also promises wonderful fruit; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control, if we accept his invitation. He’s always asking us, “Will you go?” Well? Will you?

I’ve always puzzled over the fleece that Eleazar, Abraham’s servant, set before God when he went to find a wife for Isaac. He prayed that God would let the one who offered, not only a drink, but to water his camels as well be the wife for his master’s son Isaac. Now, if my father had sent a servant to find a spouse for me, I might want to have input on the qualifications. Wouldn’t you? I might ask for a particular hair color, (blonde, brunette, etc). I would want her to be attractive. I would want her to have a nice figure, be pretty of course and have a great personality. It’s strange, but none of those things seemed to have mattered. Admit it, ladies; if you had your choice between Tom Selleck and Don Knotts who would you choose?

We have nothing to indicate that Eleazar didn’t care at all about appearance. But we know for certain what he did care about. She had to be from his family, i.e., a believer in their God. That was why Abraham sent him back to his relatives. There was another characteristic he was looking for as well. He wanted her to be a woman of integrity, honor, strong and healthy with a good work ethic. Henry Morris says, “She should be an industrious girl, harboring no delusions of a life of ease and idleness just because Isaac had great possessions.” I can’t help but wonder how many girls Eleazar asked before he found one who not only gave him a drink but offered to water his camels as well, which, by the way, would be a significant task. I can’t demonstrate this from the text, but I like to think there were several.  The bottom line, however, was that she had to have a “servants” heart. Rebekah? She was the one.

Jesus chose us, the Church, for his bride. He is busy making us what He wants us to be before the big wedding day when He will descend in the clouds and take us home for a 7 year wedding celebration. He wants us to be pure of course, but most of all, I believe he wants us to be servants. He said, “If you want to be great in the Kingdom of God, you must be the servant of all.” He said, “I have not come to be served but to serve and give my life as a ransom for many.” He said after washing his disciples feet, “what I have done (take the servant’s place) you must do for each other.” Would I have offered to water the camels as well? Probably not!

I’ve been married for 53 years come this November 2022. Wow! It seems like a long time. It is a long time to be married to one person, especially by Hollywood standards. But 53 years is really nothing in comparison to Abraham and Sarah’s lifelong marriage. By the time of Sarah’s death in Genesis 23, you can figure that they had been married well over 100 years! Also, it had been over 60 years that they had lived as vagabonds in the land that God had promised to give them. They were soul mates. They went through it all together, hand in hand, for over a century. They traveled together from Ur to Haran, from Haran to Canaan, from Canaan to Egypt and back again. They had shared it all, the ups and the downs. She had put up with Abraham’s failures, even when he made her an accomplice in his sin. Of course she was the principal character in her own failures as well.

Good news for all women. Sarah wasn’t perfect and yet she too, like Abraham, is called righteous. She was Abraham’s soul mate. The woman who gave the most precious gift possible, his one and only son, Isaac. Isaac’s name means “Laughter.” Sarah is the mother of “laughter.” She was buried in the heart of the Promised Land. The purchase of Machpelah, her burial site, marks the beginning of Israel’s ownership of the Promised Land. When Abraham dies, he too will be buried with her in the middle of the Promised Land. Although they were both sinners in their own rights they ended up in the center of the place where God wanted them.

Genesis 23:19 says, “Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah east of Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan.” Machpelah is the place. Guzik gives us a little history of the place. “This is where Isaac and Ishmael buried Abraham (Genesis 25:9). Isaac and Rebekah were both buried here (Genesis 49:31). Jacob buried Leah here (Genesis 49:31), and Joseph buried Jacob here (Genesis 50:13). The cave of Machpelah (near Hebron) was the great tomb of the Patriarchs.”¹

Wikipedia has an interesting article on the tomb of the Patriarchs. You might be interested. This is it without the footnotes and pictures.

Over the cave stands a large rectangular enclosure dating from the Herodian era. During Byzantine rule of the region, a basilica was built on the site; the structure was converted into the Ibrahimi Mosque following the Muslim conquest of the Levant. By the 12th century, the mosque and its surrounding regions had fallen under crusader-state control, but were retaken in 1188 by the Ayyubid sultan Saladin, who again converted the structure into a mosque. During the Six-Day War of 1967, the entire Jordanian-occupied West Bank was seized and occupied by the State of Israel, after which the structure was divided into a synagogue and a mosque. In 1994, the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre occurred at the Ibrahimi Mosque, in which an armed Israeli settler entered the complex on the Jewish holiday of Purim—which had occurred during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan—and opened fire on Palestinian Muslims who had gathered to pray at the site, killing 29 people, including children, and wounding over 125. The site is considered to be the second-holiest place in Judaism after the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem.

¹ David Guzik, Genesis, David Guzik’s Commentaries on the Bible (Santa Barbara, CA: David Guzik, 2013), Ge 23:17–20.