Click here to read Genesis 35
Jacob knows that only Yahweh is God, and that he will not abide his family also participating in idolatry.
God reminds Jacob to return to Bethel to fulfill the vow he made at the beginning of his journey. This will likely be a sacrificial offering of 10% of all he has, since there is no priest to give it too.
Jacob's vow in ch28:
1. YHWH is my God
Therefore, get rid of idols
2. Setting up a shrine
Therefore, return to it
3. Giving a tithe to God
We assume that his return to the shrine is to give God the tithe before he dies.
Also, the journey will bring Jacob's family back to Isaac before he dies.
The earrings - are these the spoils of Shechem?
Jacob does not destroy the idols. He hides them. This is the same word as when Achan hides the spoils of Jericho in Joshua 7:21-22.
His company must be large. No one wants to mess with them. Not to mention, of course, the terrible and ruthless reputation they must have by now after their "incident" with Shechem and Dinah.
Deborah's grave - The text does not say this land was purchased, but it is one more detail of describing Israel's claim on this land as home.
This is the second name change incident from Jacob to Israel.
God renews his covenant with Israel.
Rachel, Jacob's beloved wife, died while giving birth to his youngest son, Benjamin. Benjamin is decades younger than his other brothers.
Consider Gen 30:1 – Rachel says if she doesn't have children, she'll die. Here, she dies giving birth.
Jacob lifts one last stone, the fifth in his lifetime, in memory of Rachel. Remember, when he first saw Rachel, he responded by lifting a stone in front of her.
Rachel is buried on the road to Bethlehem.
"Rachel weeps for her children" when Herod kills the babies of Bethlehem after Jesus is born.
(The structure built near Bethlehem today called "Rachel's Tomb" is a crusader design and can only be traced back to 400 A.D.)
Israel's oldest son sleeps with his concubine. This is a huge slight culturally, and also really, really weird on several levels. Yup. It just gets more disturbing the more you think about it. Try not to.
As the firstborn, Rueben would have inherited his father's concubines. By sleeping with his concubine before death, it was like saying, "I'm top dog now". It was a grab at the authority at the head of the family. In a family with this many sons, a rivalry for who is next in line is probably to be expected. This is exactly what we see in the coming chapters, with Joseph. Jesus' 12 disciples acted the exact same way during his ministry.
There are twelve sons, but four are firstborn to four different mothers. Rueben is oldest, but Joseph is oldest of Rachel’s sons, the favourite wife. These twelve sons would have known the story of Grandpa Abraham and his firstborn son Ishmael, who was sent away. They would know that their own father, the younger son, tried to deceive his way into an inheritance. The birthright may not be entirely certain among them. At least four of them may expect to be the one special son who gets to carry on the family name. Rueben’s actions show a similar initiative to his father’s. He wants the birthright for himself. He’s trying to muscle his way in to top position.
The first born son of Israel dishonours his father with his concubine. The next two sons were the ones behind the pillaging of Shechem's family. The next oldest, Judah, is the father of Jesus.
The sons are listed in age order from first wife to last, instead of strict birth order.
Isaac dies. Jacob and Esau bury him together, just as Isaac and Ishmael buried their father together in the previous generation. Sibling rivalry is healed in both generations before the death of their father.
+
This chapter clearly illustrates the authority as a man of Yahweh that Jacob now holds. No matter how many failures he experience in his lifetime, he is now solidly Yahweh's man, no question. He is transformed. It took a lifetime.
No comments:
Post a Comment