[Editor’s Note: Commentaries on the Book of Moses and Genesis Chapters 1 – 10 may be found on the ScripturePlus App from Book of Mormon Central and on the Bible Central website here.]
Background
Experience teaches that “Man proposes, but God disposes.”[2] No human folly is more common or more destructive than the attempt to wrest our future from the hand of God so we may place it, as we suppose, securely into our own hands.
Shakespeare’s Hamlet once boasted that he would destroy his enemies by “blow[ing] them [to] the moon.”[3] Later, when Hamlet’s “deep plots”[4] failed and his rashness faded, he was left helpless and in despair. It was then that Divine Providence exercised its incontrovertible prerogative, bringing him effortlessly “what he had so long and eagerly desired.”[5] Afterward, Hamlet humbly confessed to the agreeing nod of his friend Horatio:[6]
There’s a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will —
We learn from the story of Jacob that the rough-hewing of one’s own ends, trying to leave God out of the picture, is a tedious, sometimes painful, and always futile pastime. After the inevitable disaster that follows an awakening from the illusion of exclusive self-reliance, those humble enough to listen will hear the kind, corrective voice of the Father, “I am the gardener here, and I know what I want you to be.”[7]
Introduction: Jacob’s Journey of Departure and Return Along the Covenant Path
The story of Adam and Eve’s departure from the Garden of Eden and their return to the presence of God parallels a common pattern in ancient Near Eastern writings: departure from home, mission abroad, and happy homecoming.[8] The pattern is at least as old as the Egyptian story of Sinuhe from 1800 BCE and can be seen again in scriptural accounts of Israel’s apostasy and return as well as in the lives of individuals in scripture. The pattern appears in modern literature and media as often as it did in those times.[9]
To the ancients, however, it was more than a mere storytelling convention, since it reflected a sequence of events common in widespread temple ritual practices for priests and kings.[10] More generally, it is the story of the plan of salvation in miniature, as seen from the personal perspective. This pattern can be found in the Savior’s parables of the Prodigal Son[11] and the Good Samaritan.[12] The life of Jesus Christ Himself also followed the pattern of departure from and return to the Father on the covenant path, though, unlike ordinary mortals, He was without sin: “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father” (John 16:28).
The general trajectory of departure and return along the covenant pathway is mirrored both spiritually and geographically in the story of Jacob (Hebrew “may God protect”). Taking leave of his family in Beersheba (Hebrew “well of the oath”—figuratively, the source of the covenant), he travels north and east by way of Beth-el (Hebrew “House of God”—a place of instruction about the covenant) to Haran (Hebrew charran = “Mountainous”—a place of testing for Jacob). Leaving Haran, Jacob at last returns to Beth-el, where God’s previous promises are made sure. Each major step of the way along Jacob’s personal covenant path, his experiences are remarkably infused with temple themes. The hope of Israel is that every corner of the promised land will eventually become a holy place, a Zion through which the land of Canaan will be filled with God’s presence.
As a preface to our discussion of the ladder of exaltation the present article, let’s summarize the major elements of the temple themes in Jacob’s journey:
Jacob’s Departure from Home: Initiatory Themes in Beersheba (Genesis 27:1–29; 28:1–4). In David Bokovoy’s discussion of ritualization in Genesis 27,[13] he identifies ritualized performances related to Isaac’s first blessing of Jacob: the meal prepared for Isaac as a preliminary offering or sacrifice, the hand placement on parts of the body, the putting on of clothing (identified as high priestly clothing in Jewish tradition[14]), the exchange of questions identifying the petitioner, and the description of the blessing itself (Genesis 27:1–29). All this, of course, was a deceptive attempt to obtain by stratagem the actual initiatory, birthright blessing that was obtained legitimately only later when Isaac conferred it on Jacob before he left on his mission to Haran (Genesis 28:1–4).
Jacob’s Mission Abroad: The Ladder of Exaltation at Beth-el (Genesis 28:10–22). As a result of Jacob’s dream of a “ladder” that “reached to heaven” (Genesis 28:12), Beth-el became a holy place for Jacob, a place of instruction (Genesis 28:16–17) and covenant-making (Genesis 28:20–21). The early Christian idea of a ladder of virtues, inspired by Jacob’s dream, was a symbol of the process of spiritual progression that corresponds to the Latter-day Saint idea of progression toward eternal life through the making and keeping of covenants.[15] Speaking of Jacob’s dream of the heavenly ladder in Genesis 28, Elder Marion G. Romney said: “Jacob realized that the covenants he made with the Lord were the rungs on the ladder that he himself would have to climb in order to obtain the promised blessings—blessings that would entitle him to enter heaven and associate with the Lord.”[16] Thus, the Prophet Joseph Smith correlated the “three principal rounds of Jacob’s ladder” with “the telestial, the terrestrial, and the celestial glories or kingdoms.”[17]
Jacob’s Happy Homecoming: A Wrestle with an Angel and the Promise of a New Name at Jabbok (Genesis 32:24–32). After crossing the river Jabbok (a word that plays on the “pouring out” of the river into the Jordan, “wrestling,” and the name “Jacob”), Jacob wrestled (or embraced, as this may also be understood[18]) an angel who, after a series of questions and answers in a place that Jacob named Peniel (Hebrew “face of God”), gave him a new name (Israel; Hebrew yisra’el = “God struggles/has power/prevails”; alternatively, “struggle/have power/prevail with God”). Then Jacob, prepared by his encounter with the angel, reconciled with his brother Esau through a similar embrace, saying: “for therefore I have seen thy face, as though I had seen the face of God.”[19]
Promises Made Sure by Divine Confirmation at Beth-el (Genesis 35:1–15). Jacob’s second divine encounter at Beth-el is not merely a repeat of his previous one (Genesis 32:24–32). Significantly, this experience is a direct confirmation or ratification[20] of Jacob’s earlier temple-related blessings,[21] making his promises sure,[22] as his “name is changed to Israel for the second time.”[23] In addition, there is a difference with the earlier encounter at Beth-el in that before “it was not God personally but an angelic being … who made the pronouncement.”[24] Since Jacob had now seen the face of God literally rather than merely figuratively (“as though I had seen the face of God”),[25] Jewish wordplay provided an additional meaning to Jacob’s new name: “ish-ra’ah-El, the man who saw God.”[26] When Jacob acknowledged the truth “that God is God … in his own heart, God revealed God’s Self to him at once.”[27]
Jacob’s path of discipleship and blessing that corresponds to his departure for Haran and his return to Beth-el is both a literary masterpiece and a valuable source of doctrinal and personal instruction. Through it we learn that although God will eventually “unveil his face” to Jacob, it will be “in his own time, and in his own way, and according to his own will” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:68).
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For additional reading, see Bradshaw, Jeffrey M. "Faith, hope, and charity: The ‘three principal rounds’ of the ladder of heavenly ascent." In “To Seek the Law of the Lord”: Essays in Honor of John W. Welch, edited by Paul Y. Hoskisson and Daniel C. Peterson, 59-112. Orem, UT: The Interpreter Foundation, 2017. https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/faith-hope-and-charity-the-three-principal-rounds-of-the-ladder-of-heavenly-ascent/.
Related verses
Genesis 28–33, 35:1–15
Genesis 28:1–5: Jacob Receives the Birthright Blessing
28:1: Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Isaac warns Jacob not to follow the example of Esau in taking a Canaanite wife.
28:2: Arise, go to Padam-aram. Thus, Isaac sends Jacob “on a journey that he himself had been forbidden to undertake.”[28] Everett Fox observes:[29]
Yaakov’s journey takes him not only to a foreign land, but to the portals of adulthood. It begins fittingly with a dream vision, so that we will know from the start that God is with him. In fact Yaakov always encounters God at crucial life junctures, at the point of journeys (31:3—leaving Aram; 32:25ff.—meeting Esav; 35:1—returning to Bet-El; 35:9ff.—the homecoming; and 46:2ff.—on the way to Egypt.)
28:3: a multitude of people. This refers to Jacob’s role as the progenitor of the future twelve tribes of Israel.
28:4: And give thee the blessing of Abraham. “Isaac, whatever misgivings he may have had about Jacob’s act of deception, knows that his younger son has irrevocably received the blessing. … When Isaac tells Jacob he will become an assembly of peoples and his seed will take possession of the land promised to Abraham, he is manifestly conferring on him the blessing that is the prerogative of the elder son.”[30] Because Jacob is the heir to the Abrahamic covenant, the choice of his marriage partner is of supreme importance.
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed. Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 195–196.
Related verses
Genesis 28:1–5
Genesis 28:6–9: Esau Takes an Ishmaelite Wife
28:9:
And Esau … took Mahalath … as a wife. “Overhearing Isaac’s warning to Jacob about exogamous unions [that is, intermarriage with other groups such as the Canaanites], he behaves as though endogamy [that is, intermarriage within his extended family] were a sufficient condition for obtaining the blessing, and so after the fact of his two marriages with Hittite women—perhaps even many years after the fact—he, too, takes a cousin as bride. There is no indication of his father’s response to this initiative, but the marriage is an echo in action of his plaintive cry, ‘Do you have but one blessing, my Father? Bless me, too, Father.’”[31]
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 196–197.
Related verses
Genesis 28:6–9
Genesis 28:10–12: Jacob Comes to a “Certain Place” and Sees a Ladder to Heaven
Genesis 28:11: a certain place. The construction of the phrase—a certain place—implies a definite destination for the reader, though Jacob seems unaware.[32] The Hebrew term used for “place”—maqom—connotes a sacred site. “Archaeological evidence indicates that Bethel had been a cultic site for the Canaanites centuries before the patriarchs.”[33]
Genesis 28:11: took of the stones … and put them for his pillows. Hugh Nibley comments on the parallel between the sleep of Jacob and the sleep of Adam:[34]
According to a study of Altmann, Jacob actually repeats the entire experience of Adam, being visited by heavenly messengers who instruct him in the ordinances. The sleeping Jacob is “Adam who has forgot his image,” for “in his earthly existence, Jacob, who stands for Man, is sunk into sleep, which means he has become forgetful of his image and counterpart upon the Divine Throne.” The visitation repeats the awakening of the preexistent Adam, “as it were, pushed out from the Chariot of the King. He is asleep here below.”[35] This is the “sem-sleep” of the Egyptian temple rites,[36] being pushed from the chariot and being thrust forth from the merkā
āh, the presence of God or one’s heavenly home.
As an aside, we should not suppose that Jacob’s sleep was an awkward and uncomfortable one with “stones … for his pillows” (Genesis 28:11). It has been more plausibly proposed by modern scholars that “the stone is not placed under Jacob’s head but alongside it, as a kind of protective barrier. The stone by which Jacob’s head rests as he dreams his vision will become the pillar, the commemorative… marker (matsevah) at the end of the story.”[37]
Genesis 28:12: a ladder. As to the “ladder” (Genesis 28, 12), Robert Alter concludes that the “structure envisioned is probably a vast ramp with terraced landings.”[38] To Nicolas Wyatt, the “ladder” of Jacob’s dream:[39]
looks suspiciously like a description of a Babylonian ziggurat, in all probability the temple tower in Babylon. This had an external, monumental stairway leading to the top story, which represented heaven, the dwelling-place of the gods.
Jacob will later claim a name with similar meaning to the Akkadian “gate of the god” (bāb-ili) [40] for the place of his vision: “gate of heaven” (Genesis 28:17). Michael Fishbane notes:[41]
As if to counterpoint the hubris of the tower [of Babel] building on the plain of Shinar (Genesis 11:1–9), the image of a staged temple-tower, whose “head” also “reaches to heaven,” emerges out of Jacob’s dream-work and humbles him (Genesis 28:12). He does not seek to achieve a name at the nameless place to which he has come on his flight to Aram, but is rather overawed by the divine presence there and extols His name: “Surely Yahweh is in this place,” explains Jacob, “and I did not know it” (Genesis 28:16). Nor does God collude with the pantheon in this text; but rather stands majestically above the divine beings whose “going up and coming down” the tower stairway provides the symbolic link between earth and heaven, and dramatizes the spiritual ascension inherent in the dream vision.[42] From atop this tower stairway promise and hope—not doom and dispersal [like the tower of Babel]—now unfold (Genesis 28:13–15).
The Ladder of Heavenly Ascent in Ancient Tradition
Already a religious symbol in Egypt[43] and Babylon,[44] the Jacob’s ladder of heavenly ascent is also referenced in the Gospel of John. Alluding to the multiple deceits practiced in the story of Jacob/Israel and Laban, Jesus praised the approaching Nathanael at their first meeting, saying, “Behold an Israelite [that is, a descendant of Jacob] … in whom [unlike Jacob himself] is no guile!” (John 1:47). Then, referring to the ladder in Jacob’s dream on which angels had ascended and descended, He solemnly asserted His preeminence over the revered patriarch, declaring that He was the ladder of heavenly ascent personified: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.”[45]
This, of course, echoes the idea expressed in Moses 7:53: “climbeth up by me.”Later, John records a similar declaration: “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6, emphasis mine).
The symbolism of Jacob’s ladder has a long tradition in Jewish and Christian tradition,[46] including the well-known elaborations on the subject by theologians such as John Climacus (i.e., John “of the ladder”), Saint Augustine, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, and Saint Thomas Aquinas. Suffice it to say that faith, hope, and charity—the “three theological virtues”—became important symbols of the process of spiritual progression and were identified frequently with the three principal rungs on this ladder, just as they are in modern scripture—especially in passages relating to the doctrine of Christ.[47] As Christians made their climb, some, sadly, as in Lehi’s vision of the Tree of Life, “after they had tasted of the fruit … fell away into forbidden paths and were lost” (1 Nephi 8:28). Those who endured to the end received the crown of life directly from the hand of the Lord Himself.
The Ladder of Heavenly Ascent in the Teachings of Modern Prophets and Latter-day Saint Scholars
The Prophet Joseph Smith correlated the “three principal rounds [rungs, landings, or levels?] of Jacob’s ladder” with “the telestial, the terrestrial, and the celestial glories or kingdoms.”[48] He also said that this was the same progression ascended by Paul (2 Corinthians 12:2)[49] Already in 1832, Joseph Smith had equated the “mysteries of godliness”[50] to Jacob’s ladder.
The Prophet Joseph Smith correlated the “three principal rounds [rungs, landings, or levels?] of Jacob’s ladder” with “the telestial, the terrestrial, and the celestial glories or kingdoms.”[51] He also said that this was the same progression ascended by Paul (2 Corinthians 12:2)[52] Already in 1832, Joseph Smith had equated the “mysteries of godliness”[53] to Jacob’s ladder.
Catherine Thomas observes that covenants like those made by Jacob are necessary prerequisites to celestial marriage:[54]
It was no accident that Jacob had a revelation concerning temple covenants as he was on his way to find his eternal companion. “Those married in the temple in the new and everlasting covenant of marriage become inheritors of all the blessings of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the patriarchs and thereby enter into the patriarchal order. If the participating parties abide in the eternal marriage covenant, they shall reap the full blessings of patriarchal heirship in eternity where the patriarchal order will be the order of government and rule.”[55]
John A. Tvedtnes summarizes parallels to these events elsewhere in the Bible and other ancient sources:[56]
The Bible describes the ceremony in which Aaron and his sons were ordained to the priesthood at the tabernacle. They were washed with water, dressed in “the holy garments,” anointed and consecrated (Exodus 28:40-41; 29:4-9; 40:12-15; Leviticus 8:12-13, 30; Psalm 133:2; Ben Sirach 45:8-15). This investiture was partially repeated each time the priests prepared for service, when they were required to wash and don the “holy garments” (Leviticus 16:3-4), which they then removed after completing the ordinances of the tabernacle or the temple (see Leviticus 16:23-24). Dressing in special clothing in the temple denotes a change in role, from that of mortal to immortal, from ordinary human to priest or priestess, king or queen. A number of ancient texts, both in the Bible and elsewhere, discuss temple clothing, its symbolism and some of its uses.
Perhaps the most impressive investiture account is the one ascribed to Levi, ancestor of Moses and Aaron, in a vision at Beth-El, where his father Jacob had experienced his dream of the ladder ascending into heaven.[57]
And I saw seven men in white clothing, who were saying to me, “Arise, put on the vestments of the priesthood, the crown of righteousness, the oracle of understanding, the robe of truth, the breastplate of faith, the miter for the head, and the apron for prophetic power. Each carried one of these and put them on me and said, “From now on be a priest, you and all your posterity.” The first anointed me with holy oil and gave me a staff. The second washed me with pure water, fed me by hand with bread and holy wine, and put on me a holy and glorious vestment. The third put on me something made of linen, like an ephod. The fourth placed … around me a girdle which was like purple. The fifth gave me a branch of rich olive wood. The sixth placed a wreath on my head. The seventh placed the priestly diadem on me and filled my hands with incense, in order that I might serve as priest for the Lord God.[58]
The Jubilees version of this story also has the event taking place at Beth-El but has Jacob performing the ceremony for his son:[59]
And he [Jacob] abode that night at Bethel. And Levi dreamed that he had been appointed and ordained priest of the Most High God, he and his sons forever. And he awoke from his sleep and blessed the Lord … and [the lot of] Levi fell with the portion of the Lord. And his father put the garments of the priesthood upon him and he filled his hands”
Genesis 28:12: angels of God ascending and descending. Presumably the angels were ascending and descending in order to give Jacob specific messages and instruction. Endowed Latter-day Saints will recognize similar patterns.
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 197–98.
Related verses
Genesis 28:10–12
Genesis 28:13–19: The Sacred Nature of Beth-el
Genesis 28:13: I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father. Nahum Sarna describes the significance of the Lord’s self-introduction:[60]
In the present context the use of the divine name YHWH has special importance because the relation is thereby disengaged from any possible connection with El, the head of the Canaanite pantheon, whose name is a component of Bethel, the name soon to be given to the place.
Genesis 28:15: I will keep thee in all places whither thou goest. Robert Alter comments:[61]
[U]nlike Eliezer, who [crossed] the desert in grand style with a retinue of camels and underlings [to find a wife for Isaac among Abraham’s kinsmen], Jacob is fleeing alone on foot—in fact it is a very dangerous journey. He will invoke an emblematic image of himself as a refugee and pedestrian border crosser in his reunion with Esau years later: “For with my staff I crossed this Jordan” (Genesis 32:10).
Genesis 28:17: How dreadful is this place! The Hebrew term means fearsome, awe-inspiring, or to be reverenced. The Hebrew term means fearsome, awe-inspiring, or to be reverenced. According to some strands of Jewish tradition, Beth-el (Hebrew “House of God”) was located at the site of Moriah (where Abraham’s near-sacrifice took place) and was also the site of the future temple.[62] Of course, the identification of Beth-el with Moriah and Jerusalem wreaks havoc on historical geography. But if we take the idea to be typological—or perhaps literal if there was a “temple” of some kind at Beth-el at some point in Israel’s history, Beth-el became a holy place for Jacob, a place of instruction (28:16–17) and covenant-making (Genesis 28:20–21).
According to Meir Zlotowitz and Nosson Scheman, the Lord figuratively placed the whole land of Israel underneath him while he was sleeping:[63]
The Sages teach that when God promised Jacob the entire land upon which he lay, He folded all of Eretz Yirsrel [= “the land of Israel”] beneath the sleeping Jacob to symbolize that it would be his (Chullin 91b, see comm. to 28:13). Why was this necessary in view of the Talmudic principle that a new owner need make [an] act of acquisition in only part of a tract of land in order to acquire possession of the entire property? If so, the fact that Jacob lay on one small part of Bethel/Moriah should have been sufficient to enforce Israel’s eventual ownership of the entire land.
By so folding the land, God signified that more than legal possession was intended. As the commentary sets forth, Jacob lay upon the eventual site of the … Holy of Holies. Eretz Yisrael could have easily become his without the symbolism of placing all of it beneath him, but Jacob’s vision—and the mission he had adopted by seeking the truth behind all “garments”[64]—required that the utmost holiness be found in every aspect of life. God wanted Jacob to know that every corner of Eretz Yisrael was to be invested with the utmost degree of holiness. Jews must never be content to find sanctity only on occasional excursions to Jerusalem and the Temple; they must infuse every nook and cranny with holiness.
Genesis 28:18: and set it up for a pillar. According to Nahum Sarna, such a stone becomes a mute witness to the events Jacob experienced here: “Because the stone is under his head while he sleeps, it not only marks the spot but functions, as it were, as a witness to the dream and the accompanying divine promises.”[65]
Genesis 28:18: and poured oil upon the top of it. “Jacob ritually dedicates this [pillar] by pouring oil over its top.”[66] The pouring of the oil consecrates the stone to God and for a specific sacred purpose. See Genesis 35:14; Leviticus 14:10-18; 2 Kings 16:13; Hosea 9:4; Micah 6:7.
Jacob’s Covenants and His Parting Vow (Genesis 28:20)
Genesis 28:20: And Jacob vowed a vow. Nibley summarizes the importance of the covenants made by Jacob at Bethel:[67]
It was at Beth-el, the house of God, that Jacob had his vision, set up his stone circle and altar, and received the promise of progeny that was given to Abraham as well as a title to the promised land; he declared the place to be very special, “none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (Genesis 28:17). There he made the covenant that his children thereafter made at the temple, that he would pay a tithe if God would give him this life’s necessities and grant that he return again to the presence of his Father (see Genesis 28:20-22). According to the Zohar, Abraham had been through all this before at the same place, where later Jacob made a covenant with Laban in the same manner: Let us make a covenant between us, properly recorded and notarized (compare Genesis 31:44).
Notwithstanding the seriousness of the covenants that Jacob made with God that day, he still seems to have “kept back” (Acts 5:2) part of his self-offering rather than consecrating himself wholeheartedly. Robert Alter comments as follows about Jacob’s parting vow (Genesis 28:20):[68]
The conditional form of the vow—if the other party does such and such, then I on my part will do such and such in return—is well attested elsewhere in the Bible and in other ancient Near Eastern texts. But its use by Jacob has a characterizing particularity. God has already promised him in the dream that He will do all these things for him. Jacob, however, remains the suspicious bargainer—a “wrestler” with words and conditions just as he is a physical wrestler, a heel-grabber. He carefully stipulated conditions of sale to the famished Esau; he was leery that he would be found out when Rebekah proposed her stratagem of deception to him; now he wants to be sure God will fulfill His side of the bargain before he commits himself to God’s service; and later he will prove to be a sharp dealer in his transactions with his uncle Laban.
“Nearer, My God, to Thee”
Karen Lynn Davidson describes the close relationship between this experience of Jacob and this beloved hymn:[69]
It is not possible to understand [the hymn “Nearer, My God, to Thee”[70]] fully without recalling the story of Jacob’s dream-vision, as related in Genesis 28:10-22. Jacob, on a journey, falls asleep on a pillow of stones after sunset and dreams of a great ladder stretching to heaven, with angels ascending and descending. At the top of the ladder is the Lord God, who promises blessings to Jacob and his family and assures him, “I will not leave thee.” (v. 15.) The astounded Jacob wakes the next morning and makes an altar from the stones he had used as a pillow, and he calls the place “Beth-el,” meaning “God’s house.” He vows, “Then shall the Lord be my God.” (v. 21.)
The imagery that relates specifically to this Old Testament passage begins in verse two: “Though like the wanderer, The sun gone down, / Darkness be over me, My rest a stone,” compares our need and our longing to that of Jacob as he slept on his journey. The “steps” and “angels” of verse three parallel the ladder and heavenly visitors in Jacob’s dream. The promise in verse four, “Bethel I’ll raise,” is that we will consecrate our lives—even our griefs—to the Lord, just as Jacob took the hard stones that had been his pillow and built an altar upon which to pour out an offering of oil to the Lord.
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 198–201.
Related verses
Genesis 28:13–22
Genesis 29:1–14: Jacob Meets Rebekah at the Well
Genesis 29:10: Jacob … rolled the stone from the well’s mouth. Observes Robert Alter:[71]
The “Homeric” feat of strength in rolling away the huge stone single-handed is the counterpart to his mother’s feat of carrying up water for ten thirsty camels. Though Jacob is not a man of the open field, we now see that he is formidably powerful. … The drawing of water after encountering a maiden at a well in a foreign land signals to the audience that a betrothal type-scene is unfolding. But Jacob is the antithesis of his father: instead of a surrogate, the bridegroom himself is present at the well, and it is he, not the maiden, who draws the water; in order to do so, he must contend with a stone, the motif that is his narrative signature.
Genesis 29:11: Jacob kissed Rachel. Though Jacob’s action seems forward, Nahum Sarna sees it as entirely appropriate:[72]
Since Jacob already knows [Rachel] to be his cousin, his kiss, even before he discloses his identity, becomes a natural and innocent act. The association between his watering of her flock and his show of affection is subtly expressed through assonance of the two verbs[: ‘he watered’ (va-yashq) and ‘he kissed’ (va-yishaq)]. This is the only instance in a biblical narrative of a man kissing a woman who is neither his mother nor his wife.
Genesis 29:13: Laban … ran to meet him, and embraced him, and kissed him. Jacob’s sudden appearance as a solitary and an empty-handed refugee must have raised some questions in the mind of the astute Laban. No doubt he recalled “that the last time someone came from the emigrant branch of the family in Canaan, he brought ten heavily laden camels with him.”[73] Although his warm embrace was probably nothing more than standard hospitality, the Jewish scholar Rashi cynically surmised that Laban’s intent was “to see if Jacob had gold secreted on his person.”[74]
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 201–3.
Related verses
Genesis 29:1–14
Genesis 29:15–30: Jacob’s Marriages to Leah and Rachel
Having arrived in the village of his relatives, Jacob met his match in the wily Laban, his mother’s brother and the father of his future brides. Jacob, the heel-holder, will be the subject of multiple deceptions at Laban’s hand.
Lacking the means to pay a bride-price, Jacob quickly proposed a generous offer to work seven years for Rachel’s hand in marriage (Genesis 29:17). “Laban’s reply is a piece of consummate ambiguity naively taken by Jacob to be a binding commitment.”[75]
The morning after the marriage was consummated, we are told in the terse economy of style characteristic of Genesis that “in the morning, behold, it was Leah” (Genesis 29:25). Laban’s reply when he was confronted by Jacob is similarly to the point: “It must not be so done in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn” (Genesis 29:26) Robert Alter comments:[76]
Laban is an instrument of dramatic irony: his perfectly natural reference to “our [country]” has the effect of touching a nerve of guilty consciousness in Jacob, who in his [country] acted to put the younger before the firstborn. This effect is reinforced by Laban’s referring to Leah not as the elder but as the firstborn (bekhirah). It has been clearly recognized since late antiquity that the whole story of the switched brides is a meting out of poetic justice to Jacob — the deceiver deceived, deprived by darkness of the sense of sight as his father is by blindness, relying, like his father, on the misleading sense of touch. The Midrash Bereishit Rabba vividly represents the correspondence between the two episodes: “And all that night he cried out to her, ‘Rachel!’ and she answered him. In the morning, ‘and,… look, she was Leah.’ He said to her, ‘Why did you deceive me, daughter of a deceiver? Didn’t I call out Rachel in the night, and you answered me!’ She said: ‘There is never a bad barber who doesn’t have disciples. Isn’t this how your father cried out Esau, and you answered him?’”
However, as Nahum Sarna points out, “retributive justice is not the only motif. Just as Jacob’s succession to the birthright was divinely ordained, irrespective of human machinations (Genesis 25:23), so Jacob’s unintended marriage to Leah is seen as the working of Providence, for from this unplanned union issued Levi and Judah, whose offspring … [sustained] the two great institutions of the biblical period, the priesthood and the Davidic monarchy.”[77]
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 203–6.
Related verses
Genesis 29:15–30
Genesis 29:31–30:24: The Birth of Jacob’s Children
29:32:
Surely the Lord hath looked upon my affliction. Robert Alter describes the sad wordplay in Leah’s naming of her sons:[78]
All the etymologies put forth for the names of the sons are ad hoc improvisations by the mother who does the naming—essentially midrashic play on the sounds of the names. Thus “Reuben” is construed as r’u ben, ‘see, a son,’ but Leah immediately converts the verb into God’s seeing her suffering. The narrative definition of character and relationship continues through the naming speeches, as here, the emotionally neglected Leah sees a kind of vindication in having borne a son and desperately imagines her husband will now finally love her.
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 206–10.
Related verses
Genesis 29:31–30:24
Genesis 30:25–43: Jacob’s Prospers in Cattle
After having served a second seven years for Rachel, Jacob has obtained a large family, but still lacks the personal means to provide for them independently of Laban.[79] At last, he sees an opportunity to enrich himself through making what seems to be a bargain for his father-in-law. In return for Jacob’s continued service Jacob would ask only for the relatively rare “speckled and spotted cattle, and all the brown cattle among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the goats” (Genesis 30:32). We will pass over the details of this episode to focus on its lesson: namely, that once more Jacob’s blessings were, as voiced by Shakespeare’s Antonio, “not in his power to bring to pass, But sway’d and fashion’d by the hand of heaven.”[80]
Two different accounts of Jacob’s actions, meant to assure the multiplication of his sheep and goats, are given in Genesis: one focuses on his implausible strategy of placing specially-prepared sticks in front of mating flocks;[81] the other, relying on divinely suggested and directed propagation of the stronger animals (Genesis 31:8–12). Nahum Sarna points out that these strategies need not be seen as contradictory if one assumes the first was simply an “elaborate display put on by Jacob in order to mask his secret technique.”[82]
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 211–13.
Related verses
Genesis 30:25–43
Genesis 31:1–16: Jacob Consults with His Wives
Explicitly acknowledging for the first time in scripture that it was God, not him, who deserved credit for the idea that “gave the increase” (1 Corinthians 3:6), Jacob described his revelatory dream to Leah and Rachel (Genesis 31:10–12). Further, he told them that God had commanded him to “get … out from this land, and return unto the land of [his] kindred” (Genesis 31:13). To this they both agreed heartily (Genesis 31:14–16).
Having learned through experience, Jacob was ready now to “confess … [God’s] hand in all things, and [to] obey … his commandments” (Doctrine and Covenants 59:21). Thus , he was fit for the next stage of his divine tutorial.
Source
Book of Genesis Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For further reading, see Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation Commentary, The JPS Torah Commentary, ed.
Nahum M. Sarna (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 213–15.
Related verses
Genesis 31:1–16
For an insightful comparison of the “wrestles” of Jacob and Enos, see Bowen, Matthew L. "’And there wrestled a man with him’ (Genesis 32:24): Enos’s adaptations of the onomastic wordplay of Genesis." Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 10 (2014): 151-60. http://interpreterfoundation.org/and-there-wrestled-a-man-with-him-genesis-3224-enoss-adaptations-of-the-onomastic-wordplay-of-genesis/. (accessed January 21, 2015). Bowen, Matthew L. "Jacob, Enos, Israel, and Peniel." In Name as Key-Word: Collected Essays on Onomastic Wordplay and the Temple in Mormon Scripture, edited by Matthew L. Bowen, 83-90. Orem and Salt Lake City, UT: The Interpreter Foundation and Eborn Books, 2018.
See Bradshaw, Jeffrey M. "Now that we have the words of Joseph Smith, how shall we begin to understand them? Illustrations of selected challenges within the 21 May 1843 Discourse on 2 Peter 1." Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 20 (2016): 47-150. https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/now-that-we-have-the-words-of-joseph-smith-how-shall-we-begin-to-understand-them/, 61–66 for difficulties in the textual history of some of the statements by Joseph Smith..
