Bible in 90 Days

²⁰ And Jacob vowed this vow to God: “If God will help and protect me on this journey and give me food and clothes, ²¹ and will bring me back safely to my father, then I will choose Jehovah as my God! ²² And this memorial pillar shall become a place for worship; and I will give you back a tenth of everything you give me!”

29 Jacob traveled on, finally arriving in the land of the East. ² He saw in the distance three flocks of sheep lying beside a well in an open field, waiting to be watered. But a heavy stone covered the mouth of the well. ³ (The custom was that the stone was not removed until all the flocks were there. After watering them, the stone was rolled back over the mouth of the well again.) ⁴ Jacob went over to the shepherds and asked them where they lived.

“At Haran,” they said.

⁵ “Do you know a fellow there named Laban, the son of Nahor?”

“We sure do.”

⁶ “How is he?”

“He’s well and prosperous. Look, there comes his daughter Rachel with the sheep.”

⁷ “Why don’t you water the flocks so they can get back to grazing?” Jacob asked. “They’ll be hungry if you stop so early in the day!”

⁸ “We don’t roll away the stone and begin the watering until all the flocks and shepherds are here,” they replied.

⁹ As this conversation was going on, Rachel arrived with her father’s sheep, for she was a shepherdess. ¹⁰ And because she was his cousin—the daughter of his mother’s brother—and because the sheep were his uncle’s, Jacob went over to the well and rolled away the stone and watered his uncle’s flock. ¹¹ Then Jacob kissed Rachel and started crying! ^12-13 He explained about being her cousin on her father’s side, and that he was her Aunt Rebekah’s son. She quickly ran and told her father, Laban, and as soon as he heard of Jacob’s arrival, he rushed out to meet him and greeted him warmly and brought him home. Then Jacob told him his story.

¹⁴ “Just think, my very own flesh and blood,” Laban exclaimed.

After Jacob had been there about a month, ¹⁵ Laban said to him one day, “Just because we are relatives is no reason for you to work for me without pay. How much do you want?” ¹⁶ Now Laban had two daughters, Leah, the older, and her younger sister, Rachel. ¹⁷ Leah had lovely eyes, but Rachel was shapely, and in every way a beauty. ¹⁸ Well, Jacob was in love with Rachel. So he told her father, “I’ll work for you seven years if you’ll give me Rachel as my wife.”

¹⁹ “Agreed!” Laban replied. “I’d rather give her to you than to someone outside the family.”

²⁰ So Jacob spent the next seven years working to pay for Rachel. But they seemed to him but a few days, he was so much in love. ²¹ Finally the time came for him to marry her.

“I have fulfilled my contract,” Jacob said to Laban. “Now give me my wife, so that I can sleep with her.”

²² So Laban invited all the men of the settlement to celebrate with Jacob at a big party. ²³ Afterwards, that night, when it was dark, Laban took Leah to Jacob, and he slept with her. ²⁴ (And Laban gave to Leah a servant girl, Zilpah, to be her maid.) ²⁵ But in the morning—it was Leah!

“What sort of trick is this?” Jacob raged at Laban. “I worked for seven years for Rachel. What do you mean by this trickery?”

²⁶ “It’s not our custom to marry off a younger daughter ahead of her sister,” Laban replied smoothly.^{[a] 27} “Wait until the bridal week is over and you can have Rachel too—if you promise to work for me another seven years!”

²⁸ So Jacob agreed to work seven more years. Then Laban gave him Rachel, too. ²⁹ And Laban gave to Rachel a servant girl, Bilhah, to be her maid. ³⁰ So Jacob slept with Rachel, too, and he loved her more than Leah, and stayed and worked the additional seven years.

³¹ But because Jacob was slighting Leah, Jehovah let her have a child, while Rachel was barren. ³² So Leah became pregnant and had a son, Reuben (meaning “God has noticed my trouble”), for she said, “Jehovah has noticed my trouble—now my husband will love me.” ³³ She soon became pregnant again and had another son and named him Simeon (meaning “Jehovah heard”), for she said, “Jehovah heard that I was unloved, and so he has given me another son.” ³⁴ Again she became pregnant and had a son, and named him Levi (meaning “Attachment”) for she said, “Surely now my husband will feel affection for me, since I have given him three sons!” ³⁵ Once again she was pregnant and had a son and named him Judah (meaning “Praise”), for she said, “Now I will praise Jehovah!” And then she stopped having children.

30 Rachel, realizing she was barren, became envious of her sister. “Give me children or I’ll die,” she exclaimed to Jacob.

² Jacob flew into a rage. “Am I God?” he flared. “He is the one who is responsible for your barrenness.”

³ Then Rachel told him, “Sleep with my servant girl Bilhah, and her children will be mine.” ⁴ So she gave him Bilhah to be his wife, and he slept with her, ⁵ and she became pregnant and presented him with a son. ⁶ Rachel named him Dan (meaning “Justice”),^[b] for she said, “God has given me justice, and heard my plea and given me a son.” ⁷ Then Bilhah, Rachel’s servant girl, became pregnant again and gave Jacob a second son. ⁸ Rachel named him Naphtali (meaning “Wrestling”), for she said, “I am in a fierce contest with my sister and I am winning!”

⁹ Meanwhile, when Leah realized that she wasn’t getting pregnant anymore, she gave her servant girl Zilpah to Jacob, to be his wife, ¹⁰ and soon Zilpah presented him with a son. ¹¹ Leah named him Gad (meaning “My luck has turned!”).

¹² Then Zilpah produced a second son, ¹³ and Leah named him Asher (meaning “Happy”), for she said, “What joy is mine! The other women will think me blessed indeed!”

¹⁴ One day during the wheat harvest, Reuben found some mandrakes^[c] growing in a field and brought them to his mother Leah. Rachel begged Leah to give some of them to her.

¹⁵ But Leah angrily replied, “Wasn’t it enough to steal my husband? And now will you steal my son’s mandrakes too?”

Rachel said sadly, “He will sleep with you tonight because of the mandrakes.”

¹⁶ That evening as Jacob was coming home from the fields, Leah went out to meet him. “You must sleep with me tonight!” she said; “for I am hiring you with some mandrakes my son has found!” So he did. ¹⁷ And God answered her prayers and she became pregnant again, and gave birth to her fifth son. ¹⁸ She named him Issachar (meaning “Wages”), for she said, “God has repaid me for giving my slave girl to my husband.” ¹⁹ Then once again she became pregnant, with a sixth son. ²⁰ She named him Zebulun (meaning “Gifts”), for she said, “God has given me good gifts for my husband. Now he will honor me, for I have given him six sons.” ²¹ Afterwards she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah.

²² Then God remembered about Rachel’s plight, and answered her prayers by giving her a child. ^23-24 For she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. “God has removed the dark slur against my name,” she said. And she named him Joseph (meaning “May I also have another!”), for she said, “May Jehovah give me another son.”

²⁵ Soon after the birth of Joseph to Rachel, Jacob said to Laban, “I want to go back home. ²⁶ Let me take my wives and children—for I earned them from you—and be gone, for you know how fully I have paid for them with my service to you.”

²⁷ “Please don’t leave me,” Laban replied, “for a fortune-teller that I consulted^[d] told me that the many blessings I’ve been enjoying are all because of your being here. ²⁸ How much of a raise do you need to get you to stay? Whatever it is, I’ll pay it.”

²⁹ Jacob replied, “You know how faithfully I’ve served you through these many years, and how your flocks and herds have grown. ³⁰ For it was little indeed you had before I came, and your wealth has increased enormously; Jehovah has blessed you from everything I do! But now, what about me? When should I provide for my own family?”

^31-32 “What wages do you want?” Laban asked again.

Jacob replied, “If you will do one thing, I’ll go back to work for you. Let me go out among your flocks today and remove all the goats that are speckled or spotted, and all the black sheep. Give them to me as my wages. ³³ Then if you ever find any white goats or sheep in my flock, you will know that I have stolen them from you!”

³⁴ “All right!” Laban replied. “It shall be as you have said!”

^35-36 So that very day Laban went out and formed a flock for Jacob of all the male goats that were ringed and spotted, and the females that were speckled and spotted with any white patches, and all of the black sheep. He gave them to Jacob’s sons to take them three days’ distance, and Jacob stayed and cared for Laban’s flock. ³⁷ Then Jacob took fresh shoots from poplar, almond, and sycamore trees, and peeled white streaks in them, ³⁸ and placed these rods beside the watering troughs so that Laban’s flocks would see them when they came to drink; for that is when they mated. ^39-40 So the flocks mated before the white-streaked rods, and their offspring were streaked and spotted, and Jacob added them to his flock. Then he divided out the ewes from Laban’s flock and segregated them from the rams, and let them mate only with Jacob’s black rams. Thus he built his flocks from Laban’s. ⁴¹ Moreover, he watched for the stronger animals to mate, and placed the peeled branches before them, ⁴² but didn’t with the feebler ones. So the less healthy lambs were Laban’s and the stronger ones were Jacob’s! ⁴³ As a result, Jacob’s flocks increased rapidly and he became very wealthy, with many servants, camels, and donkeys.

31 But Jacob learned that Laban’s sons were grumbling, “He owes everything he owns to our father. All his wealth is at our father’s expense.” ² Soon Jacob noticed a considerable cooling in Laban’s attitude toward him.

³ Jehovah now spoke to Jacob and told him, “Return to the land of your fathers, and to your relatives there; and I will be with you.”

⁴ So one day Jacob sent for Rachel and Leah to come out to the field where he was with the flocks, ⁵ to talk things over with them.

“Your father has turned against me,” he told them, “and now the God of my fathers has come and spoken to me. ⁶ You know how hard I’ve worked for your father, ⁷ but he has been completely unscrupulous and has broken his wage contract with me again and again and again. But God has not permitted him to do me any harm! ⁸ For if he said the speckled animals would be mine, then all the flock produced speckled; and when he changed and said I could have the streaked ones, then all the lambs were streaked! ⁹ In this way God has made me wealthy at your father’s expense.

¹⁰ “And at the mating season, I had a dream, and saw that the he-goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled, and mottled. ¹¹ Then, in my dream, the Angel of God called to me ¹² and told me that I should mate the white female goats with streaked, speckled, and mottled male goats.^[e] ‘For I have seen all that Laban has done to you,’ the Angel said. ¹³ ‘I am the God you met at Bethel,’ he continued, ‘the place where you anointed the pillar and made a vow to serve me. Now leave this country and return to the land of your birth.’”

¹⁴ Rachel and Leah replied, “That’s fine with us! There’s nothing for us here—none of our father’s wealth will come to us anyway! ¹⁵ He has reduced our rights to those of foreign women; he sold us, and what he received for us has disappeared. ¹⁶ The riches God has given you from our father were legally ours and our children’s to begin with! So go ahead and do whatever God has told you to.”

^17-20 So one day while Laban was out shearing sheep, Jacob set his wives and sons on camels, and fled without telling Laban his intentions. He drove the flocks before him—Jacob’s flocks he had gotten there at Paddan-aram—and took everything he owned and started out to return to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan. ²¹ So he fled with all of his possessions (and Rachel stole her father’s household gods and took them with her) and crossed the Euphrates River and headed for the territory of Gilead.

²² Laban didn’t learn of their flight for three days. ²³ Then, taking several men with him, he set out in hot pursuit and caught up with them seven days later, at Mount Gilead. ²⁴ That night God appeared to Laban in a dream.

“Watch out what you say to Jacob,” he was told. “Don’t give him your blessing and don’t curse him.” ²⁵ Laban finally caught up with Jacob as he was camped at the top of a ridge; Laban, meanwhile, camped below him in the mountains.

²⁶ “What do you mean by sneaking off like this?” Laban demanded. “Are my daughters prisoners, captured in a battle, that you have rushed them away like this? ²⁷ Why didn’t you give me a chance to have a farewell party, with singing and orchestra and harp? ²⁸ Why didn’t you let me kiss my grandchildren and tell them good-bye? This is a strange way to act. ²⁹ I could crush you, but the God of your father appeared to me last night and told me, ‘Be careful not to be too hard on Jacob!’ ³⁰ But see here—though you feel you must go, and long so intensely for your childhood home—why have you stolen my idols?”

³¹ “I sneaked away because I was afraid,” Jacob answered. “I said to myself, ‘He’ll take his daughters from me by force.’ ³² But as for your household idols, a curse upon anyone who took them. Let him die! If you find a single thing we’ve stolen from you, I swear before all these men, I’ll give it back without question.” For Jacob didn’t know that Rachel had taken them.

³³ Laban went first into Jacob’s tent to search there, then into Leah’s, and then searched the two tents of the concubines, but didn’t find them. Finally he went into Rachel’s tent. ³⁴ Rachel, remember, was the one who had stolen the idols; she had stuffed them into her camel saddle and now was sitting on them! So although Laban searched the tents thoroughly, he didn’t find them.

³⁵ “Forgive my not getting up, Father,” Rachel explained, “but I’m having my monthly period.”^[f] So Laban didn’t find them.

^36-37 Now Jacob got mad. “What did you find?” he demanded of Laban. “What is my crime? You have come rushing after me as though you were chasing a criminal and have searched through everything. Now put everything I stole out here in front of us, before your men and mine, for all to see and to decide whose it is! ³⁸ Twenty years I’ve been with you, and all that time I cared for your ewes and goats so that they produced healthy offspring, and I never touched one ram of yours for food. ³⁹ If any were attacked and killed by wild animals, did I show them to you and ask you to reduce the count of your flock? No, I took the loss. You made me pay for every animal stolen from the flocks, whether I could help it or not.^{[g] 40} I worked for you through the scorching heat of the day, and through the cold and sleepless nights. ⁴¹ Yes, twenty years—fourteen of them earning your two daughters, and six years to get the flock! And you have reduced my wages ten times! ⁴² In fact, except for the grace of God—the God of my grandfather Abraham, even the glorious God of Isaac, my father—you would have sent me off without a penny to my name. But God has seen your cruelty and my hard work, and that is why he appeared to you last night.”

⁴³ Laban replied, “These women are my daughters, and these children are mine, and these flocks and all that you have—all are mine. So how could I harm my own daughters and grandchildren? ⁴⁴ Come now and we will sign a peace pact, you and I, and will live by its terms.”

⁴⁵ So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a monument, ⁴⁶ and told his men to gather stones and make a heap, and Jacob and Laban ate together beside the pile of rocks. ^47-48 They named it “The Witness Pile”—“Jegar-sahadutha,” in Laban’s language, and “Galeed” in Jacob’s.

“This pile of stones will stand as a witness against us if either of us trespasses across this line,^[h]” Laban said. ⁴⁹ So it was also called “The Watchtower” (Mizpah). For Laban said, “May the Lord see to it that we keep this bargain when we are out of each other’s sight. ⁵⁰ And if you are harsh to my daughters, or take other wives, I won’t know, but God will see it. ^51-52 This heap,” Laban continued, “stands between us as a witness of our vows that I will not cross this line to attack you and you will not cross it to attack me. ⁵³ I call upon the God of Abraham and Nahor, and of their father, to destroy either one of us who does.”

So Jacob took oath before the mighty God of his father, Isaac, to respect the boundary line. ⁵⁴ Then Jacob presented a sacrifice to God there at the top of the mountain, and invited his companions to a feast, and afterwards spent the night with them on the mountain. ⁵⁵ Laban was up early the next morning and kissed his daughters and grandchildren, and blessed them, and returned home.

32 ^1-2 So Jacob and his household^[i] started on again. And the angels of God came to meet him. When he saw them he exclaimed, “God lives here!” So he named the place “God’s territory!”

³ Jacob now sent messengers to his brother, Esau, in Edom, in the land of Seir, ⁴ with this message: “Hello from Jacob! I have been living with Uncle Laban until recently, ⁵ and now I own oxen, donkeys, sheep, goats, and many servants, both men and women. I have sent these messengers to inform you of my coming, hoping that you will be friendly to us.”

⁶ The messengers returned with the news that Esau was on the way to meet Jacob—with an army of 400 men! ⁷ Jacob was frantic with fear. He divided his household, along with the flocks and herds and camels, into two groups; ⁸ for he said, “If Esau attacks one group, perhaps the other can escape.”

⁹ Then Jacob prayed, “O God of Abraham my grandfather, and of my father Isaac—O Jehovah who told me to return to the land of my relatives, and said that you would do me good— ¹⁰ I am not worthy of the least of all your loving-kindnesses shown me again and again just as you promised me. For when I left home^[j] I owned nothing except a walking stick! And now I am two armies! ¹¹ O Lord, please deliver me from destruction at the hand of my brother Esau, for I am frightened—terribly afraid that he is coming to kill me and these mothers and my children. ¹² But you promised to do me good, and to multiply my descendants until they become as the sands along the shores—too many to count.”

^13-15 Jacob stayed where he was for the night, and prepared a present for his brother Esau: 200 female goats, 20 male goats, 200 ewes, 20 rams, 30 milk camels, with their colts, 40 cows, 10 bulls, 20 female donkeys, 10 male donkeys.

¹⁶ He instructed his servants to drive them on ahead, each group of animals by itself, separated by a distance between. ¹⁷ He told the men driving the first group that when they met Esau and he asked, “Where are you going? Whose servants are you? Whose animals are these?”— ¹⁸ they should reply: “These belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present for his master Esau! He is coming right behind us!”

¹⁹ Jacob gave the same instructions to each driver, with the same message. ²⁰ Jacob’s strategy was to appease Esau with the presents before meeting him face-to-face! “Perhaps,” Jacob hoped, “he will be friendly to us.” ²¹ So the presents were sent on ahead, and Jacob spent that night in the camp.

^22-24 But during the night he got up and wakened^[k] his two wives and his two concubines and eleven sons, and sent them across the Jordan River at the Jabbok ford with all his possessions, then returned again to the camp and was there alone; and a Man wrestled with him until dawn. ²⁵ And when the Man saw that he couldn’t win the match, he struck Jacob’s hip and knocked it out of joint at the socket.

²⁶ Then the Man said, “Let me go, for it is dawn.”

But Jacob panted, “I will not let you go until you bless me.”

²⁷ “What is your name?” the Man asked.

“Jacob,” was the reply.

²⁸ “It isn’t anymore!” the Man told him. “It is Israel—one who has power with God. Because you have been strong with God, you shall prevail with men.”

²⁹ “What is your name?” Jacob asked him.

“No, you mustn’t ask,” the Man told him. And he blessed him there.

³⁰ Jacob named the place “Peniel” (“The Face of God”), for he said, “I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is spared.” ³¹ The sun rose as he started on, and he was limping because of his hip. ³² (That is why even today the people of Israel don’t eat meat from near the hip, in memory of what happened that night.)

33 Then, far in the distance, Jacob saw Esau coming with his 400 men. ² Jacob now arranged his family into a column, with his two concubines and their children at the head, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph last. ³ Then Jacob went on ahead. As he approached his brother he bowed low seven times before him. ⁴ And then Esau ran to meet him and embraced him affectionately and kissed him; and both of them were in tears!

⁵ Then Esau looked at the women and children and asked, “Who are these people with you?”

“My children,” Jacob replied. ⁶ Then the concubines came forward with their children, and bowed low before him. ⁷ Next came Leah with her children, and bowed, and finally Rachel and Joseph came and made their bows.

⁸ “And what were all the flocks and herds I met as I came?” Esau asked.

And Jacob replied, “They are my gifts, to curry your favor!”

⁹ “Brother, I have plenty,” Esau laughed. “Keep what you have.”

¹⁰ “No, but please accept them,” Jacob said, “for what a relief it is to see your friendly smile! I was as frightened of you as though approaching God!^{[l] 11} Please take my gifts. For God has been very generous to me and I have enough.” So Jacob insisted, and finally Esau accepted them.

¹² “Well, let’s be going,” Esau said. “My men and I will stay with you and lead the way.”

¹³ But Jacob replied, “As you can see,^[m] some of the children are small, and the flocks and herds have their young, and if they are driven too hard, they will die. ¹⁴ So you go on ahead of us and we’ll follow at our own pace and meet you at Seir.”

¹⁵ “Well,” Esau said, “at least let me leave you some of my men to assist you and be your guides.”

“No,” Jacob insisted, “we’ll get along just fine. Please do as I suggest.”

¹⁶ So Esau started back to Seir that same day. ¹⁷ Meanwhile Jacob and his household went as far as Succoth. There he built himself a camp, with pens for his flocks and herds. (That is why the place is called Succoth, meaning “huts.”) ¹⁸ Then they arrived safely at Shechem, in Canaan, and camped outside the city. ¹⁹ (He bought the land he camped on from the family of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for 100 pieces of silver. ²⁰ And there he erected an altar and called it “El-Elohe-Israel,” “The Altar to the God of Israel.”)

34 One day Dinah, Leah’s daughter, went out to visit some of the neighborhood girls, ² but when Shechem, son of King Hamor the Hivite, saw her, he took her and raped her. ³ He fell deeply in love with her, and tried to win her affection.

⁴ Then he spoke to his father about it. “Get this girl for me,” he demanded. “I want to marry her.”

⁵ Word soon reached Jacob of what had happened, but his sons were out in the fields herding cattle, so he did nothing until their return. ^6-7 Meanwhile King Hamor, Shechem’s father, went to talk with Jacob, arriving just as Jacob’s sons came in from the fields, too shocked and angry to overlook the insult, for it was an outrage against all of them.

⁸ Hamor told Jacob, “My son Shechem is truly in love with your daughter, and longs for her to be his wife. Please let him marry her. ^9-10 Moreover, we invite you folks to live here among us and to let your daughters marry our sons, and we will give our daughters as wives for your young men. And you shall live among us wherever you wish and carry on your business among us and become rich!”

¹¹ Then Shechem addressed Dinah’s father and brothers. “Please be kind to me and let me have her as my wife,” he begged. “I will give whatever you require. ¹² No matter what dowry or gift you demand, I will pay it—only give me the girl as my wife.”

¹³ Her brothers then lied to Shechem and Hamor, acting dishonorably because of what Shechem had done to their sister. ¹⁴ They said, “We couldn’t possibly. For you are not circumcised. It would be a disgrace for her to marry such a man. ¹⁵ I’ll tell you what we’ll do—if every man of you will be circumcised, ¹⁶ then we will intermarry with you and live here and unite with you to become one people. ¹⁷ Otherwise we will take her and be on our way.”

^18-19 Hamor and Shechem gladly agreed, and lost no time in acting upon this request, for Shechem was very much in love with Dinah, and could, he felt sure, sell the idea to the other men of the city—for he was highly respected and very popular. ²⁰ So Hamor and Shechem appeared before the city council^[n] and presented their request.

²¹ “Those men are our friends,” they said. “Let’s invite them to live here among us and ply their trade. For the land is large enough to hold them, and we can intermarry with them. ²² But they will only consider staying here on one condition—that every one of us men be circumcised, the same as they are. ²³ But if we do this, then all they have will become ours and the land will be enriched. Come on, let’s agree to this so that they will settle here among us.”

²⁴ So all the men agreed, and all were circumcised. ²⁵ But three days later, when their wounds were sore and sensitive to every move they made, two of Dinah’s brothers, Simeon and Levi, took their swords, entered the city without opposition, and slaughtered every man there, ²⁶ including Hamor and Shechem. They rescued Dinah from Shechem’s house and returned to their camp again. ²⁷ Then all of Jacob’s sons went over and plundered the city because their sister had been dishonored there. ²⁸ They confiscated all the flocks and herds and donkeys—everything they could lay their hands on, both inside the city and outside in the fields, ²⁹ and took all the women and children, and wealth of every kind.

³⁰ Then Jacob said to Levi and Simeon, “You have made me stink among all the people of this land—all the Canaanites and Perizzites. We are so few that they will come and crush us, and we will all be killed.”

³¹ “Should he treat our sister like a prostitute?” they retorted.

35 “Move on to Bethel now, and settle there,” God said to Jacob, “and build an altar to worship me—the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.”

² So Jacob instructed all those in his household to destroy the idols they had brought with them, and to wash themselves and to put on fresh clothing. ³ “For we are going to Bethel,” he told them, “and I will build an altar there to the God who answered my prayers in the day of my distress, and was with me on my journey.”

⁴ So they gave Jacob all their idols and their earrings, and he buried them beneath the oak tree near Shechem. ⁵ Then they started on again. And the terror of God was upon all the cities they journeyed through, so that they were not attacked. ⁶ Finally they arrived at Luz (also called Bethel), in Canaan. ⁷ And Jacob erected an altar there and named it “the altar to the God who met me here at Bethel”^[o] because it was there at Bethel that God appeared to him when he was fleeing from Esau.

⁸ Soon after this^[p] Rebekah’s old nurse, Deborah, died and was buried beneath the oak tree in the valley below Bethel. And ever after it was called “The Oak of Weeping.”

⁹ Upon Jacob’s arrival at Bethel, en route from Paddan-aram, God appeared to him once again and blessed him. ¹⁰ And God said to him, “You shall no longer be called Jacob (‘Grabber’), but Israel (‘One who prevails with God’). ¹¹ I am God Almighty,” the Lord said to him, “and I will cause you to be fertile and to multiply and to become a great nation, yes, many nations; many kings shall be among your descendants. ¹² And I will pass on to you the land I gave to Abraham and Isaac. Yes, I will give it to you and to your descendants.”

^13-14 Afterwards Jacob built a stone pillar at the place where God had appeared to him; and he poured wine over it as an offering to God and then anointed the pillar with olive oil. ¹⁵ Jacob named the spot Bethel (“House of God”), because God had spoken to him there.

¹⁶ Leaving Bethel, he and his household traveled on toward Ephrath (Bethlehem). But Rachel’s pains of childbirth began while they were still a long way away. ¹⁷ After a very hard delivery, the midwife finally exclaimed, “Wonderful—another boy!” ¹⁸ And with Rachel’s last breath (for she died) she named him “Ben-oni” (“Son of my sorrow”); but his father called him “Benjamin” (“Son of my right hand”).

¹⁹ So Rachel died, and was buried near the road to Ephrath (also called Bethlehem). ²⁰ And Jacob set up a monument of stones upon her grave, and it is there to this day.

²¹ Then Israel journeyed on and camped beyond the Tower of Eder. ²² It was while he was there that Reuben slept with Bilhah, his father’s concubine, and someone told Israel about it.

Here are the names of the twelve sons of Jacob:

²³ The sons of Leah: Reuben, Jacob’s oldest child, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun.

²⁴ The sons of Rachel: Joseph, Benjamin.

²⁵ The sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s servant girl: Dan, Naphtali.

²⁶ The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s servant girl: Gad, Asher.

All these were born to him at Paddan-aram.

²⁷ So Jacob came at last to Isaac his father at Mamre in Kiriath-arba (now called Hebron), where Abraham too had lived. ^28-29 Isaac died soon afterwards, at the ripe old age of 180. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.

36 Here is a list of the descendants of Esau (also called Edom): ^2-3 Esau married three local girls from Canaan: Adah (daughter of Elon the Hethite), Oholibamah (daughter of Anah and granddaughter of Zibeon the Hivite), Basemath (his cousin^[q]—she was a daughter of Ishmael—the sister of Nebaioth).

⁴ Esau and Adah had a son named Eliphaz. Esau and Basemath had a son named Reuel.

⁵ Esau and Oholibamah had sons named Jeush, Jalam, and Korah. All these sons were born to Esau in the land of Canaan.

^6-8 Then Esau took his wives, children, household servants, cattle and flocks—all the wealth he had gained in the land of Canaan—and moved away from his brother Jacob to Mount Seir. (For there was not land enough to support them both because of all their cattle.)

⁹ Here are the names of Esau’s descendants, the Edomites, born to him in Mount Seir:

^10-12 Descended from his wife Adah, born to her son Eliphaz were: Teman, Omar, Zepho, Gatam, Kenaz, Amalek (born to Timna, Eliphaz’ concubine).

^13-14 Esau also had grandchildren from his wife Basemath. Born to her son Reuel were: Nahath, Zerah, Shammah, Mizzah.

^15-16 Esau’s grandchildren^[r] became the heads of clans, as listed here: the clan of Teman, the clan of Omar, the clan of Zepho, the clan of Kenaz, the clan of Korah, the clan of Gatam, the clan of Amalek.

The above clans were the descendants of Eliphaz, the oldest son of Esau and Adah.

¹⁷ The following clans were the descendants of Reuel, born to Esau and his wife Basemath while they lived in Canaan: the clan of Nahath, the clan of Zerah, the clan of Shammah, the clan of Mizzah.

^18-19 And these are the clans named after the sons of Esau and his wife Oholibamah (daughter of Anah): the clan of Jeush, the clan of Jalam, the clan of Korah.

^20-21 These are the names of the tribes that descended from Seir, the Horite—one of the native families of the land of Seir: the tribe of Lotan, the tribe of Shobal, the tribe of Zibeon, the tribe of Anah, the tribe of Dishon, the tribe of Ezer, the tribe of Dishan.

²² The children of Lotan (the son of Seir) were Hori and Heman. (Lotan had a sister, Timna.)

²³ The children of Shobal: Alvan, Manahath, Ebal, Shepho, Onam.

²⁴ The children of Zibeon: Aiah, Anah. (This is the boy who discovered a hot springs in the wasteland while he was grazing his father’s donkeys.)

²⁵ The children of Anah: Dishon, Oholibamah.

²⁶ The children of Dishon: Hemdan, Eshban, Ithran, Cheran.

²⁷ The children of Ezer: Bilhan, Zaavan, Akan.

^28-30 The children of Dishan: Uz, Aran.^[s]

^31-39 These are the names of the kings of Edom (before Israel had her first king):

King Hadad’s wife was Mehetabel, daughter of Matred and granddaughter of Mezahab.

^40-43 Here are the names of the subtribes of Esau, living in the localities named after themselves: the clan of Timna, the clan of Alvah, the clan of Jetheth, the clan of Oholibamah, the clan of Elah, the clan of Pinon, the clan of Kenaz, the clan of Teman, the clan of Mibzar, the clan of Magdiel, the clan of Iram.

These, then, are the names of the subtribes of Edom, each giving its name to the area it occupied. (All were Edomites, descendants of Esau.)

37 So Jacob settled again in the land of Canaan, where his father had lived.

² Jacob’s son Joseph was now seventeen years old. His job, along with his half brothers, the sons of his father’s wives Bilhah and Zilpah, was to shepherd his father’s flocks. But Joseph reported to his father some of the bad things they were doing. ³ Now as it happened, Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other children, because Joseph was born to him in his old age. So one day Jacob gave him a special gift—a brightly colored coat.^{[u] 4} His brothers of course noticed their father’s partiality, and consequently hated Joseph; they couldn’t say a kind word to him. ⁵ One night Joseph had a dream and promptly reported the details to his brothers, causing even deeper hatred.

⁶ “Listen to this,” he proudly announced. ⁷ “We were out in the field binding sheaves, and my sheaf stood up, and your sheaves all gathered around it and bowed low before it!”

⁸ “So you want to be our king, do you?” his brothers derided. And they hated him both for the dream and for his cocky attitude.

⁹ Then he had another dream and told it to his brothers. “Listen to my latest dream,” he boasted. “The sun, moon, and eleven stars bowed low before me!” ¹⁰ This time he told his father as well as his brothers; but his father rebuked him. “What is this?” he asked. “Shall I indeed, and your mother and brothers come and bow before you?” ¹¹ His brothers were fit to be tied concerning this affair, but his father gave it quite a bit of thought and wondered what it all meant.

¹² One day Joseph’s brothers took their father’s flocks to Shechem to graze them there. ^13-14 A few days later Israel called for Joseph, and told him, “Your brothers are over in Shechem grazing the flocks. Go and see how they are getting along, and how it is with the flocks, and bring me word.”

“Very good,” Joseph replied. So he traveled to Shechem from his home at Hebron Valley. ¹⁵ A man noticed him wandering in the fields.

“Who are you looking for?” he asked.

¹⁶ “For my brothers and their flocks,” Joseph replied. “Have you seen them?”

¹⁷ “Yes,” the man told him, “they are no longer here. I heard your brothers say they were going to Dothan.” So Joseph followed them to Dothan and found them there. ¹⁸ But when they saw him coming, recognizing him in the distance, they decided to kill him!

^19-20 “Here comes that master-dreamer,” they exclaimed. “Come on, let’s kill him and toss him into a well and tell Father that a wild animal has eaten him. Then we’ll see what will become of all his dreams!”

^21-22 But Reuben hoped to spare Joseph’s life. “Let’s not kill him,” he said; “we’ll shed no blood—let’s throw him alive into this well here; that way he’ll die without our touching him!” (Reuben was planning to get him out later and return him to his father.) ²³ So when Joseph got there, they pulled off his brightly colored robe, ²⁴ and threw him into an empty well—there was no water in it. ²⁵ Then they sat down for supper. Suddenly they noticed a string of camels coming towards them in the distance, probably Ishmaelite traders who were taking gum, spices, and herbs from Gilead to Egypt.

^26-27 “Look there,” Judah said to the others. “Here come some Ishmaelites. Let’s sell Joseph to them! Why kill him and have a guilty conscience? Let’s not be responsible for his death, for, after all, he is our brother!” And his brothers agreed. ²⁸ So when the traders^[v] came by, his brothers pulled Joseph out of the well and sold him to them for twenty pieces of silver, and they took him along to Egypt. ²⁹ Some time later, Reuben (who was away when the traders came by)^[w] returned to get Joseph out of the well. When Joseph wasn’t there, he ripped at his clothes in anguish and frustration.

³⁰ “The child is gone; and I, where shall I go now?” he wept to his brothers. ³¹ Then the brothers killed a goat and spattered its blood on Joseph’s coat, ³² and took the coat to their father and asked him to identify it.

“We found this in the field,” they told him. “Is it Joseph’s coat or not?” ³³ Their father recognized it at once.

“Yes,” he sobbed, “it is my son’s coat. A wild animal has eaten him. Joseph is without doubt torn in pieces.”

³⁴ Then Israel tore his garments and put on sackcloth and mourned for his son in deepest mourning for many weeks. ³⁵ His family all tried to comfort him, but it was no use.

“I will die in mourning for my son,” he would say, and then break down and cry.

³⁶ Meanwhile, in Egypt, the traders sold Joseph to Potiphar, an officer of the Pharaoh—the king of Egypt. Potiphar was captain of the palace guard, the chief executioner.

38 About this time, Judah left home and moved to Adullam and lived there with a man named Hirah. ² There he met and married a Canaanite girl—the daughter of Shua. ^3-5 They lived at Chezib and had three sons, Er, Onan, and Shelah. These names were given to them by their mother, except for Er, who was named by his father.

⁶ When his oldest son, Er, grew up, Judah arranged for him to marry a girl named Tamar. ⁷ But Er was a wicked man, and so the Lord killed him.

⁸ Then Judah said to Er’s brother, Onan, “You must marry Tamar, as our law requires of a dead man’s brother; so that her sons from you will be your brother’s heirs.”

⁹ But Onan was not willing to have a child who would not be counted as his own, and so, although he married her,^[x] whenever he went in to sleep with her, he spilled the sperm on the bed to prevent her from having a baby which would be his brother’s. ¹⁰ So far as the Lord was concerned, it was very wrong of him to deny a child to his deceased brother, so he killed him, too. ¹¹ Then Judah told Tamar, his daughter-in-law, not to marry again at that time, but to return to her childhood home and to her parents, and to remain a widow there until his youngest son, Shelah, was old enough to marry her. (But he didn’t really intend for Shelah to do this, for fear God would kill him, too, just as he had his two brothers.) So Tamar went home to her parents.

¹² In the process of time Judah’s wife died. After the time of mourning was over, Judah and his friend Hirah, the Adullamite, went to Timnah to supervise the shearing of his sheep. ¹³ When someone told Tamar that her father-in-law had left for the sheepshearing at Timnah, ¹⁴ and realizing by now that she was not going to be permitted to marry Shelah, though he was fully grown, she laid aside her widow’s clothing and covered herself with a veil to disguise herself, and sat beside the road at the entrance to the village of Enaim, which is on the way to Timnah. ¹⁵ Judah noticed her as he went by and thought she was a prostitute, since her face was veiled. ¹⁶ So he stopped and propositioned her to sleep with him, not realizing of course that she was his own daughter-in-law.

“How much will you pay me?” she asked.

¹⁷ “I’ll send you a young goat from my flock,” he promised.

“What pledge will you give me, so that I can be sure you will send it?” she asked.

¹⁸ “Well, what do you want?” he inquired.

“Your identification seal and your walking stick,” she replied. So he gave them to her and she let him come and sleep with her; and she became pregnant as a result. ¹⁹ Afterwards she resumed wearing her widow’s clothing as usual. ²⁰ Judah asked his friend Hirah the Adullamite to take the young goat back to her, and to pick up the pledges he had given her, but Hirah couldn’t find her!

²¹ So he asked around of the men of the city, “Where does the prostitute live who was soliciting out beside the road at the entrance of the village?”

“But we’ve never had a public prostitute here,” they replied. ²² So he returned to Judah and told him he couldn’t find her anywhere, and what the men of the place had told him.

²³ “Then let her keep them!” Judah exclaimed. “We tried our best. We’d be the laughingstock of the town to go back again.”

²⁴ About three months later word reached Judah that Tamar, his daughter-in-law, was pregnant, obviously as a result of prostitution.

“Bring her out and burn her,” Judah shouted.

²⁵ But as they were taking her out to kill her she sent this message to her father-in-law: “The man who owns this identification seal and walking stick is the father of my child. Do you recognize them?”

²⁶ Judah admitted that they were his and said, “She is more in the right than I am, because I refused to keep my promise to give her to my son Shelah.” But he did not marry her.

²⁷ In due season the time of her delivery arrived and she had twin sons. ²⁸ As they were being born, the midwife tied a scarlet thread around the wrist of the child who appeared first, ²⁹ but he drew back his hand and the other baby was actually the first to be born. “Where did you come from!” she exclaimed. And ever after he was called Perez (meaning “Bursting Out”). ³⁰ Then, soon afterwards, the baby with the scarlet thread on his wrist was born, and he was named Zerah.

39 When Joseph arrived in Egypt as a captive of the Ishmaelite traders, he was purchased from them by Potiphar, a member of the personal staff of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. Now this man Potiphar was the captain of the king’s bodyguard and his chief executioner. ² The Lord greatly blessed Joseph there in the home of his master, so that everything he did succeeded. ³ Potiphar noticed this and realized that the Lord was with Joseph in a very special way. ⁴ So Joseph naturally became quite a favorite with him. Soon he was put in charge of the administration of Potiphar’s household, and all of his business affairs. ⁵ At once the Lord began blessing Potiphar for Joseph’s sake. All his household affairs began to run smoothly, his crops flourished and his flocks multiplied. ⁶ So Potiphar gave Joseph the complete administrative responsibility over everything he owned. He hadn’t a worry in the world with Joseph there, except to decide what he wanted to eat! Joseph, by the way, was a very handsome young man.

⁷ One day at about this time Potiphar’s wife began making eyes at Joseph, and suggested that he come and sleep with her.

⁸ Joseph refused. “Look,” he told her, “my master trusts me with everything in the entire household; ⁹ he himself has no more authority here than I have! He has held back nothing from me except you yourself because you are his wife. How can I do such a wicked thing as this? It would be a great sin against God.”

¹⁰ But she kept on with her suggestions day after day, even though he refused to listen, and kept out of her way as much as possible. ¹¹ Then one day as he was in the house going about his work—as it happened, no one else was around at the time— ¹² she came and grabbed him by the sleeve^[y] demanding, “Sleep with me.” He tore himself away, but as he did, his jacket slipped off and she was left holding it as he fled from the house. ¹³ When she saw that she had his jacket, and that he had fled, ^14-15 she began screaming; and when the other men around the place came running in to see what had happened, she was crying hysterically. “My husband had to bring in this Hebrew slave to insult us!” she sobbed. “He tried to rape me, but when I screamed, he ran, and forgot to take his jacket.”

¹⁶ She kept the jacket, and when her husband came home that night, ¹⁷ she told him her story.

“That Hebrew slave you’ve had around here tried to rape me, ¹⁸ and I was only saved by my screams. He fled, leaving his jacket behind!”

¹⁹ Well, when her husband heard his wife’s story, he was furious. ²⁰ He threw Joseph into prison, where the king’s prisoners were kept in chains. ²¹ But the Lord was with Joseph there, too, and was kind to him by granting him favor with the chief jailer. ²² In fact, the jailer soon handed over the entire prison administration to Joseph, so that all the other prisoners were responsible to him. ²³ The chief jailer had no more worries after that, for Joseph took care of everything, and the Lord was with him so that everything ran smoothly and well.

40 ^1-3 Some time later it so happened that the king of Egypt became angry with both his chief baker and his chief butler, so he jailed them both in the prison where Joseph was, in the castle of Potiphar, the captain of the guard, who was the chief executioner. ⁴ They remained under arrest there for quite some time, and Potiphar assigned Joseph to wait on them. ⁵ One night each of them had a dream. ⁶ The next morning Joseph noticed that they looked dejected and sad.

⁷ “What in the world is the matter?” he asked.

⁸ And they replied, “We both had dreams last night, but there is no one here to tell us what they mean.”

“Interpreting dreams is God’s business,” Joseph replied. “Tell me what you saw.”

^9-10 The butler told his dream first. “In my dream,” he said, “I saw a vine with three branches that began to bud and blossom, and soon there were clusters of ripe grapes. ¹¹ I was holding Pharaoh’s wine cup in my hand, so I took the grapes and squeezed the juice into it, and gave it to him to drink.”