Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 33-35.

I was recently listening to a video discussion about the age of marriage for women in the Old Testament.  In doing so they talked about different Hebrew words for girl, young woman, virgin, etc..  One of the words they talked about was “yaldah”.  They said this referred to a girl who was old enough to have some independence, but not yet old enough to be married (they said typically 8 years old to 12 years old).   The reason I bring this up is that they also said that “yaldah” was one of the words used in this passage to describe Dinah.  I could not find any supporting evidence for this claim when I looked it up today.  All of the references I could find said that “yaldah” refers to a girl/young woman of close to, or early marriageable age.  The sources I found put Dinah’s age at 14-16.  If the claim from that video I watches is correct. it puts a completely different understanding on what happened to Dinah, and to her brothers’ response to it.  I had always thought of Dinah as being 16-20 when Shechem raped her.  From that perspective, her brothers’ response was understandable, but seems a bit more about them being disrespected than about concern for their sister.  On the other hand, if Dinah was only 14, or even younger, then what Shechem did to her was reprehensible, and the fact that the people of the town found it acceptable makes them reprehensible.  It puts into context what God said to Abraham in chapter fifteen about the sins of the Amorites not yet being complete.

I find it interesting that it is after the incident at Shechem, when Jacob goes to Bethel and gets his entire family to dedicate themselves to the God of Abraham and Isaac to the exclusion of all other gods, that the writer tells us that God came and officially changed his name from Jacob to Israel.  Before that the name change was given to Jacob by a “man” about whose identity the writer is ambiguous.  God here confirms the name change given to Jacob.  He has striven once more with man (this time through the actions of his sons) and won.  Jacob is not a deceiver, he is one who strives with God.  I want to note that does not mean strives against God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Genesis 31-32.

The first thing I want to comment on is that the passage said that Jacob tricked Laban by taking his wives and flocks and heading for Canaan while Laban was with his sons shearing his sheep.  I want to make note that sheep shearing was a time of celebration which would have kept Laban and his people busy for a few days.  So, we understand that Jacob almost certainly chose that time to flee on purpose.  When we see how Laban reacted when he learned that Jacob had fled we should understand why Jacob did so when Laban would be distracted.  Laban gathered his kinsmen (who were likely with him for the sheep shearing celebration) to pursue Jacob.  Laban did not bring all of his relatives with him in order to bid farewell to his daughters and grandsons.  However, I don’t really view what Jacob did to Laban as a trick.  What I really wanted to focus on was the account of the “man” with whom Jacob wrestled before he met with Esau.  We generally say that the “man” was God or an angel of God.  Jacob certainly seems to believe that to be the case.  The passage itself does not say that.  Reading that part of the passage and trying to decide if the writer was trying to tell us that the “man” was God, or if he was an angel, or if the writer was saying that he did not know who it was that Jacob wrestled that night, made me notice something about Jacob’s name change to Israel.  The name Jacob meant “heel-catcher” and was a euphemism for a cheater.  The fact that his name was a euphemism for cheater has colored the way we think about Jacob in the passages about him.  However, if we think about what Jacob did from the perspective of the new name which he was given, we can see them a bit differently.  The “man” who gave Jacob the name Israel says that he does so because Jacob strove against God and man.  Jacob strove against Esau and he strove against Laban.  As I was reading the stories about Jacob this year, I saw them less as Jacob tricking people into doing things which benefited him and more as him striving to make his way in the world when others had the upper hand over him.  Jacob did not give in to depression when things went against him.  He trusted in God, dug down into his soul, and tried harder.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 29-30.

We think of Jacob as the trickster, but it was his mother, Rebekah, who plotted out how he would steal Esau’s blessing and it was Laban, Rebekah’s brother, who twice violated the spirit of the agreements which he made with Jacob.  Yes, Jacob carried out his mother’s deception, but the deception was not his idea.  Even the case where he got Esau to trade his birthright for a bowl of stew was not deceptive.  The other thing I find interesting is that Laban deceptively dealt with Jacob, even though he begged Jacob to stay because God had blessed him because of Jacob.  The thing is that Jacob did not get down when Laban essentially cheated him after agreeing to his idea for his wages.  Jacob just went to work to maximize his profits.  I want to look at what the agreement was.  Jacob proposed, and Laban agreed, that all of the speckled, spotted sheep, the black lambs, and the speckled and spotted goats in the flocks which Jacob was tending would be Jacob’s.  Laban promptly went out and removed all of those animals from the flocks which Jacob would be tending and sent them to the flocks being tended by Laban’s sons.   Jacob did not complain because Laban had cheated him.  He did not descend into depression because ‘the deck was stacked against him’.  He just went to work to make the most of the hand he was dealt.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Genesis 26-28.

I think that perhaps we do not pay enough attention to Esau’s poor choices for his first two wives.  They represent the same sort of poor decision making which led him to sell his birthright to Jacob for a bowl of stew.  It says here that Esau’s wives made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah.  The NIV translates that as “They were a source of grief for Isaac and Rebekah.”  In either case, Esau’s wives made life miserable for his parents. This was not just a matter of them not liking his wives.  What made me go down this path was that as I read this passage I began to wonder what made Rebekah choose to trick her husband into giving his blessing to Jacob.  Yes, in yesterday’s passage it said that Isaac loved Esau because he ate of the game which Esau killed when he went hunting, and that Rebekah loved Jacob, but that does seem like enough for Rebekah to go to this much effort to steal Isaac’s blessing for Jacob.  No, I think Esau’s wives were the reason that Rebekah chose to conspire with Jacob to steal the blessing.  I think that it never occurred to Esau that his wives had caused a problem with his father until after Isaac sent Jacob to Paddan-aram.  Perhaps he was aware that his mother did not like his wives, but I don’t think it ever crossed his mind that that was a problem.  Of course, Esau’s wives also did not see how their behavior negatively impacted Esau’s relationship with his family, or, perhaps they thought it did not matter.  It never occurred to any one of the three of them that they needed to care what Isaac and Rebekah thought about their relationship or how they acted.  While this example gives us an example of the sorts of problems which arise when we do not think about how our actions, and the actions of those we choose to love, will impact our relations with our families, the same thing holds true with our other relationships as well.  We should think carefully about our various relationships will impact our other relationships, especially when we decide on who we will marry (but not just who we marry).  I want to also note that I think Esau would have been better off trying to get his wives to act differently in regard to his parents rather than trying to fix the problem by marrying a third woman.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 24-25.

One thing that struck me during this time reading through the accounts of Ishmael and Isaac is that despite Ishmael being given reasons to resent Isaac, he appears to have been on good terms with him by the time Abraham died.  Back in chapter 17, God gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision at the same time as He told Abraham that Isaac would be born the following year.  Ishmael was thirteen years old when Abraham circumcised him.  It seems that there is a good chance that Ishmael would have known about the connection between being circumcised, which was surely a painful procedure, and the birth of Isaac.  Many thirteen year old’s would have resented their younger half-brother for that.  Later, when Abraham sent Hagar and Ishmael away, Ishmael would have surely known it was because Sarah viewed him as a threat to her son Isaac.  Again many young men would have resented their younger half-brother for that.  Yet, when Abraham died, Ishmael stood by Isaac as they together buried their father.  And we know from later on that there were some continued relations between Isaac and Ishmael because when Esau realized that his parents did not like his first two wives, he tried to fix that by marrying Ishmael’s daughter.  Esau would not have done that if there were not some goodwill between Isaac and Ishmael.

I have never really given much thought to Esau’s side of the relationship between Jacob and Esau.  I often think about the fact that God said that He favored Jacob before they were born, but that’s not exactly what God says here.  God told Rebekah that her older son would serve his younger brother.  (Yes, later, in Malachi, God said “I have loved Jacob but Esau I have hated.” But that doesn’t change what I am writing here).  Here we see that Esau had no real thought for his future.  He came back from the field when Jacob was cooking.  Esau was hungry and casually sold his birthright for a meal.  As the eldest son of Jacob, Esau’s birthright was a double portion of his father’s wealth when his father passed it on to his sons (typically upon the father’s death).  But it’s more than just the wealth, it is also a double portion of his father’s legacy.  It should have been Esau through whom God’s blessing to Abraham and Isaac should have come, but here he sold that to Jacob for a bowl of stew.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Genesis 21-23.

I always find the account of Hagar and Ishmael being sent away by Abraham interesting.  Reading it out of context makes it seem like Ishmael was a young boy at the time, but, if we read it in context, Ishmael was at least sixteen when this happened.  We know that Ishmael was fourteen when Isaac was born and this account took place when Isaac was weaned, which would have happened when Isaac was between two and five years old.  This completely destroys the idea that children were considered adult at younger ages than today.  Having said that I want to look at one other aspect of this story.  Sarah had felt that Hagar held her in contempt, which had led to Hagar running away in yesterday’s passage.  Only to have God tell her to return and submit to Sarah.  Now, Sarah felt that Ishmael mocked Isaac and would bully him, so she told Abraham to send Hagar and the boy away (I want to note that I am not saying that Sarah was wrong in either case, just that it was her perception of the sleight which led to her actions).  Abraham was hesitant to send Ishmael and Hagar away, but God told him that He would care for the two of them and be with them.  Abraham sent Ishmael and Hagar away at Sarah’s request in order to maintain peace in his household.  God confirmed to him that he was doing the right thing.  Then God provided for Hagar and Ishmael.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 19-20.

The first thing which really struck me when I read this was where it mentions that Lot was afraid to live in Zoar.  After that the passage mentions that at some point after that Lot’s daughters got him drunk so that he would impregnate them, since there were no men around them that they could marry.  My thought when I read that was that Lot became that crazy old man who lives “off the grid” out in the woods with his family and interacts with no one else.  The passage does not tell us why Lot was afraid to live in Zoar, but when you look at his experiences in Sodom you can hardly blame him.  He must have been suffering some pretty traumatic PTSD.  Let’s look at his story.  Shortly after he moved into Sodom, the city was conquered and he was taken captive, probably to be sold into slavery.  His uncle, Abram, rescued him.  Then, when he offered shelter to some men visiting Sodom, the men of Sodom attacked him.  The visitors he sheltered warned him to get out of Sodom because God was about to destroy it.  Then, as he fled from Sodom with his family, his wife looked back and was turned into a pillar of salt.

But how did Lot get into this situation?  Back when Abram realized that he and Lot, and there flocks and herds, could not remain together, Abram gave Lot the choice of area.  Lot chose the easy, comfortable route by choosing the valley near Sodom and Gomorrah.  Additionally, Lot lived in Sodom for years, but failed to make any impact on the way his neighbors chose to live.  Perhaps I am being unfair to Lot, but his neighbors did not respect him for his morality.  Instead, they saw him as being judgmental.  The men engaged to marry his daughters thought he was joking when he told them that God was going to destroy the city.  Lot chose to take the “easy” way and paid the price.  The results Lot faced did not come from that one choice, but that one choice was indicative of a series of poor choices.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 16-18.

I am struggling with how to write out the lesson I see in the story of Hagar and Ishmael.  God had promised Abram that he would have a son and that through that son God would bless the entire world.  But Abram was 86 years old and Sarai had not given birth to a son.  So, she decided that Abram would need to have a son by another woman.  She chose to give him her slave, Hagar, to be his wife, to bear him a son.  This led to all sorts of problems, but God nevertheless chose to bless Ishmael, even though he was not part of God’s original plan.  Because Sarai tried to “fix” things so as to bring about the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abram, she created problems for herself.  Because Abram did not stand firm on God’s promise and allowed Sarai to try her hand at “fixing” things, he had problems in his household which I am sure tore at his heart.  Because she became arrogant and looked at Sarai with contempt created problems for herself.  Nevertheless, God chose to bless Ishmael, even though he was never part of God’s plan to bless Abram.  It appears that God renamed Abram to Abraham because he had born Ishmael, thus, with the blessing which God was going to give Ishmael, Abram became the father of a multitude.  Thus we learn that we would be better off waiting on God, but that God will still bless us even when we move ahead of what He planned for us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 12-15.

This passage begins with God telling Abram that He will bless him.  I recently took the Kairos course from Simply Mobilizing, which endeavors to inculcate a dedication to missions in all members of Christ’s Church.  One of the foundational points it references is this blessing which God gave to Abram.  God tells Abram the following, “…I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.”  The point they made is that God blessed Abram so that he could be a blessing to others.  The same is true of us.  The purpose of every blessing which God gives us is so that we might be a blessing for others.  When I started writing I planned to write about this and about the end of the passage where God made a covenant with Abram, but wasn’t sure what I was going to write.  When God made the covenant with Abram He told him that his descendants would be sojourners in a land which was not there and would come back to the land which God promised Abram for his descendants, “for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”  Interestingly, the name of the course which made me notice that Abram was blessed in order to be a blessing to others was “Kairos”.  Kairos is the Greek word which means “the critical time”.  The kairos is the proper time for action.  So, God was telling Abram that his descendants would come back to the Land of Canaan and conquer it at the proper time, at the time when the wickedness of the people currently living in the land could no longer be overlooked.  Reading this in the context of Abram, and his descendants, being blessed so that they could bless others, God was promising Abram that his descendants would conquer the land when they could bring the greatest blessing to those living in the land who were not wicked.  In the same way, God blesses us at the time and place where we can bless others.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Genesis 8-11.

Since I had noted that in the Creation accounts it said that God had given only plants for people to eat, I want to note that here in the Flood account God gives mankind everything else as food as well.  This suggests to me that in the perfect world, humans would be strictly vegetarian, but since we do not live in such a world, God has given us meat to eat.  Before telling Noah and his sons that He was giving them all living things as food for them, God commanded them to be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth.  What I had never noticed before is what the text says regarding why the people of Babel built their tower.  They chose to build the tower to make a name for themselves, “lest they be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”  God did not divide the languages because the people of Babel chose to build a tower which would reach to heavens.  He did so because they were avoiding obeying His command to fill the whole earth.  This tells us something about how God works with us.  A similar thing happens with Christians when we fail to truly fulfill the Great Commission: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”  In fact, the Great Commission is a follow up to the command which God gave Noah and his sons.  They were told to fill the earth.  We are told to make disciples of all nations.  We are to fill the earth with disciples of Jesus.  If we become settled in our groups and stop reaching out to the unsaved, God will disrupt us.  He may do so by creating division within our group so that we spread out.  He may do so by introducing persecution against us so that we scatter.  He may use another mechanism to cause us to spread His word.  It is less painful if we do so on our own initiative.  The Great Commission is not optional for those who follow Christ.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.