MOMMA MADE ME DO IT

Rebekah shows obsessive love for one son, alienates second son and husband. Genesis 24-27

“Now then, please take your weapons, your quiver, and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt wild game for me,” the old, near-blind Isaac told his son Esau in Genesis 27: 3-4, ISR. “And make me a tasty dish, such as I love, and bring it to me to eat, in order that my being does bless you before I die.”

Rebekah overhears the conversation her husband is having with their oldest twin son. She’s not eavesdropping per se; sound carries when you dwell in tents on semi-arid land. But she favors the younger twin, Jacob, and is perturbed by Isaac’s plan to follow tradition.

Esau, with the chiseled, sun-tanned body of a well-trained athlete, scurries off to fulfill his father’s wishes. He “left for the open country to hunt game and bring it back,” according to Gen. 27: 5, NLT.

Meanwhile, Rebekah springs into action, calling Jacob and repeating the conversation Isaac had with Esau. The laid back, studious Jacob appears skeptical. But Rebekah insists:

^“Now, my son, listen to me. Do exactly as I tell you. Go out to the flocks and bring me two fine young goats. I’ll use them to prepare your father’s favorite dish.Then take the food to your father so he can eat it and bless you before he dies,” according to Gen. 27:8, NLT.

“But look,” Jacob replies to Rebekah in verse 11, “my brother, Esau, is a hairy man, and my skin is smooth.What if my father touches me? He’ll see that I’m trying to trick him, and then he’ll curse me instead of blessing me.”

Rebekah responds to Jacob’s lack of enthusiasm for the plot: “Then let the curse fall on me, my son! Just do what I tell you. Go out and get the goats for me!”

Jacob accepts his mother’s assurance and follows her instructions.

Rebekah was a beautiful woman, even after years of marriage in the harsh climate of the Negev Desert area. Though her good looks remained, many of her endearing qualities had faded. In her youth, she possessed an innate ability to communicate. Now she relied on deceit and deception, rather than openly talking with her husband about her feelings and what she alone knew about God’s promises.

The couple certainly didn’t start that way. Isaac and Rebekah had lived an enviable love story for years.

Isaac’s birth to Abraham and Sarah was the highlight of their eventful and exciting lives following God. Sarah died at the age of 127, 37 years after delivering Isaac. It was at this time that Abraham realized his son needed a wife and entrusted the task of finding a suitable woman for Isaac to his senior servant, the manager of his entire household, Eliezer.

Abraham lived in a culture where fathers’ selected marriage partners. He explained to Eliezer he did not want his son to marry a woman from the neighboring Canaanites because he believed they were cursed by God and doomed to destruction. But Abraham was not naïve either. He understood that his relatives in northern Mesopotamia had idols and didn’t walk as closely with God as his family did. But Nahor and his family at least knew about God and respected him.

Eliezer accepts the assignment and travels to the vicinity of Haran, relying on Abraham’s assurance that the angel of the Lord would go before him. So, he stops at a well in the town of Nahor, the area in Mesopotamia where Abraham’s brother by the same name settled after Abraham migrated to Canaan 65 years earlier.

Selecting a wife took skills and Eliezer knew what essential characteristics were needed for Isaac’s mate. For example, the servant sought chesed or lovingkindness, generosity, selfless commitment, and boundless energy to look for opportunities to serve. He prayed and devised a test that would point him in the right direction.

“O Lord, God of my master, Abraham,” Eliezer prays in Genesis 24:12-15, NLT. “Please give me success today, and show unfailing love to my master, Abraham.See, I am standing here beside this spring, and the young women of the town are coming out to draw water. This is my request. I will ask one of them, ‘Please give me a drink from your jug.’ If she says, ‘Yes, have a drink, and I will water your camels, too!’—let her be the one you have selected as Isaac’s wife. This is how I will know that you have shown unfailing love to my master.”

Rebecca was a young woman of nobility, not a poor servant girl accustomed to lugging water. She was the daughter of Bethuel, the ruler of Aram Naharaim and Abraham’s nephew. On the day that Eliezer arrived at the well, the mature and independent Rebekah had decided that for the first time, she would personally travel to the well to fetch water. She had maids who could have done it but decided to go herself.

Shortly after Eliezer says “Amen” to end his prayer, Rebekah arrives at the well. She is the granddaughter of Abraham’s brother. Eliezer watches her fill a jug of water and place it on her shoulder. Then, he runs over and asks for a drink. She hurriedly removes the jug from her shoulder to her hand to create a distance that prevents him from getting too close to her face as he drinks the water. Her culture required modesty.

When he finishes drinking, Rebekah offers to give the camels water as well. Eliezer had loaded 10 of Abraham’s camels with all kinds of expensive gifts. She empties the remainder of the water into a trough. She then adds more water for the animals’ use.

Rebekah shows sensitivity because she found an unoffensive way to use the rest of the water left from Eliezer’s drink. The custom was to just pour out water left from a stranger’s drink because it would be unsanitary for anyone else to use the water. If she had just poured out the water, the action may have suggested he had contaminated the water.

After watering the camels, a lot transpires with rapid-fire speed. Eliezer gives Rebekah a golden ring and two bracelets. She hurries to her mother’s home to tell about the encounter. Eliezer is invited to stay the night and he explains the reason for his visit. The next morning, he is ready to return to Canaan with Rebekah. Her family is reluctant to let her go so soon. However, the radiant, quick-witted Rebekah is ready to join the famous household of Abraham and Isaac. All these years, she had managed to stay above her idol-worshiping environment and remain a virgin; she was ready to live in a God-fearing household.

The 500-mile trip provided time for Eliezer and Rebekah to talk about her intended husband. Eliezer has worked for the Abraham household for years so he is qualified to tell Rebekah that Isaac is unassuming, mild-mannered, a quiet meditative, reserved, and peace-loving man who would go to great lengths to avoid a fight. Isaac’s most endearing characteristic was his steadfast faith in God whose promise that his seed would bring spiritual blessing to the whole earth he trusted, Eliezer confided.

No one, especially Isaac and Rebekah, thought it would take 20 years for them to conceive. But it did and Genesis 25:21, NLT said: “Isaac pleaded with the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was unable to have children. The Lord answered Isaac’s prayer, and Rebekah became pregnant with twins.”

Rebekah’s pregnancy was violent. She almost regretted being pregnant until the Lord revealed in Genesis 25: 23, NLT, “The sons in your womb will become two nations. From the very beginning, the two nations will be rivals. One nation will be stronger than the other; and your older son will serve your younger son.”

The young woman delivered twins as foretold in the divine prophecy. Genesis 25: 24-26, NLT, said: “The first one was very red at birth and covered with thick hair like a fur coat. So, they named him Esau.Then the other twin was born with his hand grasping Esau’s heel. So, they named him Jacob.” 

Isaac was 60 years old when the twins were born and was unaware of the Lord’s unusual divine prophecy that Jacob, the younger, would receive the blessing of the firstborn. The talkative Rebekah, with her bubbly personality, never confided in her husband who used solitude and silence to coat his retiring personality. Instead of building communication and tightening the marriage bond, each latched onto a boy.

“As the boys grew up, Esau became a skillful hunter. He was an outdoorsman, but Jacob had a quiet temperament, preferring to stay at home. Isaac loved Esau because he enjoyed eating the wild game Esau brought home, but Rebekah loved Jacob,” according to Genesis 25: 27-28, NLT.

Wives and mothers are expected to love passionately but Rebekah’s love for Jacob became a selfish, jealous love that led to favoritism of one child over another. The diabolical plan she was plotting with Jacob proves she had compromised her love for, and loyalty to, her husband. She was determined to do what she thought would help Jacob, at the expense of both Esau and Isaac.

She prepared Isaac’s favorite dish from the goats that Jacob brought to her. Also, she made Jacob wear Esau’s best clothes and covered his smooth hands and neck with goatskins.

Timing and Jacob’s voice made Isaac suspicious.

Genesis 27: 18-29, NIV, tells the story this way:

“My father,” Jacob says as he enters the tent.

“Yes, my son,” Isaac answers. “Who is it?”

Jacob says to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.”

“How did you find it so quickly, my son?” Isaac asks.

“The Lord your God gave me success,” he replies.

Then Isaac says to Jacob, “Come near so I can touch you, my son, to know whether you really are my son Esau or not.”

Jacob moves close to his father Isaac, who touches him and says, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”

“Are you really my son Esau?” he asks.

“I am,” Jacob replies.

Then he says, “My son, bring me some of your game to eat, so that I may give you my blessing.”

Jacob brings it to him, and he eats; and he brings some wine, and he drinks.

Isaac then says to him, “Come here, my son, and kiss me.”

 So, he goes to him and kisses him. When Isaac smells his clothes, he blesses him and says:

“Ah, the smell of my son is like the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed. May God give you heaven’s dew and earth’s richness – and abundance of grain and new wine. May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers and may the sons of your mother bow down to you. May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed.”

Shortly after Isaac had blessed Jacob and the younger twin left his father’s presence, Esau arrives with his meal. He becomes so upset that he vows to kill his younger brother once their feeble father dies.

Again, Rebekah devises a plan to protect Jacob, without consulting God. She calls Jacob, reveals Esau’s plan to kill him and offers to send him to spend time with her brother Laban in Haran until Esau’s fury subsides.

Then, she goes to Isaac and dramatically complains about the women available for Jacob to marry. She convinces her old, weary, near-blind husband that Jacob should leave home.

Rebekah died before Jacob returned home 20 years later. Isaac still lived. And Jacob was on the run from his brother for years. Even as an adult, with great wealth, wives and children, Jacob constantly looked over his shoulder for a vengeful Esau. Only near the end of their father’s life did the twins come to some sort of reconciliation and worked together to bury their father – Genesis 35:29, NLT.

Note: In Hebrew Bibles, Rebekah is called Ribqah or Rivkah. Isaac is Yitshaq. Esau is Esaw and Jacob is Ya’aqob.

Written by COH

SOURCE:

Adelman, Mendel. Rebecca of the Bible.

https://chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/4028268/jewish/Rebecca-of-the-Bible.htm

Bible in Pictures – Isaac and Rebekah – A Tender Love Story. Four impressive lessons.

Harrison-Dixon, Troy Janel. Rebekah. Women of the Bible for Women of Color. 2021 Urban Spirit LLC

Haynes Jr., Clarence L. Clarencehaynes.com      Crosswalk.com

Hurwitz, Yitzi. The Spiritual Life of Rebecca.

https://www.chabad.org/parshah/article_cdo/aid/3534977/jewish/The-Spiritual-Life-of-Rebecca.htm

Isaacs, Jacob. Isaac’s Marriage. Kehot Publication Society.

https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/246617jewish/Isaacs-Marriage.htm

Isaac and Rebekah – Bible Story

https://www.biblestudytools.com/bible-stories/isaac-and-rebekah-bible-story.html

Strauss, Richard L. Talk to Me – The Story of Isaac and Rebekah. From the Series: Living in Love: Secrets from Bible Marriages.

https://bible.org/seriespages/3-talk-me-story-isaac-and-rebekah

Vilenkin, Esther. Rebecca and the Camel Test: A Lesson in Giving.

https://www.chabad.org/parshah/article_cdo/aid/3534977/jewish/The-Spiritual-Life-of-Rebecca.htm