Like Father, Like Son

From chapters twenty-six on (until chapter thirty-five), we hear about various stories.

First is the story about Isaac and how he was sent to wander and conquer the lands by God, and he lied about his wife being his sister, and was cursed and thrown out, and then was used to reach God by the same ones who had rejected him, and built altars all along his ways, and was blessed with children from God- just like his father, Abraham. Isaac's wife, Rebekah bares twins: Esau and Jacob.

Jacob was cunning and very smart, and so he got Esau to deny his birthrights and he cheated Esau out of Isaac's blessing, by dressing up and passing as him to his dying, blind father. However, this action was totally maneuvered and controlled by Rebekah, who preferred Jacob, and so he must not have to take all of the blame. Then Jacob, fearing Esau's revenge and again being controlled by his mother, left for Laban's lands, Laban being his uncle. There he falls in love with Rachel, Laban's daughter (that would make them cousins, incestuous much?!), and he promises Laban seven years of labor in exchange for his daughter. When the seven years end, Laban sneaks his eldest daughter, Leah, to be with Jacob. That way Jacob has to promise seven more years of labor to get Rachel, who is who he really wants. After twenty years of being cheated and mistreated by Laban, Jacob leaves with his wives and eleven sons to go back to his lands, over where Esau rules now.

They get there and Jacob sends gifts and servants in front of him, as to avoid his brother's anger, but he is greeted only by love and kindness. Then Jacob and his crew continue traveling through all lands, all the while committing the same actions and mistakes as his father. He travels and build altars until Rachel dies, when she is buried just like Sarah was buried once before.

 

I think that throughout this whole journey, we see a very big change in Jacob. At first he is very sly and seems to have no morals, as we can see he betrays his own brother to get what isn't rightfully his, but towards the middle we can see that he turns humble and is willing to work no matter how hard to get what he wants, exchanging almost twenty years of labor with Laban for his true love. However, when he returns home, he starts acting like a total coward, sending all these people and presents in front of him so his brother would forget to get back at him for what he did. Even though it worked, he was forgiven, I think he should have still gotten what he deserved.

 

In the middle of all this story there is a part where out of the blue, Jacob finds himself wrestling with some guy. I think that guy is God. He tells Jacob: 'Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed', which is something that God himself says afterwards. We see another Jewish tradition that comes out of this scene, 'the children of Israel eat not of the sinew which shrank … because he touched the hollow of Jacob's thigh in the sinew that shrank.' The bond seems to just be getting bigger.