God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel, and live there. Make there an altar to God, who appeared to you when you fled from the face of Esau your brother.”
Then Jacob said to his household, and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, purify yourselves, change your garments. Let’s arise, and go up to Bethel. I will make there an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me on the way which I went.”
They gave to Jacob all the foreign gods which were in their hands, and the rings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4 1. And God said unto Jacob. Moses relates that…
1. And God said unto Jacob. Moses relates that when Jacob had been reduced to the last extremity, God came to his help in the right time, and as at the critical juncture. And thus he shows, in the person of one man, that God never deserts his Church which he has once embraced, but will procure its salvation. We must, however, observe the order of his procedure; for God did not immediately appear to his servant, but suffered him first to be tormented by grief and excessive cares, that he might learn patience, deferring his consolation to the time of extreme necessity. Certainly the condition of Jacob was then most miserable. For all, on every side, might be so incensed against him that he would be surrounded with as many deaths as there were neighboring nations: and he was not so stupid as to be insensible of his danger. God suffered the holy man to be thus tossed with cares and tormented with troubles, until, by a kind of resurrection, he restored him, as one half-dead. Whenever we read this and similar passages, let us reflect that the providence of God watches for our salvation, even when it most seems to sleep. Moses does not say how long Jacob was kept in anxiety, but we may infer from the context, that he had been very greatly perplexed, when the Lord thus revived him. Moreover, we must observe that the principal medicine by which he was restored, was contained in the expression, The Lord spoke. Why did not God by a miracle translate him to some other place, and thus immediately remove him from all danger? Why did he not even, without a word, stretch out the hand over him, and repress the ferocity of all, so that no one should attempt to hurt him? But Moses does not insist upon this point in vain. For hereby we are taught whence our greatest consolation in our afflictions is to be sought; and also, that it is the principal business of our life, to depend upon the word of God, as those who are certainly persuaded that, when he has promised salvation, he will deal well with us, so that we need not hesitate to walk through the midst of deaths. Another reason for the vision was, that Jacob might not only truly perceive that God was his deliverer; but, being forewarned by his word, might learn to ascribe to God whatever afterwards followed. For seeing that we are slow and dull, bare experience by no means suffices to attest the favor of God towards us, unless faith arising from the word be added.
Go up to Beth-el. Though it is God’s design to raise his servant from death to life, he may yet have appeared to hold him up to derision; for the objection was ready, Thou indeed, O Lord, commandest me to go up, but all the ways are closed; for my sons have raised such a flame against me, that I cannot remain safe in any hiding-place. I dare scarcely move a finger: what therefore will become of me, if with a great multitude, I now begin to move my camp? shall I not provoke new enmities against me by my movements? But by this mode the faith of Jacob was most fully proved; because, knowing God to be the leader and guardian of his journey, he girded himself to it, relying on the divine favor. Moreover, the Lord does not simply command what it is his will to have done, but he encourages his servant, by adding the promise. For, in reminding him that he is the same God who had before appeared unto him as he was fleeing in alarm from his brother, a promise is included in these words. The altar also refers to the same point; for since it is the divinely appointed token of thanksgiving, it follows that Jacob would come thither in safety, in order that he might duly celebrate the grace of God. God chooses and assigns Bethel, rather than any other place, for his sanctuary; because the very sight of it would greatly avail to take away terror, when he should remember that there the glory of the Lord had been seen by him. Further, since God exhorts his servant to gratitude, he shows that he is kind to the faithful, in order that they, in return, may own themselves to be indebted for everything to his grace, and may exercise themselves in the celebration of it.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4 God is ever at hand to succor his in…
God is ever at hand to succor his in their troubles.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–4 Gen 35:1 And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go…
Gen 35:1 And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there: and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother.
Ver. l. Arise, go up to Bethel.] This is not the first time that God tells him of that vow, and calls for performance. See Gen 31:13. It is with us, as with children - Eaten bread is soon forgotten: deliverances, commonly, are but nine days’ wonderment at most; and it is ten to one, that any leper returns to give praise to God. If anything arouse and raise up our hearts to thankful remembrance of former mercy, it must be the sense of some present misery, as here. Jacob was in a great strait and fright: his sons had troubled him; the country was ready to rise upon him, and root him out: God also was justly displeased with him for his forgotten vow; yet chides him not, now that he was in heaviness; but takes his opportunity, for we are best when at worst, and gently minds him of what was his duty, and would be for his safety. Numa is said to have put so much confidence in his gods, that when he was sacrificing and news came that the enemy was at hand, he laughed, and said, At ego rein divinam facio. {a} Those Philistines were even ambitious of destruction, and ran to meet their ruin, that gathered themselves against Israel, while they were sacrificing and serving the Lord in their meet at Mizpeh. {1Sa 7:7} The Church, in her worship, is "terrible as an army with banners"; {Son 6:10} "a cup of trembling to all the people round about"; "a burdensome stone for all people"; "a torch of fire in a sheaf." {Zec 12:2-3; Zec 12:6} He is a mad man that will meddle with her while she is upon good terms with Christ, her Champion. {Isa 37:22} Balaam knew this, and therefore gave that villanous counsel. All Germany was in arms against that handful of Hussites in Bohemia, yet could not suppress them. {b} Geneva, a small people, surrounded with enemies, and barred from aid of neighbours, yet faithful with God, hath been hitherto strangely upheld. At the siege of Mountabone in France, the people of God, using daily humiliation, as their service would permit, did sing a Psalm after, and immediately before, their sallying forth. With which practice the enemy coming acquainted, ever, upon the singing of the Psalm, upon which they expected a sally, they would so quake and tremble, crying, They come, they come, as though the wrath of God had been breaking out upon them. {c}
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{a} Eγω δε ηυω - Plut
{b} Germani nondum, viso hoste, Danico terrore perculsi diffugerunt. - Pareus.
{c} Spec. Belli Sacri, 282.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–4 This was a word in season to comfort his…
This was a word in season to comfort his disquieted mind, and convey him to a safer place. Understand, and pay thy vows there made in the time of thy distress, but not yet paid; whether it was Jacob's error to forget and neglect his former vows and promises; or whether he waited for a fit time, or an admonition from God concerning the season of paying them.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v1 Here, I. God reminds Jacob of his vow at…
Here, I. God reminds Jacob of his vow at Beth-el, and sends him thither to perform it, Gen 35:1. Jacob had said in the day of his distress, If I come again in peace, this stone shall be God's house, Gen 28:22. God had performed his part of the bargain, and had given Jacob more than bread to eat and raiment to put on - he had got an estate, and had become two bands; but, it should seem, he had forgotten his vow, or at least had too long deferred the performance of it. Seven or eight years it was now since he came to Canaan; he had purchased ground there, and had built an altar in remembrance of God's last appearance to him when he called him Israel (Gen 33:19, Gen 33:20); but still Beth-el is forgotten. Note, Time is apt to wear out the sense of mercies and the impressions made upon us by them; it should not be so, but so it is. God had exercised Jacob with a very sore affliction in his family (ch. 34), to see if this would bring his vow to his remembrance, and put him upon the performance of it, but it had not this effect; therefore God comes himself and puts him in mind of it: Arise, go to Beth-el. Note, 1. As many as God loves he will remind of neglected duties, one way or other, by conscience or by providences. 2. When we have vowed a vow to God, it is best not to defer the payment of it (Ecc 5:4), yet better late than never. God bade him go to Beth-el and dwell there, that is, not only go himself, but take his family with him, that they might join with him in his devotions. Note, In Beth-el, the house of God, we should desire to dwell, Psa 27:4. That should be our home, not our inn. God reminds him not expressly of his vow, but of the occasion of it: When thou fleddest from the face of Esau. Note, The remembrance of former afflictions should bring to mind the workings of our souls under them, Psa 66:13, Psa 66:14.
II. Jacob commands his household to prepare for this solemnity; not only for the journey and remove, but for the religious services that were to be performed, Gen 35:2, Gen 35:3. Note, 1. Before solemn ordinances, there must be solemn preparation. Wash you, make you clean, and then come, and let us reason together, Isa 1:16-18. 2. Masters of families should use their authority for the promoting of religion in their families. Not only we, but our houses also, should serve the Lord, Jos 24:15. Observe the commands he gives his household, like Abraham, Gen 18:19. (1.) They must put away the strange gods. Strange gods in Jacob's family! Strange things indeed! Could such a family, that was taught the good knowledge of the Lord, admit them? Could such a master, to whom God had appeared twice, and oftener, connive at them? Doubtless this was his infirmity. Note, Those that are good themselves cannot always have those about them so good as they should be. In those families where there is a face of religion, and an altar to God, yet many times there is much amiss, and more strange gods than one would suspect. In Jacob's family, Rachel had her ִֶַ, which, it is to be feared, she secretly made some superstitious use of. The captives of Shechem brought their gods along with them, and perhaps Jacob's sons took some with the plunder. However they came by them, now they must put them away. (2.) They must be clean, and change their garments; they must observe a due decorum, and make the best appearance they could. Simeon and Levi had their hands full of blood, it concerned them particularly to wash, and to put off their garments that were so stained. These were but ceremonies, signifying the purification and change of the heart. What are clean clothes, and new clothes, without a clean heart, and a new heart? Dr. Lightfoot, by their being clean, or washing themselves, understands Jacob's admission of the proselytes of Shechem and Syria into his religion by baptism, because circumcision had become odious. 3. They must go with him to Bethel, Gen 35:3. Note, Masters of families, when they go up to the house of God, should bring their families with them.
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III. His family surrendered all they had that was idolatrous or superstitious, Gen 35:4. Perhaps, if Jacob had called for them sooner, they would sooner have parted with them, being convicted by their own consciences of the vanity of them. Note, Sometimes attempts for reformation succeed better than one could have expected, and people are not so obstinate against them as we feared. Jacob's servants, and even the retainers of his family, gave him all the strange gods, and the ear-rings they wore, either as charms or to the honour of their gods; they parted with all. Note, Reformation is not sincere if it be not universal. We hope they parted with them cheerfully, and without reluctance, as Ephraim did, when he said, What have I to do any more with idols? (Hos 14:8), or that people that said to their idols, Get you hence, Isa 30:22. Jacob took care to bury their images, we may suppose in some place unknown to them, that they might not afterwards find them and return to them. Note, We must be wholly separated from our sins, as we are from those that are dead and buried out of our sight, cast them to the moles and the bats, Isa 2:20.
IV. He removes without molestation from Shechem to Bethel, Gen 35:5. The terror of God was upon the cities. Though the Canaanites were much exasperated against the sons of Jacob for their barbarous usage of the Shechemites, yet they were so restrained by a divine power that they could not take this fair opportunity, which now offered itself, when they were upon their march, to avenge their neighbours' quarrel. Note, The way of duty is the way of safety. While there was sin in Jacob's house, he was afraid of his neighbours; but now that the strange gods were put away, and they were all going together to Bethel, his neighbours were afraid of him. When we are about God's work, we are under special protection. God is with us, while we are with him; and, if he be for us, who can be against us? See Exo 34:24, No man shall desire thy land, when thou goest up to appear before the Lord. God governs the world more by secret terrors on men's minds than we are aware of.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–4 And God said unto Jacob,.... When he was in…
And God said unto Jacob,.... When he was in great distress, on account of the slaughter of the Shechemites by his sons, not knowing what step to take, or course to steer for the safety of him and his family; then God, for his comfort and direction, appeared and spoke to him, either in a dream or vision, or by an impulse on his mind, or by an articulate voice: perhaps this was the Son of God, the second Person, who might appear in an human form, as he often did; since he afterwards speaks of God as of another divine Person, distinct from him, even his divine Father:
arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there; which is said to be twenty eight miles from Shechem (r); hither he is bid to go in haste, and where, it is suggested, he would be safe, and where it would be right and proper for him to dwell awhile:
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and make there an altar to God; and offer sacrifice to him, praise him for salvation and deliverance wrought, pray to him for present and future mercies that were needful, and pay the vows he had there made, even to that God:
that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother; who, resenting his getting the birthright and blessing from him, threatened to kill him; which obliged him to flee from his father's house, and go into Mesopotamia, and in his way thither God appeared to him, at the place called by him from thence Bethel, and gave him many precious promises; and Jacob there made a solemn vow, that if God would be with him, and keep him, and give him food and raiment, and return him to his father's house, the pillar that was then and there set up should be God's house, as well as he should be his God. Jacob had now been nine or ten years in the land of Canaan, and had all done for him he desired, and much more abundantly, and yet had not been at Bethel to make good his vow, either through forgetfulness or neglect; and therefore, as Jarchi thinks, was chastised for it in the affair of Dinah; or rather, for one can hardly think so good a man could forget, or would wilfully neglect such a vow as this, that he wanted opportunity of going thither, or waited for a divine order, and now he had both, which he readily embraced.
(r) Bunting's Travels, p. 72.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 4 In this chapter we have,
In this chapter we have,
I. Three communions between God and Jacob.
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1. God ordered Jacob to Beth-el, and in obedience to that order, he purged his house of idols, and prepared for that journey, ver. 1-5.
2. Jacob built an altar at Beth-el to the honour of God that had appeared to him, and in performance of his vow, ver. 6, 7.
3. God appeared to him again, and confirmed the change of his name, and the covenant with him, ver 9-13. of which appearance Jacob made a grateful acknowledgement, ver. 14, 15.
II. Three funerals.
1. Deborah's, ver. 8.
2. Rachel's, ver. 16-20.
3. Isaac's, ver. 27-29.
III. Here is also Reuben's incest, ver. 22. and an account of Jacob's sons, ver. 23-26.
Arise go to Bethel - Here God minds Jacob of his vow at Beth- el, and sends him thither to perform it, Jacob had said in the day of his distress, If I come again in peace, this stone shall be God's house, chap. xxviii, 22. God had performed his part, had given Jacob more than bread to eat, and raiment to put on; but it should seem he had forgotten his vow, or, at least, deferred the performance of it. And dwell there - That is, Not only go himself, but take his family with him, that they might join with him in his devotions. Put away the strange Gods - Strange God's in Jacob's family! Could such a family, that was taught the knowledge of the Lord, admit them? Could such a master, to whom God had appeared twice, and oftner, connive at them? And be clean, and change your garments - These were ceremonies signifying the purification and change of the heart.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–4 Jacob is commanded of God to go to Beth-el,…
CHAPTER XXXV
Jacob is commanded of God to go to Beth-el, and to build
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an altar there, 1.
His exhortation to his family to put away all strange
gods, c., 2, 3.
They deliver them all up, and Jacob hides them in the
earth, 4.
They commence their journey, 5
come to Luz, 6;
build there the altar El-beth-el, 7.
Burial place of Deborah, Rebekah's nurse, 8.
God appears again unto Jacob, 9.
Blesses him and renews the promises, 10-13.
To commemorate this manifestation of God, Jacob sets up
a pillar, and calls the place Beth-el, 14, 15.
They journey to Ephrath, where Rachel, after hard labour,
is delivered of Benjamin, and dies, 16-19.
Jacob sets up a pillar on her grave, 20.
They journey to Edar, 21.
While at this place, Reuben defiles his father's bed, 22.
Account of the children of Jacob, according to the mothers,
23-26.
Jacob comes to Mamre to his father Isaac, who was probably
then in the one hundred and fifty-eighth year of his age, 27.
Isaac dies, and is buried by his sons Esau and Jacob, 29.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXXV
Verse 1. Arise, go up to Beth-el] The transaction that had lately taken place rendered it unsafe for Jacob to dwell any longer at the city of Shechem; and it seems that while he was reflecting on the horrible act of Simeon and Levi, and not knowing what to do, God graciously appeared to him, and commanded him to go up to Beth-el, build an altar there, and thus perform the vow he had made, Ge 28:20; Ge 28:22.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1–4 Gen 35:1. God said, Arise, go up to Beth-el…
Gen 35:1. God said, Arise, go up to Beth-el — This was a word in season to comfort his disquieted mind, and direct him to a safer place. Make there an altar — Consider and pay thy vows there, made in the time of thy distress. Jacob had said in the day of his distress, If I come again in peace, this stone shall be God’s house, Gen 28:22. God had performed his part, and given Jacob more than he then desired, namely, “bread to eat, and raiment to put on;” but it seems, if he had not forgotten his vow, he had at least deferred the performance of it, waiting, probably, for a fit time for that purpose; or an admonition from God concerning the proper season of paying it. And dwell there — That is, he was not only to go himself, but to take his family with him, that they might join with him in his devotions.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On v1 - The Death of Isaac
- The Death of Isaac
8. דברה deborâh, Deborah, “bee.” בּכוּת אלּון 'alôn-bākût, Allon-bakuth, “oak of weeping.”
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16. כברה kı̂brâh, “length stretch.” A certain but unknown distance, a stadium or furlong (Josephus) a hippodrome (Septuagint) which was somewhat longer, a mile (Kimchi). אפרת 'ephrâth, Ephrath, “fruitful or ashy.”
18. בן־אוני ben-'ônı̂y, Ben-oni, “son of my pain.” בנימין bı̂nyāmı̂yn, Binjamin, “son of the right hand.”
19. לחם בית bēyt-lechem, Beth-lechem, “house of bread.”
21. עדר ‛ěder, ‘Eder, “flock, fold.”
This chapter contains the return of Jacob to his father’s house, and then appends the death of Isaac.
Gen 35:1-8
Jacob returns to Bethel. “And God said unto Jacob.” He receives the direction from God. He had now been six years lingering in Sukkoth and Sleekem. There may have been some contact between him and his father’s house during this interval. The presence of Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, in his family, is a plain intimation of this. But Jacob seems to have turned aside to Shekem, either to visit the spot where Abraham first erected an altar to the Lord, or to seek pasture for his numerous flocks. “Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there.” In his perplexity and terror the Lord comes to his aid. He reminds him of his former appearance to him at that place, and directs him to erect an altar there. This was Abraham’s second resting-place in the land. He who had there appeared to Jacob as the Yahweh, the God of Abraham and Isaac, is now described as (house of El), the Mighty One, probably in allusion to Bethel (house of El), which contains this name, and was at that time applied by Jacob himself to the place. “His house;” his wives and children. “All that were with him;” his men-servants and maid-servants.
The strange gods, belonging to the stranger or the strange land. These include the teraphim, which Rachel had secreted, and the rings which were worn as amulets or charms. Be clean; cleanse the body, in token of the cleaning of your souls. Change your garments; put on your best attire, befitting the holy occasion. The God, in contradistinction to the strange gods already mentioned. Hid them; buried them. “The oak which was by Shekem.” This may have been the oak of Moreh, under which Abraham pitched his tent Gen 12:6. The terror of God; a dread awakened in their breast by some indication of the divine presence being with Jacob. The patriarch seems to have retained possession of the land he had purchased and gained by conquest, in this place. His flocks are found there very shortly after this time Gen 37:12, he alludes to it, and disposes of it in his interview with Joseph and his sons Gen 48:22, and his well is there to this day.
“Luz, which is in the land of Kenaan.” This seems at first sight to intimate that there was a Luz elsewhere, and to have been added by the revising prophet to determine the place here intended. Luz means an almond tree, and may have designated many a place. But the reader of Genesis could have needed no such intimation, as Jacob is clearly in the land of Kenaan, going from Shekem to Hebron. It seems rather to call attention again Gen 33:18 to the fact that Jacob has returned from Padan-aram to the land of promise. The name Luz still recurs, as the almond tree may still be flourishing. “And he built there an altar, and called the place El-beth-el.” Thus has Jacob obeyed the command of God, and begun the payment of the vow he made twenty-six years before at this place Gen 38:20-22. “There God revealed himself unto him.” The verb here נגלוּ nı̂glû is plural in the Masoretic Hebrew, and so it was in the copy of Onkelos. The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Septuagint have the singular. The reading is therefore, various. The original was probably singular, and may have been so even with its present letters. If not, this is one of the few instances in which Elohim is construed grammatically with a plural verb. Deborah dies in the family in which she began life. She is buried under “the well-known oak” at Bethel. Jacob drops a natural tear of sorrow over the grave of this faithful servant, and hence, the oak is called the oak of weeping. It is probable that Rebekah was already dead, since otherwise we should not expect to find Deborah transferred to Jacob’s household. She may not have lived to see her favorite son on his return.
Gen 35:9-15
God appears to Jacob again at Bethel, and renews the promise made to him there Gen 28:13-14. Again. The writer here refers to the former meeting of God with Jacob at Bethel, and thereby proves himself cognizant of the fact, and of the record already made of it. “When he went out of Padan-aram.” This corroborates the explanation of the clause, Gen 35:6, “which is in the land of Kenaan.” Bethel was the last point in this land that was noticed in his flight from Esau. His arrival at the same point indicates that he has now returned from Padan-aram to the land of Kenaan. “He called his name Israel.” At Bethel he renews the change of name, to indicate that the meetings here were of equal moment in Jacob’s spiritual life with that at Penuel. It implies also that this life had been declining in the interval between Penuel and Bethel, and had now been revived by the call of God to go to Bethel, and by the interview.
The renewal of the naming aptly expresses this renewal of spiritual life. “I am God Almighty.” So he proclaimed himself before to Abraham Gen 17:1. “Be fruitful, and multiply.” Abraham and Isaac had each only one son of promise. But now the time of increase is come. Jacob has been blessed with eleven sons, and at least one daughter. And now he receives the long-promised blessing, “be fruitful and multiply.” From this time forth the multiplication of Israel is rapid. In twenty-six years after this time he goes down into Egypt with seventy souls, besides the wives of his married descendants, and two hundred and ten years after that Israel goes out of Egypt numbering about one million eight hundred thousand. “A nation and a congregation of nations,” such as were then known in the world, had at the last date come of him, and “kings” were to follow in due time. The land, as well as the seed, is again promised.
Jacob now, according to his wont, perpetuates the scene of divine manifestation with a monumental stone. “God went up;” as he went up from Abraham Gen 17:22 after a similar conferencc with him. He had now spoken to Jacob face to face, as he communed with Abraham. “A pillar” in the place where he talked with him, a consecrated monument of this second interview, not in a dream as before, but in a waking vision. On this he pours a drink-offering of wine, and then anoints it with oil. Here, for the first time, we meet with the libation. It is possible there was such an offering when Melkizedec brought forth bread and wine, though it is not recorded. The drink-offering is the complement of the meat-offering, and both are accompaniments of the sacrifice which is offered on the altar. They are in themselves expressive of gratitude and devotion. Wine and oil are used to denote the quickening and sanctifying power of the Spirit of God. “Bethel.” We are now familiar with the repetition of the naming of persons and places. This place was already called Bethel by Jacob himself; it is most likely that Abraham applied this name to it: and for aught we know, some servant of the true God, under the Noachic covenant, may have originated the name.
Gen 17:16-22.
On the journey, Rachel dies at the birth of her second son. “A stretch.” It was probably a few furlongs. “Fear not.” The cause for encouragement was that the child was born, and that it was a son. Rachel’s desire and hope expressed at the birth of Joseph were therefore, fulfilled Gen 30:24. “When her soul was departing.” This phrase expresses not annihilation, but merely change of place. It presupposes the perpetual existence of the soul. “Ben-oni,” son of my pain, is the natural expression of the departing Rachel. “Benjamin.” The right hand is the seat of power. The son of the right hand is therefore, the child of power. He gave power to his father, as he was his twelfth son, and so completed the number of the holy family. “Ephrath and Beth-lehem” are names the origin of which is not recorded. “The pillar of Rachel’s grave.” Jacob loves the monumental stone. “Unto this day.” This might have been written ten or twenty years after the event, and therefore, before Jacob left Kenaan (see on Gen 19:37). The grave of Rachel was well known in the time of Samuel 1Sa 10:2, and the Kubbet Rahil, dome or tomb of Rachel, stands perhaps on the identical spot, about an English mile north of Bethlehem.
Gen 35:21-22
Eder - The tower of the flock was probably a watch-tower where shepherds guarded their flocks by night. It was a mile (Jerome) or more south of Bethlehem. Here Reuben was guilty of the shameful deed which came to the knowledge of his father, and occasions the allusion in Gen 49:4. He was by this act degraded from his position in the holy family. The division of the open parashah in the text here is more in accordance with the sense than that of the verse.
Gen 35:22-29
Jacob’s return and his father’s death. The family of Jacob is now enumerated, because it has been completed by the birth of Benjamin. “In Padan-aram.” This applies to all of them but Benjamin; an exception which the reader of the context can make for himself. Jacob at length arrives with his whole establishment at Hebron, the third notable station occupied by Abraham in the land Gen 13:1. Here also his father sojourns. The life of Isaac is now closed. Joseph must have been, at the time of Jacob’s return, in his thirteenth year, and therefore, his father in his hundred and fourth. Isaac was consequently in his hundred and sixty-third year. He survived the return of Jacob to Hebron about seventeen years, and the sale of Joseph his grandson about thirteen. “Esau and Jacob his sons buried him.” Hence, we learn that Esau and Jacob continued to be on brotherly terms from the day of their meeting at the ford of Jabbok.
This chapter closes the ninth of the pieces or documents marked off by the phrase “these are the generations.” Its opening event was the birth of Isaac Gen 25:19, which took place in the hundreth year of Abraham, and therefore, seventy-five years before his death recorded in the seventh document. As the seventh purports to be the generations of Terah Gen 11:27 and relates to Abraham who was his offspring, so the present document, containing the generations of Isaac, refers chiefly to the sons of Isaac, and especially to Jacob, as the heir of promise. Isaac as a son learned obedience to his father in that great typical event of his life, in which he was laid on the altar, and figuratively sacrificed in the ram which was his substitute. This was the great significant passage in his life, after which he retires into comparative tranquillity.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4 God dissipates Jacob’s well-grounded fears, and sends him to…
God dissipates Jacob’s well-grounded fears, and sends him to perform his vow, chap. xviii. 13. (Haydock)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 4. The departure to Bethel. Gen_35:1-8.—And God said to…
4. The departure to Bethel. Gen_35:1-8.—And God said to Jacob.—The warning to depart comes from Elohim, and hence Knobel and Delitzsch regard the section in Genesis 35 as Elohistic, though Knobel thinks the Jehovist has made additions. Without regard to this, we can easily see, that God, who is to hold the Canaanites under his fear, so that they shall not take revenge on the house of Jacob, must be called Elohim. Although Jacob had suffered nearly ten years to elapse since his return from Mesopotamia, without fulfilling the vow he had made (Gen_28:20) at Bethel, when he fled from Esau (Keil), we are not, therefore, to infer that he had been regardless of his duty during these ten years. For a perfect security against Esau was a part of that which was to complete his happy return; but there arose a necessity between Peniel and Succoth, that he must not only have security for himself and his family, against the persecutions of Esau; but against his officious importunity, before he could go beyond Shechem with his whole train. Hence his sojourn at Succoth and Shechem. But when he is now reminded of a duty, too slowly fulfilled, the motive is found not merely in the vow which he has to fulfil, but in the circumstances occasioned by his sons, which make his longer stay at Shechem unsafe, to which we must, doubtless, add, that in the mean-while the relations and distinctions between his house and that of Esau, were more securely and permanently established. Have not the sons, who formerly were easily infatuated to render homage to their stately uncle, now manifested in an extreme way their Israelitish consciousness? The recollection (Gen_31:30) proves that Jacob cherished the consciousness of his duty. He seems, indeed, to have gone too far in his precautionary tardiness. In seeking to entirely avoid Esau, he is entangled with the Shechemites. The call and warning also—Make an altar at Bethel—informs him that the time for his complete return home has now come.—Up to Bethel.—Bethel lay in the mountain region.—Put away the strange gods.—The shock that Jacob had experienced by the rape of Dinah, the crime of his sons, the imperilled existence of his family, and the divine warning immediately following, strengthens his sense of the holiness of God, and of the sinfulness in himself and his household, and he enjoins, therefore, an act of repentance, before he can enter upon the act of thanksgiving. He has, moreover, to confess, in reference to his house, the sins of a refined idolatry, the sins of his sons at Shechem, and his own sins of omission. His love for Rachel had, doubtless, led him weakly to tolerate her teraphim until now. But now he has grown strong and decided even in respect to Rachel. The fanatical Israelitish zeal of his sons had also a better element, which may have quickened his monotheistic feeling. Since the majority of Jacob’s servants came from the circle and influence of the Nahorites, whose image-worship was viewed by the stricter Israelitish thought as idolatry (Exodus 20; Jos_24:2), there were probably to be found in Jacob’s house other things, besides the teraphim of Rachel, which were regarded as the objects of religious veneration. But the purification was necessary, not merely because they were now to remove to Bethel, the place of the outward revelation of Jehovah (Knobel), but because the spirit of Jehovah utters stronger demands in the conscience of Jacob, and because the approaching thanksgiving must be sanctified by a foregoing repentance. [There is good ground for the conjecture that there was a special reason for the charge now, since in the spoil of the city there would be images of gold and silver.—A.G.]—And be clean.—The acts take place in the following order: 1. The putting away of the strange gods; 2. A symbolical purification, completed, with out any doubt, through religious washings (Exo_29:4; and similar passages); and 3. The change of garments. In some cases (Exo_19:20) a mere washing of the garments was held to be sufficient, here the injunction is more strict, since the pollution has been of longer duration. In Knobel’s view they were to put on their best garments, but they would scarcely go on their mountain journey in such array. The changed garments express the state of complete purification, even externally.—Unto God who answered me.—He will thus fulfil his vow, and hold a thanksgiving feast with them.—And all their ear-rings.—They followed the injunction of Jacob so strictly, that they not only gave up the religious images, but also their amulets (chains), for the ear-rings were especially so used (see Winer: Real Wörterbuch, Amulets).—And Jacob hid them.—As stripped and dead human images they are buried as the dead (Isa_2:20).—Under the oak (Terebinth).—Knobel: “In the Terebinth grove at Shechem, i.e., under one of its trees (comp. Gen_12:6; Jdg_6:11). According to Gen_12:7, and other passages, it was a grove. We must, therefore, read here חָאַלָּח, as in Jos_24:26, by the same author, to whom belongs also Exo_32:2, or assume that there were both kinds of trees in the grove.”—And the terror of God was upon.—The genuine repentance in the house of Jacob was followed by the blessing of divine protection against the bloody revenge with which he was threatened from those who dwelled near Shechem. God himself, as the protecting God of Jacob, laid this terror upon them, which may have been introduced on the one hand, through the outrage of Shechem (Knobel); and on the other, through the fearful power of Jacob’s sons, their holy zeal, and that of their God.—Luz, which is in the land of Canaan.—The words appear to be added, in order to fix the fact, that Jacob had now accomplished his prosperous return. [The name Luz, almond tree, still recurs, as the almond tree is still flourishing. Murphy.—A. G.]—And all the people.—The number of Jacob’s servants, both in women and children, may have been considerably increased through the sudden overthrow of Shechem. Although Jacob would have restored all, as some have conjectured, the heads of the families to whom this restitution could be made were wanting.—That is Bethel.—There is no contradiction, as Knobel thinks, between this passage and Gen_28:19, which is to be explained upon the assumption of an Elohistic account, but as (Gen_35:15) a confirmation of the new name which Jacob gave the city. Luz is so called by the Canaanites now, as it was before, although a solitary wanderer had named the place, where he spent the night, more than twenty years before, Bethel.—El-Bethel. He names the altar itself, as he had also the altar at Shechem (Gen_33:20) and still further the place surrounding the altar, and thus declared its consecration as a sanctuary. El, too, is here in the genitive, and to be read of God; the place is not called God of Bethel, but of the God of Bethel. He thus evidently connects this consecration with the earlier revelation of God received at Bethel.1—Then Deborah died.—The nurse of Rebekah had gone with her to Hebron, but how came she here? Delitzsch conjectures that Rebekah had sent her, according to the promise (Gen_27:45), or to her daughter-in-law and grandchildren, for their care; but we have ventured the suggestion that Jacob took her with him upon his return from a visit to Hebron. She found her peculiar home in Jacob’s house, and with his children after the death of Rebekah. For other views see Knobel, who naturally prefers to find a difficulty even here. It is a well-known method of exaggerating all the blanks in the Bible into diversities and contradictions.—Allonbachuth.—Oak of weeping. Delitzsch conjectures that perhaps Jdg_4:5; 1Sa_16:3, refer to the same tree as a monument, a conjecture which, however, the locality itself refutes.—And God appeared unto Jacob.—The distinction between God spake and God appeared is analogous to the distinction in the mode of revelation (Genesis 12 Gen_35:1; Gen_35:7). “He now appears to him,” Keil says, “by day in visible form: for the darkness of that former time of anguish has now given way to the clear light of salvation. The representation is incorrect, and is based upon the assumption, that the night revelations are confined to times of trouble.—Again.—Now, at his return when the vow has been paid, as before in his migration, when the vow was occasioned and made. But now Jehovah appears to him as his God, according to his vow, then shall the Lord be my God. [When he came out of Padanaram.—This explains the clause (Gen_35:6), which is in the land of Canaan. Bethel was the last point in the laud of Canaan that was noticed in his flight from Esau. His arrival at this point indicates that he has now returned to the land of Canaan. Murphy, p. 427.—A. G.]—And blessed him.—So also Abraham was blessed repeatedly.—Thy name is Jacob?—We read the phrase according to its connection with Gen_32:27, as a question. Then Jacob answered to the question “what is thy name? Jacob. Here God resumes the thread again, thou art Jacob? But if any one is not willing to read the words as a question, it still marks a progress. The name Israel was given to him at Peniel, here it is sealed to him. Hence it is here connected with the Messianic promise. [Murphy suggests also that the repetition of the name here implies a decline in his spiritual life between Peniel and Bethel.—A. G.]—I am God Almighty.—This self-applied title of God has the same significance here as it had in the revelation of God for Abraham (Gen_17:1); there he revealed himself as the miracle-working God, because he had promised Abraham a son; here, however, because he promises to make from Jacob’s family a community [assembly.—A. G.] of nations. [The kahal is significant as it refers to the ultimate complete fulfilment of the promise in the true spiritual Israel.—A. G.]2 Knobel sees here only an Elohistic statement of the fact which has already appeared of the new naming of Jacob, which, too, he regards as a mere poetic fiction. According to this supposition, Israel here cannot be warrior of God, but, perhaps, prince with God. Even Delitzsch wavers between the assumption of an Elohistic redaction or revision, and the apprehension and recognition of new elements, which, of course, favor the idea of a new fact. To these new elements belong the libation, the drink-offering (probably of wine), poured upon the stone anointed with oil, Jacob’s own reference to this revelation of God at Bethel (Gen_48:3), and the circumstance that Hos_12:5, can only refer to this revelation. Under a closer observation of the development of Jacob’s faith, there cannot be any question as to the confounding the theophany at Peniel with a second theophany at Bethel. It must be observed, too, that henceforth the patriarch is sometimes called Jacob, and sometimes Israel. [This is the first mention of the drink-offering in the Bible.—A. G.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
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1. We view Jacob’s settlement at Succoth: a. In the light of a building of booths and houses for refreshment, after a twenty years’ servitude, and the toils and soul-conflicts connected with his journeyings (comp. the station Elim, Exo_15:27, where Israel first rested); b. As a station where he might regain his health, so that he could come to Shechem well and in peace; c. As a station where he could tarry for a time on account of Esau’s importunity (comp. Exegetical notes).
2. Jacob’s places of abode in Canaan, in their principal stations, are the same with those of his grandfather Abraham. He settles down in the vicinity of Shechem, as formerly Abraham had done in the oak groves of Moreh (Gen_12:6). Then he removed to Bethel, just as Abraham had gone into the same vicinity (Gen_12:8), and after his wandering to Egypt returned here again to Bethel. At last he comes to Hebron, which had been consecrated by Abraham, as the seat of the patriachal residence.
3. For the history of Shechem in the history of the kingdom of God (see Bible Dict.) It is: a. A capital of the Hivites, and as such the scene of the brutal heathenish iniquity, in relation to the religious and moral dignity of Israel; b. The birth-place of Jewish fanaticism in the sons of Jacob; c. A chief city of Ephraim, and an Israelitish priestly city; d. The capital of the kingdom of Israel for some time; e. The principal seat of the Samaritan nationality and cultus. The acquisition of a parcel of land at Shechem by Jacob, forms a counterpart to the purchase of Abraham at Hebron. But there is an evident progress here, since he made the purchase for his own settlement during life, while Abraham barely gained a burial place. The memory of Canaan by Israel and the later conquest (comp. Gen_48:22), is closely connected with this possession. In Jacob’s life, too, the desire to exchange the wandering nomadic life for a more fixed abode, becomes more apparent than in the life of Isaac. [Robinson’s “History of Shechem” is full and accurate. Wordsworth’s remark here, after enumerating the important events clustering around this place from Abraham to Christ, is suggestive. Thus the history of Shechem, combining so many associations, shows the uniformity of the divine plan, extending through many centuries, for the salvatian of the world by the promised seed of Abraham, in whom all nations are blessed; and for the outpouring of the spirit on the Israel of God, who are descended from the true Jacob; and for their union in the sanctuary of the Christian church; and for the union of all nations in one household in Christ, Luk_1:68.—A. G.]
4. Dinah’s history, a warning history for the daughters of Israel, and a foundation of the Old Testament limitation of the freedom of the female sex.
5. The collision between the sons of Jacob and Shechem, the son of Hamor, is a vivid picture of the collisions between the youthful forms of political despotism and hierarchal pride. Shechem acts as an insolent worldly prince, Jacob’s sons as young fanatical priests, luring him to destruction.
6. After Jacob became Israel, the just consciousness of his theocratic dignity appears manifestly in his sons, under the deformity of fanatical zeal. We may view this narrative as the history of the origin, and first original form of Jewish and Christian fanaticism. We notice first that fanaticism does not originate in and for itself, but clings to religious and moral ideas as a monstrous and misshapen outgrowth, since it changes the spiritual into a carnal motive. The sons of Jacob were right in feeling that they were deeply injured in the religious and moral idea and dignity of Israel, by Shechem’s deed. But still they are already wrong in their judgment of Shechem’s act; since there is surely a difference between the brutal lust of Ammon, who after his sin pours his hatred upon her whom he had dishonored, and Shechem, who passionately loves and would marry the dishonored maiden, and is ready to pay any sum as an atonement; a distinction which the sons of Jacob mistook, just as those of the clergy do at this day who throw all branches of the seventh commandment into one common category and as of the same heinous dye. Then we observe that Jacob’s sons justly shun a mixture with the Shechemites, although in this case they were willing to be circumcised for worldly and selfish ends. But there is a clear distinction between such a wholesale, mass conversion, from improper motives, which would have corrupted and oppressed the house of Israel, and the transition of Shechem to the sons of Israel, or the establishment of some neutral position for Dinah. But leaving this out of view, if we should prefer to maintain (what Jacob certainly did not maintain) that an example of revenge must be made, to intimidate the heathen, and to warn the future Israel against the Canaanites, still the fanatical zeal in the conduct of Jacob’s sons passed over into fanaticism strictly so called, which developed itself from the root of spiritual pride, according to its three world-historical characteristics. The first was cunning, the lie, and enticing deception. Thus the Huguenots were enticed into Paris on the night of St. Bartholomew. The second was the murderous attack and carnage. How often has this form shown itself in the history of fanaticism! This pretended sacred murder and carnage draws the third characteristic sign in its train: rapine and pillage. The possessions of the heretics, according to the laws of the middle ages, fell to the executioner of the pretended justice; and the history of the crusades against the heretics testifies to similar horrors and devastation. Jacob, therefore, justly declares his condemnation of the iniquity of the brothers, Simeon and Levi, not only at once, but upon his death-bed (Genesis 49), and it marks the assurance of the apocryphal standpoint, when the book Judith, for the purpose of palliating the crime of Judith, glorifies in a poetical strain the like fanatical act of Simeon (Genesis 9). Judith, indeed, in the trait of cunning, appears as the daughter in spirit of her ancestor Simeon. We must not fail to distinguish here in our history, in this first vivid picture of fanaticism, the nobler point of departure, the theocratic motive, from the terrible counterfeit and deformity. In this relation there seems to have been a difference between the brothers, Simeon and Levi. While the former appears to have played a chief part in the history of Joseph also (Gen_42:24, and my article, “Simeon,” in Herzog’s “Real Encyclopedia”), and in the division of Canaan was dispersed among his brethren, the purified Levi came afterwards to be the representative of pure zeal in Israel (Exo_32:28; Deu_33:8) and the administrator of the priesthood, i. e., the theocratic priestly first-born, by the side of Judah the theocratic political first-born. A living faith and a faithful zeal rarely develop themselves as a matter of fact without a mixture of fanaticism; “the flame gradually purifies itself from the smoke.” In all actual individual cases, it is a question whether the flame overcomes the smoke, or the smoke the flame. In the life of Christ, the Old-Testament covenant faithfulness and truth burns pure and bright, entirely free from smoke; in the history of the old Judaism, on the contrary, a dangerous mixture of fire and smoke steams over the land. And so in the development of individual believers we see how some purify themselves to the purest Christian humanity, while others, ever sinking more and more into the pride, cunning, uncharitableness and injustice of fanaticism, are completely ruined. Delitzsch: “The greatest aggravation of their sin was that they degraded the sacred sign of the covenant into the common means of their malice. And yet it was a noble germ which exploded so wickedly.”
7. This Shechemite carnage of blind and Jewish fanaticism, is reflected in a most remarkable way, as to all its several parts, in the most infamous crime of Christian fanaticism, the Parisian St. Bartholomew. [The narrative of these events at Shechem shows how impartial the sacred writer is, bringing out into prominence whatever traits of excellence there were in the characters of Shechem and Hamor, while he does not conceal the cunning, falsehood, and cruelty of the sons of Jacob. Nor should we fail to observe the connection of this narrative with the later exclusion of Simeon and Levi from the rights of the first-born, to which they would naturally have acceded after the exclusion of Reuben; and with their future location in the land of Canaan. The history furnishes one of the clearest proofs of the genuineness and unity of Genesis.—A. G.]
8. Jacob felt that, as the Israel of God, he was made offensive even to the moral sense of the surrounding heathen, through the pretended holy deed of his sons; so far so that they had endangered the very foundation of the theocracy, the kingdom of God, the old-covenant church. Fanaticism always produces the same results; either to discredit Christianity in the moral estimate of the world, and imperil its very existence by its unreasonable zeal, or to expose it to the most severe persecutions.
9. The direction of Jacob to Bethel, by the command of God, is a proof that in divine providence the true community of believers must separate itself from the condition into which fanaticism has placed it. By this emigration Israel hazards the possession at Shechem which he had just acquired.
10. Divine providence knows perfectly how to unite in one very different aims, as this narrative very clearly shows. They are then, indeed, subordinated to the one chief end. The chief end here which the providence of God has in view in the journey of Jacob from Shechem to Bethel, is the duty of Jacob to fulfil the vow he had made at Bethel. But with this the object of his removing from Shechem and of his concealed flight is closely connected. So also the purpose of purifying his house from the guilt of fanaticism, and the idolatrous image-worship. At the same time it is thus intimated that both these objects would have been secured already, if Jacob had been more in earnest in the fulfilment of his vow.
11. As Jacob intends holding a feast of praise and thanksgiving at Bethel, he enjoins upon his household first a feast of purification, i. e., a fast-day. This preparation rests upon a fundamental law of the inner spiritual life. We must first humble ourselves for our own deeds, and renounce all known evil practices, if we would celebrate with joyful praise and thanksgiving, with pure eyes and lips, the gracious deeds of God. The approach of such a feast is a foretaste of blessedness, and hence the conscience of the pious, warned by its approach, is quickened and made more tender, and they feel more deeply the necessity for a previous purification by repentance. In the Mosaic law, therefore, the purification precedes the sacrifices; the solemnities of the great day of atonement went before the joyful feast of tabernacles. Hence the Christian prepares himself for the holy Supper through a confession of his sins, and of his faith, and a vow of reformation. The grandest form in which this order presents itself is in the connection between Good-Friday and Easter, both in reference to the facts commemorated (the atonement and the new life in Christ) and in reference to the import of the solemnities. The Advent-season affords a similar time for preparation for the Christmas festival (comp. Mat_5:23).
12. Viewed in its outward aspect, the purification of Jacob’s house was a rigid purification from religious image-worship, and the means of superstition, which the now awakened and enlightened conscience of Jacob saw to be nothing but idolatry. But these works of superstition and idolatry are closely connected with the fanaticism for which Jacob’s house must also repent. The common band or tie of idolatry and fanaticism is the mingling of the religious state and disposition with mere carnal thoughts or sentiments. There is, indeed, a fanaticism of iconoclasm, but then it is the same carnal thought, which regards the external aspect of religion as religion itself, and through this extreme view falls into an idolatrous fear of images, as if they were actual hostile powers. The marks of a sound and healthy treatment of images idolatrously venerated, are clearly seen in this history: 1. A cheerful putting away of the images at the warning word of God; but no threats or violence against the possessors of the images; 2. a seemly removal, as in the burial of the dead body. Whatever has been the object of worship should be buried tenderly, unless it was used directly for evil and cruel purposes. The sacred washings follow the removal of the images, the prelude to the religious washings of the Jews, and the first preliminary token of baptism. The washing was a symbol of the purifying from sin and guilt by repentance; and as such was connected with the change of garments, the new garments symbolizing the new disposition, as with the baptismal robes.
13. The religious earnestness with which Israel departed from Shechem set the deed of the sons of Jacob in a different light before the surrounding Canaanites. They saw in the march of Israel a host with whom the holiness and power of God was in covenant, and were restrained from pursuing them by a holy terror of God. The terror of God here indicates the fact, that the small surrounding nations received an impression from the religious and moral earnestness of the sons of Israel, far deeper and more controlling than the thirst for revenge. A like religious and moral working of fear went afterwards before the nation of Israel when it entered Canaan, and we may even view the present march of Jacob as foreshadowing that later march and conquest. But the same terror of God has at various times protected and saved the people of God, both during the old and new covenants.
14. The fulfilment of a pious vow in the life of the believer, corresponds, as the human well-doing, to the fulfilment of the divine promise. It stands in the same relation as the human prayer and amen to the word of God. The vow of baptism and confirmation3 is fulfilled in the pious Christian life, upon the ground of the grace and truth with which God fulfils his promises. Jacob’s vow refers to a special promise of God, at his entrance upon a difficult and dangerous journey, and hence the fulfilment of the vow was the glorification of the gracious leading of God, and of the truth and faithfulness of God to his word. It was a high point in the life of Israel, from which, while holding the feast, he looked back over his whole past history, but more especially over his long journey and wanderings. But for this very reason the feast was consecrated also to an outlook into the future. For the further history of Bethel, see Bible Dictionaries.
15. The solemn, reverent burial of Deborah, and the oak of weeping dedicated to her memory, are a proof that old and faithful servants were esteemed in the house of Jacob, as they were in Abraham’s household. As they had taken a deep interest and part in the family spirit and concerns, so they were treated in life and death as members of the family. The aged Deborah is the counterpart to the aged Eliezer. The fact that we find her here dying in the family of Jacob, opens to us a glance into the warm, faithful attachment of this friend of Rebekah, and at the same time enables us to conclude with the highest certainty that Rebekah was now dead. Deborah would not have parted from Rebekah while she was living. Delitzsch: “We may regard the heathen traditions, that the nurse of Dionysius (בָּכיּת, Βάκχος) lies buried in Scythopolis (Plin. H. N. ch. v. 15), and that the grave of Silenos is found in the land of the Hebrews (Pausan. Eliaca, cap. 24), with which F. D. Michaelis connects the passage, as the mere distorted echoes of this narrative.”
16. We may regard the new and closing revelation and promise which Jacob received at Bethel after his thanksgiving feast, as the confirmation and sealing of his faith, and thus it forms a parallel to the confirmation and sealing of the faith of Abraham upon Moriah (Gen_22:15). But it is to be observed here that Jacob is first sealed after having purified his faith from any share in the guilt of fanaticism. And the same thing precisely may be said of the sealing of Abraham, after he had freed himself from the fanatical prejudice that Jehovah could in a religious sense literally demand the sacrifice of a human life, i. e., the literal killing, he became certain of his life of faith, of the promise of God, and of his future. Thus here the flame of Israel is completely purified from the smoke. But here, again, it lies in the very law of the inward life, that God cannot seal the faith from which the impure elements have not been purged. Otherwise fanaticism, too, would be confirmed and sanctioned. Hence the assurance of faith will always waver and fluctuate, even to its disappearance in any one, in the measure in which he combines impure and carnal elements with his faith, and then holds it more and more as a confidence of a higher grade. Enthusiastic moments, mighty human acts of boldness, party earnestness and temerity, will not compensate for the profound, heavenly assurance of faith, an established life of faith, which is the gift of the Holy Spirit. True it is, that the precondition of sealing is justification, the heart experience of the peace of God, of reconciliation by faith; but this gift of God the Christian must keep pure by steadfastness in the Lord, even in the midst of temptation, which is often a temptation to fanaticism (see the Epistle of James), and then he is confirmed. In our estimate of the stages of confirmation, it is not at all strange that Jacob should have the name of Israel, first given to him at Peniel, here confirmed to him. Henceforth he is more frequently called Israel, for the new life in him has become a new nature, the prominent and ruling feature of his being.
17. The renewed Messianic promise assured to Jacob (Gen_35:11).
18. From the fact that Jacob erected a stone pillar at Bethel, on which he poured a drink-offering, and then oil, Knobel conjectures, without the least ground, that the Elohist here introduces the sacrifice in this form, and knows nothing of an altar and of animal sacrifices (p. 274). But it is evident that this pillar was taken from the altar before mentioned (Gen_35:7), and that this drink-offering must therefore be distinguished from the sacrifice upon that altar. As in the Wrestling of Jacob, the distinction between the outward and inward aspects of the right of the first-born, and thus also of the priesthood, first comes into view, so here, also, we have the distinction between the peculiar sacrifice in the strict sense and the thank-offering. The stone designates (Gen_28:20) the ideal house of God, and in this significance must be distinguished from the altar. Through the thank-offering Jacob consecrates the enjoyment of his prosperity to the Lord; through the oil he raises the stone, as well as his thanksgiving, to a lasting, sacred remembrance. [Kurtz remarks here: “The thirty years’ journey from Bethel to Bethel is now completed. The former residence at Bethel stands to the present somewhat as the beginning to the end, the prophecy to the fulfilment; for, the unfolding of the purpose of salvation, so far as that could be done in the life of Jacob, has now reached its acme and relative completion. There the Lord appeared to him in a dream, here in his waking state, and the dream is the prophetic type of the waking reality. There God promised to protect and bless him, and bring him back to this land—a promise now fulfilled. There Jacob made his vow, here he pays it. There God consecrates him to be the bearer of salvation, and makes the threefold promise of the blessing of salvation. So far as the promise could be fulfilled in Jacob, it is now fulfilled; the land of promise is open before him, he has already obtained possession in part, and the promised seed reaches its first stage of completeness in the last son of Rachel, giving the significant number twelve, and the idea of salvation attains its development, since Jacob has become Israel. But this fulfilment is only preliminary and relative, and in its turn becomes a prophecy of the still future fulfilment. Hence God renews the blessing, showing that the fulfilment lies in the future still; hence God renews his new name Israel, which defines his peculiar position to salvation and his relation to God, showing that Jacob has not yet fully become Israel; the promise and the name are correlates—the one will be realized when the other is fulfilled. Hence, too, Jacob renews the name Bethel, in which the peculiarity of the relation of God to Jacob is indicated, his dwelling in and among the seed of Jacob, and the renewing of this name proclaims his consciousness that God would still become in a far higher measure, El-beth-el.”—A. G.]
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
See the Doctrinal and Ethical remarks. Jacob’s settlement at Shechem: 1. The departure thither from Succoth; 2. the settlement itself: 3. the new departure to Bethel.—The settlement itself: 1. How promising! happy return. Prosperous acquisition of the parcel of land. Peaceful relations with the Shechemites. Religious toleration. 2. How seriously endangered (through Jacob’s carelessness. He does not return early enough to Bethel to fulfil his vow. Probably he even considers the altar at Shechem a substitute. His love for Rachel makes him tolerant to her teraphim, and consequently to the teraphim of his house generally. His polygamy is perhaps the occasion of his treating the children with special indulgence). 3. How fearfully disturbed! Dinah’s levity and dishonor. Importunity of the Shechemites; the carnage of his sons. The existence of his house endangered. 4. The happy conclusion caused by Jacob’s repentance and God’s protection.—The first great sorrow prepared for the patriarch by his children.—Dinah’s conduct.—The dangerous proposals of friendship by the Shechemites.—The brothers, Simeon and Levi. Their right. Their wrong.—Fanaticism in its first biblical form, and its historic manifestations.—Its contagious power. All, or at least the majority, of Jacob’s sons, are swept along by its influence.—Jacob’s repentance, or the feast of purification of his house.—How the union of repentance and faith is reflected in the sacred institutions. In both sacraments, in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, in the connection of sacred festivals, especially in the connection between Good-Friday and Easter.—The thanksgiving at Bethel.—Here, too, the feast of joy is followed by deep mourning and funeral obsequies.—Deborah: 1. We know very little of her; and yet, 2. we know very much of her.—The greatness of true and unselfish love in the kingdom of God.—The nobility of free service.—Jacob’s confirmation—confirmed as Israel.—The renewed promise.
First Section. The settlement at Succoth. Gen_33:17. Starke: He, no doubt, visited his father during this interval.—Gerlach: (On some accounts we believe that Succoth was situated on the right side of Jordan, in the valley of Succoth, in which lay the city of Beth-Shean. Succoth are literally huts made of boughs, here folds made of boughs of trees and bushes.)
Second Section. The settlement at Shechem. Gen_33:18-20. Starke: (Shechem, Quesita. The Septuagint transl., lambs; Chald., pearls. Others understand money. Epiph., de pond. et mons., asserts that Abraham introduced the art of coining money in Canaan). Schröder: Von Raumer considers Shalem as the more ancient name of Shechem. Robinson regards it as a proper name, and finds it now in the village of Shalem, some distance east from Shechem.
Third Section. Dinah. Gen_34:1-31. Starke: Dinah’s walk: without doubt, taken from motives of curiosity.—Contrary to all his expectations (for a peaceful, quiet time of worship, etc.), Jacob’s heart is most keenly mortified by Dinah’s disgrace, and the carnage committed by Simeon and Levi.—He who wishes to shun sin, must avoid also occasions of sin.—Curiosity is a great fault in the female sex, and has caused many a one to fall.
Schröder: (Val. Herb.) A gadding girl, and a lad who has never gone beyond the precincts of home, are both good for nothing (Tit_2:5). a. The rape. Starke: (2Sa_13:12) By force (2Sa_13:12-14). (Judging from Dinah’s levity, it was not without her consent.)—Cramer: Rape a sin against the sixth and seventh commandments.—What a disgrace, that great and mighty lords, instead of being an example to their subjects in chastity and honor, should surpass them in a dissolute and godless deportment.—Gerlach: Gen_35:7. Fool and folly are terms used frequently in the Old Testament to denote the perpetration of the greatest crimes. The connection of the thought is this, that godlessness and vice are the greatest folly, etc.—Schröder: Josephus says, Dinah went to a fair or festival at Shechem. The person that committed the rape was the most distinguished (Gen_35:19) son (the crown-prince, so to speak) of the ruling sovereign.—The sons of Jacob, for the first time, transfer the spiritual name of their father to the house of Jacob, etc. They are conscious, therefore, of the sacredness of their families. The sharp antithesis between Israel and Canaan enters into their consciousness (Baumgarten). b. The proposal of marriage. Starke: Although it is just and proper to strive to restore fallen virgins to honor by asking their parents or friends to give them in marriage, and thus secure their legal position and rights, yet it is putting the cart before the horse.—Little children bring light cares, grown children heavy cares. (God afterwards prohibited (Deu_7:3) them to enter into any friendly relations with the heathen nations.) c. The fanatical revenge of Jacob’s sons. Starke: Take care that you do not indulge in wrath and feelings of revenge.—Hall: Smiling malace is generally fatal.—Even the most bloody machinations are frequently gilded with religion.—Freiberger Bibel: Hamor, the ruling prince, is a sad example of an unfaithful and interested magistracy, who, under the pretence of the common welfare, pursues his own advantage and interests, while he tries to deceive his subjects.—The Shechemites, therefore, did not adopt the Jewish religion from motives of pure love or a proper regard for it, but from self-interest and love of gain.—Cramer: It is no child’s play, to treat religion in a thoughtless and careless way, and to change from one form to another.—One violent son may bring destruction upon a whole city and country.—Hall: The aspect of external things constrains many more to a profession of religion, than conscience (Joh_6:26). But how will it be with those who do not use the sacraments from proper motives?—Strictures upon the apology for this deed in the book of Judith, and by others.—Cramer: God sometimes punishes one folly by another.—Hall: To make the punishment more severe than the sin, is no less unjust than to injure.—What Shechem perpetrated alone, is charged upon all the citizens in common, because it seems that they were pleased with it.—Lange: This was a preliminary judgment of God upon the Shechemites, thus to testify what the Canaanites in future had to expect from Jacob’s descendants.—Osiander: When magistrates sin, their subjects are generally punished with them. They evidently do not present circumcision as an entirely new divine service, as an initiation into the covenant with the God of Israel, but only as an external custom.—It is remarkable here, how adroitly Hamor and Shechem represent to the people as pertaining to the common advantage, what was only for their personal interest.—We here meet the wild Eastern vindictiveness in all its force. Moreover, the carnal heathen view, that all the people share in the act of the prince.—Schröder: We have here the same sad mixture of flesh and spirit which we have seen at the beginning, in Jacob.—Taube: Sins of the world and sins of the saints in their connection, d. Jacob’s judgment upon this crime. Starke: (Jacob, no doubt, sent back all the captives with their cattle.)—(It seems that, while not altogether like Eli, he did not have his sons under a strict discipline, since his family was so large.)—For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God (Jam_1:20).—Gerlach: How miraculously God protected this poor, despised (?) company from mingling with the heathen on the one hand, and from persecution on the other.—Schröder: Judging from this test, what would have become of Jacob’s descendants, if divine grace had left them to themselves in such a way (Calvin)? It was not due to themselves, certainly, that they were not entirely estranged from the kingdom of God, etc.
Fourth Section. The departure to Bethel. Gen_35:1-8. Starke: Because the true church was in Jacob’s house, God would not permit it to be wholly destroyed, as Jacob, perhaps, conjectured.—Change your garments.—Which are yet sprinkled with the blood of the Shechemites.—Osiander: Legitimate vows, when it is in our power to keep them, must be fulfilled (Deu_23:21).—Cramer: The Christian Church may err, and easily be led to superstition; pious bishops, however, are to recognize these errors, and to do away with them. They are to purify churches, houses, and servants, and point them to the word of God. Repentance and conversion of the soul is the proper purification of sins.—Bibl. Tub.: Is our worship to please God, then our hearts must be cleansed, and the strange gods, our wicked lusts, must be eradicated.—The proper reformation of a church consists, not only in the extirpation of idolatry and false doctrines, but also in the reformation of the wrong courses of life (Neh_10:29).
Gen_35:8. All faithful servants, both males and females, are to be well cared for when they become sick or feeble, and to be decently buried after their death.—Cramer: Christ is the pillar set up, both in the Old and New Testament; he is anointed with the oil of gladness, and with him only we find the true Bethel, where God speaks with us.—Gerlach: Gen_35:1. His worship of God connects itself with this critical point in his history. As in the Old Test., “The God of peace and of comfort,” etc., is frequently mentioned, so also the faith of the patriarch clings to God in his peculiar personal revelations. It is the God who revealed himself at Bethel. (Still the name, El-Bethel, given with the first revelation at Bethel, includes the whole journey of Jacob until his return to Bethel.)—Schröder: Jehovah has accomplished what he has said.—We can only approach the house of God in faith, when we have first penitentially put away from our houses all strange gods. (Michaelis finds here the first and oldest trace of the baptism of proselytes.) I consider that Deborah, a wise and pious matron, was esteemed, so to speak, by the servants as a grandmother, who served and consoled Jacob (Luther).—Taube: The house of the patriarch Jacob as a mirror of Christian family life.
Fifth Section. The sealing of the covenant between God and the patriarch at Bethel. Gen_35:9-15. Starke: As God appears to Abraham ten times, so he appears to Jacob six times (Gen_28:12; Gen_31:11; Gen_31:13; Gen_32:1-2; Gen_32:24; Gen_35:1; the present passage; and Gen_46:2).—Schröder: Now that Jacob has become Israel in its fullest sense, the renewal of the promise connected with the conferring of the name has a far greater signification than before (Hengstenberg).
Gen_35:13. God descends into us, whenever he gives us a token of his presence. Here, therefore, we have a designation of the end of the vision (Calvin).—For the symbolical signification of oil, see Bähr.—As Israel, as patriarchal ancestor, the foundation-stone of the spiritual temple, he lays the first (?) stone to the building which his descendants are to complete. (Drechsler: So much is certain, that the first idea of a definite house of God is connected with the Bethel of Jacob.)
Footnotes:
[1][The verb נגִלוּ, appeared, is here plural—one of the few cases in which Elohim takes the plural verb.—A. G.]
[2][Murphy says, from this time the multiplication of Israel is rapid. In twenty-five years after this time he goes down into Egypt with seventy souls, and two hundred and ten years after that Israel goes out of Egypt numbering about one million eight hundred thousand. A nation and a congregation of nations, such as were then known in the world, had at the last date come of him, and “kings” were to follow in due time.—A. G.]
[3][Among the continental churches confirmation is regarded in much the same light as we regard the open reception of the baptized members of the church, to their first communion; when they are said to assume for themselves the vows which were made for them in their baptism.—A. G.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2, 4 Then Jacob said unto his household . . .…
Then Jacob said unto his household . . . Put away the strange gods that are among you--Hebrew, "gods of the stranger," of foreign nations. Jacob had brought, in his service, a number of Mesopotamian retainers, who were addicted to superstitious practices; and there is some reason to fear that the same high testimony as to the religious superintendence of his household could not have been borne of him as was done of Abraham (Gen 18:19). He might have been too negligent hitherto in winking at these evils in his servants; or, perhaps, it was not till his arrival in Canaan, that he had learnt, for the first time, that one nearer and dearer to him was secretly infected with the same corruption (Gen 31:34). Be that as it may, he resolved on an immediate and thorough reformation of his household; and in commanding them to put away the strange gods, he added,
be clean, and change your garments--as if some defilement, from contact with idolatry, should still remain about them. In the law of Moses, many ceremonial purifications were ordained and observed by persons who had contracted certain defilements, and without the observance of which, they were reckoned unclean and unfit to join in the social worship of God. These bodily purifications were purely figurative; and as sacrifices were offered before the law, so also were external purifications, as appears from the words of Jacob; hence it would seem that types and symbols were used from the fall of man, representing and teaching the two great doctrines of revealed truth--namely, the atonement of Christ and the sanctification of our nature.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–4 JACOB AGAIN AT BETHEL. Gen_35:1-15.
JACOB AGAIN AT BETHEL. Gen_35:1-15.
The fear of Esau occasioned Jacob’s departure from Beer-sheba; the fear of the Canaanites his departure from Shechem. In both cases he went to Beth-el, the house of God, the gate of heaven. In the former case he had the command of Rebekah, and the blessing and charge of Isaac; now he has the command of God. He seems to have been slow in fulfilling his vow at Beth-el. At Succoth and Shechem he tarried many years. Probably the fear of Esau still detained him, and he would fain keep as remote from him as practicable. The secular cares of his large household and flocks, and the interests of his growing sons, had also occupied his thoughts. It was not until the shame and troubles of Shechem broke his sense of security, and the voice of God called him again, that he aroused from his neglect, put away the idols of his household, and proceeded to Beth-el.
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1. God said — Probably in a dream or vision of the night.
Go up to Beth-el — Though southward from Shechem, and on a lower range, its importance led to speaking of it as a going up.
Dwell there — Not at Shechem; an implied rebuke for his long dwelling in such proximity to idolaters. So, too, the reference to his flight from Esau, and the vision of God at Beth-el, were of the nature of admonition and rebuke.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–4 1. go up to Beth-el] From Shechem to Bethel…
1. go up to Beth-el] From Shechem to Bethel is an ascent of 1000 feet. Bethel is 2890 feet above the sea.
LXX εἰς τὸν τόπον Βαιθήλ = “unto the place Bethel,” cf. Gen_12:6-8, Gen_13:4, Gen_28:11.
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an altar] Jacob is commanded to worship at Bethel in fulfilment of his vow, Gen_28:22.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–4 (1) Arise, go up to Beth-el.—The position of Jacob…
XXXV.
JACOB RETURNS TO BETH-EL AND HEBRON.—DEATH OF ISAAC.
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(1) Arise, go up to Beth-el.—The position of Jacob at Shechem had become dangerous; for though the first result of the high-handed proceeding of Simeon and Levi was to strike the natives with terror (Gen_35:5), yet reprisals might follow if they had time to learn the comparatively small number of Jacob’s followers. It was necessary, therefore, to remove; but besides this, Beth-el was the goal of the patriarch’s jonrneyings. He had made a solemn vow there on his journey to Padanaram, and though forty-two years had elapsed, it had not been forgotten (see Gen_31:13); and the Divine command to go thither Was the outward authorisation of what his own conscience dictated. On this account we cannot believe that he had remained long at Shechem. Nomads are singularly leisurely in their movements. There is nothing of the rush and hurry of city life in their doings or purposes. They are capable of a great effort occasionally, but then relapse into their usual slowness. And so, when Jacob found good pasture and plenty of room for his cattle at Shechem, he remained there for awhile; but he did not abandon his purpose of going first to Beth-el, and finally to Hebron.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. H. Mackintosh 1880 · Public Domain On v1 Genesis 35
Genesis 35
"And God said unto Jacob. Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there." This confirms the principle on which we have been dwelling. When there is failure or declension, the Lord calls the soul back to Himself. "Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen; and repent and do the first works." (Rev. 2: 5) This is the divine principle of restoration. The soul must be recalled to the very highest point; it must be brought back to the divine standard. The Lord does not say, ’remember where you are;’ no; but ’remember the lofty position from whence you have fallen.’ Thus only can one learn how far he has declined, and how he is to retrace his steps.
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Now, it is when thus recalled to God’s high and holy standard, that one is really led to see the sad evil of one’s fallen condition. What a fearful amount of moral evil had gathered round Jacob’s family, unjudged by Him, until his soul was roused by the call to "go up to Bethel." Shechem was not the place in which to detect all this evil. The atmosphere of that place was too much impregnated with impure elements to admit of the soul’s discerning, with any degree of clearness and precision, the true character of evil. But the moment the call to Bethel fell on Jacob’s ear, "Then Jacob said unto his household, and to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean and change your garments, and let us arise and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went." The very mention of "the house of God" struck a chord in the soul of the patriarch; it carried him, in the twinkling of an eye, over the history of twenty eventful years. It was at Bethel he had learnt what God was, and not at Shechem; hence he must get back to Bethel again, and erect an altar upon a totally different base, and under a totally different name, from his altar at Shechem. This latter was connected with a mass of uncleanness and idolatry.
Jacob could speak of "El-elohe-Israel," while surrounded by a quantity of things utterly incompatible with the holiness of the house of God. It is important to be clear in reference to this point. Nothing can keep the soul in a path of consistent, intelligent separation from evil save the sense of what "the house of God" is, and what becomes that house. If I merely look at God, in reference to myself, I shall not have a clear, full, divine sense of all that flows out of a due recognition of God’s relation to His house. Some there are who deem it a matter of no importance how they are mixed up with impure materials in the worship of God, provided they themselves are true and upright in heart, In other words, they think they can worship God at Shechem; and that an altar, named "El-elohe Israel," is just as elevated, just as much according to God, as an altar named "El Bethel." This is evidently a mistake. The spiritually minded reader will at once detect the vast moral difference between Jacob’s condition at Shechem, and his condition at Bethel; and the same difference is observable between the two altars. Our ideas, in reference to the worship of God, must, of necessity, be affected by our spiritual condition; and the worship which we present will be low and contracted, or elevated and comprehensive, just in proportion as we enter into the apprehension of His character and relationship.
Now, the name of our altar, and the character of our worship, express the same ides. El-Bethel worship is, higher than El-elohe-Israel worship, for this simple reason, that it conveys a higher idea of God. It gives me a more elevated thought of God to speak of Him as the God of His house, than as the God of a solitary individual truth, there is beautiful grace expressed in the title, "God, the God of Israel;" and the soul must ever feel happy in looking at the character of God, so graciously connecting Himself with every separate stone of His house, and every separate member of the body. Each stone in the building of God is a "lively stones’ as connected with the "living stone," having communion with the living God," by the power of "the Spirit of life." But while all this is blessedly true, God is the God of His house; and when we are enabled,: by an enlarged spiritual intelligence, to view Him as such, we enjoy a higher character of worship than that which flows from merely apprehending what He is to ourselves individually.
But there is another thing to be remarked in Jacob’s recall to Bethel. He is told to make an altar "unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother." He is thus reminded of "the day of his distress." It is often well to have our minds led in this way to the point in our history in which we found ourselves brought down to the lowest step of the ladder. Thus Saul is brought back to the time when he was "little in his own eyes." This is the true starting point with all of us. "When thou wast little in thine own eyes," is a point of which we often need to be reminded. It is then that the heart really leans on God. Afterwards we begin to fancy ourselves to be something, and the Lord is obliged to teach us afresh our own nothingness. When first one enters upon a path of service or testimony, what a sense there is of personal weakness and incapacity! and as a consequence, what leanings upon God! what earnest, fervent appeals to Him for help and strength. Afterwards we begin to think that, from being so long at the work, we can get on by ourselves, at least there is not the same sense of weakness, or the same simple dependence upon God; and then our ministry becomes a poor, meagre, flippant, wordy thing, without unction or power - a thing flowing, not from the exhaustless tide of the Spirit, but from our own wretched minds.
From ver. 9-15, God repeats His promise to Jacob, and confirms the new name of "prince," instead of "supplanter;" and Jacob again calls the name of the place" Bethel." At verse 18 we have an interesting example of the difference between the judgement of faith and the judgement of nature The latter looks at things through the hazy mist with which it Is surrounded; the former looks at them in the light of the presence and counsels of God. "And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died,) that she called his name Ben-oni: but his father called him Benjamin." Nature called him, "the son of my sorrow;" but faith "the son of the right hand." Thus is it ever. The difference between the thoughts of nature must ever be wide indeed, and we should earnestly desire that our souls should be governed by the latter, and not by the former.
C. H. Mackintosh, Notes on the Pentateuch — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4 And God Elohim. The employment of this name for…
And God Elohim. The employment of this name for the Deity throughout the present chapter has been deemed conclusive evidence that, with Rome Jehovistic alterations, it belongs to the fundamental document (Tuch, Bleek, Delitzsch, Kalisch, et alii); but the frequent allusions to, Gen_28:13-16, which by partitionists is almost universally assigned to the Jehovist, prove that both sections have proceeded from the same author, and that, "though the mention of the name is avoided, this chapter, there is no doubt, substantially relates to Jehovah" (Hengstenberg) while the name Elohim may simply indicate that Jacob s journey from Shechem was undertaken in obedience to a Divine intimation (Quarry)said unto Jacob (shortly after the incidents recorded in the preceding chapter), Arise, go up to Bethel, about thirty miles distant, (Gen_12:8 Gen_13:3 Gen_28:19) to which, some thirty years previous, he had solemnly vowed to return (Gen_28:22) a vow which he appeared somewhat dilatory in performing, although its conditions had been exactly fulfilled (Keil, Kurtz, Kalisch, &c.);and dwell there (the massacre of the Shechemites had obviously rendered longer residence in that neighborhood unsafe): and make there an altar this Jacob had substantially promised to do in his vow (vide Gen_28:22) unto God, that appeared unto thee i.e. unto Jehovah (vide Gen_28:13) when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother. The words contained an assurance that the same Divine arm which had shielded him against the enmity of Esau and the oppression of Laban would extend to him protection on his future way.
Vers. 1-15.
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Bethel revisited.
I JACOB"S JOURNEY TO BETHEL.
1. The occasion of the journey. The crime of his sons had made it necessary that Jacob should leave Shechem and its neighborhood; but it is doubtful if in the circumstances Jacob would have thought of going to Bethel without an express invitation from Heaven, which, however, he got.
1. The object of the journey. This was stated by the Divine communication which Jacob received to be the fulfillment of the vow which twenty years before he had made to erect an altar on the spot where he enjoyed the vision of the ladder and the angels. Vows do not lose their obligatory character by lapse of years. Men may, but God never does, forget the promises which are made to him. Hence the counsel of the Preacher. (Ecc_5:4, Ecc_5:5)
2. The preparation for the journey. The removal of the strange gods
(1) Was needful if God was to be sincerely worshipped by Jacob and his household. The necessity of having no other gods but Jehovah was afterwards enjoined upon Israel as a nation. In the gospel the law is equally imperative. God and Christ demand the undivided homage of the human heart.
(2) Was counseled by Jacob to his household. It is well when heads of families have the ability as well as inclination to direct their children and dependents in the duties of religion.
(3) Was cheerfully assented to by Jacob"s household. The silver and wooden images (the teraphim) that Rachel had abstracted from her father"s tent, the idolatrous objects that the Shechemites may have brought with them, and the earrings that were in their ears, were at once and completely given up, and by Jacob"s own hand buried beneath the oak of Shechem.
(4) Was symbolized in Jacob"s household by the acts of washing and putting on of clean apparel. Under the law corporeal ablutions and beautified habiliments were typical of spiritual renovation and the putting on of the righteousness of the saints (cf. Eze_36:25; Jud_1:23; Rev_19:2)
1. The experience of the journey. Wherever the travelers went they found themselves unmolested, and the cities round about them alarmed, and afraid to pursue. The terror of Elohim was upon the people of the land, and thus the care of Jehovah was around his saints.
2. The completion of the journey. Jacob and all the people that were with him came to Luz in the land of Canaan, which is Bethel. Many journeys are begun that never end. Some that promise well at the outset are overwhelmed in disaster before they terminate. It is only he who keeps Israel that can preserve a good man"s going out and coming in.
II JACOB"S RESIDENCE AT BETHEL.
1. The building of an altar. This was on the part of Jacob
(1) an act of obedience, since it was done in accordance with Divine instructions (ver. 1);
(2) an act of justice, inasmuch as it was executed in fulfillment of a vow,; (Gen_28:22)
(3) an act of gratitude, being designed to give expression to Jacob s thankfulness for God s mercies (vers. 3, 7).
2. The death of Deborah.
(1) Her life-work: Rebekah"s nurse.
(2) Her death: this must have taken place at an advanced age.
(3) Her burial: the place of sepulture was on the slope of Bethel hill, beneath the shadow of a wide-spreading oak.
(4) Her memorial: the tree was named Allon-bachuth, oak of weeping.
3. The appearance of Elohim.
(1) The blessing renewed (ver. 9;)
(2) the new name confirmed (ver. 10);
(3) the promises repeated (ver. 11).
4. The erection of a pillar. The old column having probably been thrown down, this was
(1) set up as a memorial of the interview with God which had just been enjoyed;
(2) employed as an altar for the worship of Elohim poured a drink offering thereon;" and
(3) consecrated as an object of reverential regard by pouring oil thereon.
5. The renaming of the place. The name given twenty years previously is renewed, Bethel (ver. 15), with a slight modification, El-Bethel (ver. 7), to connect it with the altar just erected.
Learn
1. That good men sometimes require to be reminded by God of their duty.
2. That acts of Divine worship should be preceded by heart purification and life reformation.
3. That God is perfectly able to protect his people when they are walking in his appointed paths.
4. That good men when serving God are not exempt from the afflictions of life.
5. That faithful servants should be tenderly cherished by their masters when old, decently buried when dead, and lovingly remembered when entombed.
6. That God never forgets either his promises or his people.
7. That God should not be forgotten by those whom he remembers.
HOMILIES BY R.A. REDFORD Vers. 1-15.
God with us.
Jacob"s settlement with his family at Bethel. This was a solemn renewal of the covenant to the patriarch at the end of his pilgrimage. It was the occasion for a new dedication of himself and his household by vows and offerings, and by separation of themselves from all heathen things and thoughts around the newly-erected altar El-Bethel.
I REVELATION the basis of faith. God went up from him after he had spoken with him, and there he set up a pillar of stone, and poured a drink offering thereon, and he poured oil thereon.
II PERSONAL EXPERIENCE the background of a consecrated life. We should make the memory of Gears goodness the foundation on which we build up the monuments of our life. Mark the places by offerings. Let the Bethel of our worship be the Bethel of his praise. R.
HOMILIES BY J.F. MONTGOMERY Vers. 1, 2.
Spiritual renovation.
Spiritual life is a thing of growth; never finished here (Php_3:13; Heb_6:1) No doubt the all-important question is, Art thou in Christ? And in every Christian life there is a point, known to God, when the soul passes from death to life. (1Jn_5:12) For by nature children of wrath. Still there is a life"s work. The spirit may have chosen Christ; but the flesh is weak, and the law of sin still works. Most commonly in such a life certain times will stand out, connected with special lessons and special dealings, when some window of the soul has been opened to heavenly light, some line of action pressed upon the mind.
I THE LESSON LEARNED BY JACOB HIMSELF. We know not when his spiritual life began. Probably before he left home; for with all his faults he desired a spiritual blessing. But at Bethel and Penuel great steps were made. He learned the presence of God, and the protecting care of God, as he had never known them before. Yet the lessons were chiefly subjective; they regarded his own attitude towards God. And this generally comes first, but it is not all. "Arise, go up to Bethel." Take up again the lesson book. Is there not more to be learned from it? Those angels ascending and descending, were they charged with thy good only? The Lord who stood above, did he care only for thee? With all thy possessions thou art in "a solitary way". (Psa_107:4) Here Jacob seems first to realize his responsibility for the spiritual state of others (cf. Psa_119:136) The Christian character is not thoroughly formed till it is felt that the possession of truth hinds us to use-it for the good of others. Being "bought with a price," we are debtors to all; (Rom_1:14) and chiefly to those with whom we are connected. (1Ti_5:8)
II THE WORK HE TOOK IN HAND. To press upon his household
1. Single-hearted service of God. "Put away the strange gods." Sincerity lies at the root of all real renovation. Hitherto the semi-idolatry of teraphim seems to have been tacitly allowed. Jacob"s fondness for Rachel may have kept him from forbidding it. Hence a divided service (2Ki_17:33; Mar_7:7) Putting away does not refer only to formal worship. It is putting away service of the god of this world: covetousness, (Col_3:5) worldly aims, (Joh_5:44) gratification of self, (Luk_12:19 Luk_14:11) traditional maxims of conduct and judgment. (Mar_3:21; 1Pe_4:4) It is seeking first the kingdom of God, and resting in him. (Psa_37:5)
1. "Be clean." No toleration of evil. (Mat_5:48) Christians are to be a holy people. (1Pe_2:9) This is much more than a mere upright and honorable life. The Levitical rules, strict and minute as they were, faintly shadowed the extent of the law of righteousness. See the Sermon on the Mount. Vast difference between an upright life and a holy life. The one is a following of rules, the other a walk with God.
2. "Change your garments." Under the law this a necessary part of purification. Contrast the garments, Psa_109:18 and Isa_61:10. The explanation, Zec_3:4. In New Testament language, put on Christ. The root is atonement, the covering of sins, (Psa_32:1) the forgiveness of the sinful. (Rom_3:26) No real renovation without this change casting away self-righteousness, and clinging to the work of Christ (Jer_23:6; Rom_10:4) Many have said trust in free grace points to sin. God"s word from end to end declares it is the only way of holiness. M.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1–2 God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel,…
Gen_35:1-15
God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there
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Jacobs second journey to Bethel
I.
IT WAS UNDERTAKEN AT THE CALL OF GOD.
II. IT WAS ACCOMPLISHED IN THE SPIRIT OF OBEDIENCE AND CONSECRATION.
III. IT WAS ACCOMPANIED BY THE DIVINE PROTECTION.
IV. IT WAS FOLLOWED BY INCREASED SPIRITUAL BLESSING.
1. The old promises were renewed.
2. He has increased knowledge of God.
3. His religious character is purified and raised. (T. H. Leale.)
The second journey of Jacob to Bethel
I. REFRESHING OF EARLY RECOLLECTIONS.
1. Respecting this pilgrimage to Bethel, observe, first, that it was done by Divine direction--God said to Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel. Let us not imagine that a voice spoke articulately. There were simple modes of thinking in those days; men had not learnt to philosophize on their mental operations. They strongly felt an impulse within them. They knew that it was a higher one, and in the simple poetry of thought they said, God is speaking. The voice that spoke to Jacob was the voice within him, the voice of conscience--the same voice that speaks to us.
2. Observe, secondly, Jacobs preparation for this act of remembrance. He puts away the strange gods from his household.
3. The third thing we mark here is the consecration of the place (Gen_35:1). It is not in reference to God, but for a help to our own feelings that we consecrate certain spots of earth and buildings. There are sacred places, not sacred for their own sake, but sacred to us. Where we have loved and lost, where we have gained new light and life, the church where our forefathers worshipped, the place where we first knew God--these are by instinct hallowed. Hence we are told that God met Jacob in Bethel; not that He came down from another place, for He is everywhere, but that Jacob experienced a feeling of awe, a feeling that God was then specially near to him. In this meeting of Jacob with God, there are two facts to observe.
(1) The first is that since he was last at Bethel he had increased in the knowledge of God. He knew Him then only as God, now he knows Him as the God Almighty (Gen_35:11). This is but a type of our own life; our knowledge of God must always be progressive.
(2) Another thing we perceive, that in these twenty years there had been a growth in his personal religion. Once it had been but a selfish religion--he adopted a system of barter with God; if God will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, then shall God be my God (chap. 29.). Now there is a higher step, it is gratitude; God has done it, and now God shall be his God (Gen_35:3)--a higher motive, but not the highest; he has yet to learn to serve Him, not in happiness, but in misery; to serve Him in trial, because He is God, and to learn to say simply and believingly, Thy will be done.
II. THE GATHERING OF HIS DISFORTUNES.
1. The first of these was one not so keenly felt--the death of Deborah, Rebekahs nurse. He buried her at Bethel, under an oak (Gen_35:8), and the story gives us an interesting view of the ancient relation between master and servant.
2. But Jacobs second blow was of a different kind--Rachel dies, his early and youthful passion, his beloved wife, the only one whom, with all his strength of affection, Jacob loved, and whose children were dearer for her sake to him than all the others. Even his father and fondly indulgent self-sacrificing mother he seems to have regarded with coldness. From this moment he becomes a mourner for the rest of his life; and yet we can see the infinite good of this. Jacob was a selfish, comfort-loving man; these sorrows drew him out of himself to think of something higher.
3. The last blow was the death of Isaac. (F. W. Robertson, M. A.)
Jacobs return to Bethel
I. GOD REMINDS OF HIS BENEFACTIONS. God, that appeared to thee, &c.
1. An incident of the past brought to mind.
2. The place of future dwelling indicated.
3. Continual worship required for continued favours. The altar should not be absent from the home.
II. THE BENEFACTORS WILL OBEYED (Gen_35:2-3).
1. An immediate response. Then.
2. A proposal for preparation. Put away--wrong thoughts, desires, purposes, practices.
3. A summons to Divine service. Self-devotion first, then concern for all whom we can influence.
III. THE BENEFACTORS GOODNESS ACKNOWLEDGED.
1. He declared Gods supremacy.
2. He owned Gods kindness.
3. He realized Gods presence. (M. Braithwaite.)
Lessons from the life of Jacob
I. EVERY SPIRITUAL HISTORY HAS ITS SPECIAL PLACES, WHERE MEMORY LOVES TO LINGER, AND WHERE SPIRITUAL POWER PERTAINS.
II. SPECIAL MERCIES DEMAND SPECIAL REMEMBRANCE.
III. THE TEXT MAY BE APPLIED TO A DEVOUT REMEMBRANCE OF THE TIME AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF OUR EARLY CHRISTIAN LIFE.
1. Diligence in searching the Scriptures.
2. Fervour of private prayer and devotion.
3. Careful cultivation of the public means of grace.
4. Ardour of Christian zeal and work. The strong man grows stronger by exercise, so the robust Christian is always an active one.
IV. BETHEL WAS THE SCENE OF VOWS WHICH HAD BEEN PARTIALLY NEGLECTED AND FORGOTTEN. Prosperity has turned more heads than Jacobs.
V. DWELL THERE. A picture of a man of activity and business retiring to spend the leisure of age amidst the contemplations of religion and the memories of its power. (G. Deane, B. Sc.)
Jacob sent to Bethel
I. GODS COMMAND TO WORSHIP.
1. This intimates that God places man in the most favourable circumstances to obey His commandments.
2. It intimates the employment of mans highest and noblest faculties.
3. It implies the necessity of having the consciousness of Gods presence.
4. It suggests the spirit of entire dependence upon God.
II. THE NECESSARY PREPARATION TO OBEY THIS COMMAND.
1. A willing heart.
2. A determination to have all obstacles removed.
3. A sincere love for the pure.
III. THE RESULT OF POSSESSING A WORSHIPPING SPIRIT.
1. A manifestation of Divine power.
2. Safety in the midst of foes. (Homilist.)
Forgetfulness of Gods goodness
I. HERE IS A REFERENCE TO JACOBS PAST EXPERIENCE OF JEHOVAHS KINDNESS. The God that appeared to thee.
1. His fleeing from the wrath of an enraged brother.
2. The manifestation of God to him as his Friend.
3. His consecration of himself to God.
II. HERE IS A CALL FOR GRATITUDE TO GOD FOR HIS PAST KINDNESS. Arise, and go to Bethel.
1. God was peculiarly kind to Jacob. He had given him more than he asked--two wives, ten children, and large possessions (chaps. 29., 30., 31.).
2. God had subdued the anger of his brother, even though Esau had kept it up twenty years.
3. Jacob returned to his own country, but forgot his vow. He settles down for eight years before he visits Bethel, and not then until visited by a domestic affliction, and God thereby reminded him of his neglected duties; then he and his household went up to Bethel, and paid his vows, and had a renewed instance of Gods favour.
III. HERE LEARN A LESSON OF GRATITUDE TO THE GOD OF ALL YOUR MERCIES. For this is recorded for that purpose.
1. How many mercies have you to be thankful for! Not only common, but special mercies.
2. Many a place has been a Bethel to the Christians soul.
3. Think of your vows and resolutions, and carry them out, and you will have renewed seasons of enjoyment, and fresh instances of the Divine favour. (The Evangelical Preacher.)
The forgotten vow
I. THE VOW MADE.
II. THE VOW FORGOTTEN. A common occurrence.
III. THE VOW CALLED TO REMEMBRANCE.
1. The Lord is never at a loss for means in order that His ends may be gained.
2. Mark the way in which He acts here.
(1) First a gentle hint--Arise, go to Bethel.
(2) Then the command, and make there an altar.
3. Has not the Lord brought your vows to your remembrance?
(1) Failure.
(2) Sickness.
(3) Conscience.
IV. THE VOW PAID.
Lessons
1. How soon the influences of the most impressive scenes may pass away.
2. Gods forbearance when the performing of the vow is so long delayed.
3. By acting rightly ourselves, we influence others.
4. Bethel was to Jacob the house of God, and he went there. So it is right for you, in a particular place and in a marked manner, to perform your vow. (A. F. Barfield.)
Jacob returning to Bethel
I. JACOB WAS NOW IN A MOURNFUL STATE OF MIND, AND YET A VERY COMMON ONE.
1. Forgotten mercies.
2. Forgotten vows.
II. Let us look now at THE COMMAND GIVEN TO JACOB IN HIS FORGETFULNESS.
1. The Lord remembers our promises and vows.
2. The Lord often reminds His people of their forgotten mercies and vows. He did so in this case again and again.
III. We come now to our third point--THE OBEDIENCE THE PATRIARCH RENDERED TO THE DIVINE COMMAND.
1. Here is something to surprise us. There were strange gods, we find, in the house of Jacob at this time; yes, idols in the house of almost the only man in the world who worshipped the true God; and he knew they were there, and tolerated them. Well may we ask, how was this? We must go back for an answer. The Rachel whom he so tenderly loved, and for whom he had so patiently waited and laboured, was an amiable and affectionate woman; but she wanted one thing, and that one thing was a decided love for the Lord God of Israel. She had been brought up in an idolatrous country, and she herself was half an idolater. Accordingly, when he married her, he introduced a worshipper of false gods into his house; she had her secret idols, and she brought them with her. Here began, perhaps, Jacobs own forgetfulness of God, and here undoubtedly began much of the ungodliness and wretchedness of his children. Shall I say that we may learn here the vast importance of the connections which we form in the days of our youth? that there is a loud warning given here to the pious young never to let their affections wind round one who does not plainly and decidedly love the Lord? to let the heart break rather than give the heart to an idolater? I had rather speak to men like this patriarch, men who have households, children, and servants. I would say to them, Dear brethren, look through your houses and ask, Are there no idols here? Is there nothing here that takes Gods place in our hearts or our childrens? Is there nothing here that is opposed to Gods will and law, and tends to Gods dishonour? Bad books, bad company, dangerous amusements, practices which the world does not condemn nor even some of those who profess to live above the world, but such as will not bear the trial of Scripture for one moment, such as you would see the evil of in a moment did they not in some way or other fall in with your taste or interest--these are all idols; these will lead to irreligion and ungodliness in your houses: these will bring down on you Gods displeasure and judgments. Mischief will rise up in your families from these things, and through your families God will smite you for them.
2. There is something also here to instruct us. It is the promptitude and decision of the patriarchs obedience. (J. Bradley, M. A.)
A call to religious observances
I. JACOB CALLED TO SERIOUS CONSIDERATION. Bethel was forgotten. How often is it forgotten by us! Time wears out the impressions of mercies received. Afflictions come upon us, public calamities, and the approach even of pestilence; we are alarmed and distracted, but we never think of our vow, and of raising our altar, and beginning a thorough, speedy downright conversion to God as the God of mercies. Brethren, we should often turn back the book of our lives. We are fond of reading many books, but no book would be so profitable as the book of our past history.
II. THE PROMPT OBEDIENCE TO THE DIVINE ADMONITION WHICH JACOB RENDERED. The pious man, the conscientious master of a house, loses no time when Providence concurs with his own conviction of duty, in rousing him to religion, and in reminding him of his past neglects and family derelictions; and, therefore, we find Jacob addressing his household, and all that were with him, thus: Put away the strange gods, &c.
1. Jacob addresses his household as one who well knew that he was answerable to God for it.
2. He exhorts them to put away the strange gods that were among them. Alas! idols will enter the best family, in spite of Jacob, because they are the creatures of the human heart, and they regard not Jacobs prohibition. Therefore, when providences are moving, when conscience is awakened, when every heart trembles, then Jacob must say to his family--and every head of a family, every master, every parent, must say unto his household--Put away the strange gods that are among you. For whatever takesthe place in our heart of the Lord God, is a strange god and an idol; whatever takes the place of Gods name is an idol; whatever takes the place of Gods revelation, Gods truth, is an idol. A strange god! Covetousness, which is idolatry. A strange god! The world is the strange god of the worldly-minded. Talents, beauty of person, dress, pleasure, are the strange gods of the young.
3. But besides putting away their strange gods, Jacob called his family to purity of heart. Be clean, and change your garments.
4. Family prayer. The preceding led up to this.
(1) Scriptural exhortations to this duty.
(2) But, further, family prayer comes under the promise, Where two or three are met together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.
(3) The third argument is, the example of the saints in every age.
(4) But the fourth argument is, that family prayer, like social, rests on the nature of man. We are destined to live in society, and are bound together by mutual wants and sympathies; and, therefore, mans religion, like his nature, must be social.
(5) Once more, the duties of the head of a household towards his family cannot be discharged without its observance. You wish to train up your children in the fear of the Lord; but is it possible to do so while you neglect to afford them an example of what you wish them to practice. (D. Wilson, M. A.)
At Bethel again
I. THY ADMONITION FROM GOD. How common a fault it is, to put off some religions duty to what we think a more convenient season! Then, oftentimes, God reminds us by some affliction--some loss--some calamity--of our want of earnestness, and bids us do what we had long left undone in His service.
II. THE PURIFICATION OF JACOBS HOUSEHOLD.
1. The strange gods were to be given up and put away.
2. They were, moreover, to cleanse themselves and to change their clothes. Outward signs of inward consecration and cleansing.
III. THE FULFILMENT OF JACOBS VOW.
IV. THE RENEWAL OF GODS PROMISE.
1. God reminds Jacob of his recent change of name.
2. God reminds Jacob of His own Almighty power.
3. God renews the Abrahamic promise in its threefold form of--
(1). An on reaching blessing;
(2) A promised numerous seed;
(3)A promised possession of the land. (W. S. Smith, B. D.)
Family reformation; or, Jacobs second visit to Bethel
There are critical times in mast families; times when much decision of character will be needed on the part of the father to guide things aright. Even the heathen outside began to smell the ill savour of Jacobs disorganized family, and the one alternative was--mend or end. If you notice, Jacob himself was in a bad way. His business was to remain in Canaan a mere sojourner, dwelling in tents, not one of the people, but moving about among them, testifying that he looked for a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. He expected to inherit the land, but, for the time being, he was to be a stranger and a sojourner, as his fathers Abraham and Isaac had been. Yet at Succoth we read that he built booths--scarcely houses, I suppose, but more than tents. It was a compromise, and a compromise is often worse than a direct and overt disobedience of command. He dares not erect a house, but he builds a booth and thus shows his desire for a settled life; and though it is not ours to judge the purchase of land at Shechem, still it looks in the same direction. Jacob is endeavouring to find a resting-place where Abraham and Isaac had none. I will not speak too positively, but the patriarchs acts look as if he desired to find a house for himself, where he might rest and be on familiar terms with the inhabitants of the land. Now the Lord his God would not have it so. Children of God cannot mix with the world without mischief. The world does hurt to us and we to it when once be begin to be of the world and like it. It is an ill-assorted match. Fire and water were never meant to be blended. The seed of the woman must not mix with the seed of the serpent. A stand must be made. Something behoves to be done, and Jacob must do it. The Lord comes in, and He speaks with Jacob, and since the good mans heart was sound towards Gods statutes, the Lord had only to speak to him and he obeyed. He was pulled up short, and made to look at things, and set his house in order, and he did so with that resolution of character which comes out in Jacob when he is brought into a strait, but which at other times is not perceptible.
I. First, then, WHAT WAS TO BE DONE?
1. The first thing to do was to make a decided move. God said to Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there. You must hasten away from Shechem, with its fertile plains, and make a mountain journey up to Bethel, and dwell there. You have been long enough near these Shechemites; mischief has come from your being so intimate with the world. You must cut a trench between yourselves and the associations you have formed, and you must go up to Bethel and remain there awhile. Every now and then we shall find it necessary to say to ourselves and to our family, We must come out from among worldlings, we must be separate. We are forming connections which are injurious to us, and we must snap the deceitful bonds.
2. Now they must revive old memories. Go up to Bethel, and dwell there: and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother. A revival of old memories is often most useful to us, especially to revive the memory of our conversion. Then you must come back to your first hours of communion. Where you lost your joy you will find it, for it remains where you left it. Then go back mourning and sighing to Bethel, and pray that the old feelings may be revived in you.
3. But now, again, Jacob must keep an old vow. I do not quite remember how many years old that vow was, but I suppose some thirty or so; yet he had not kept it. Be very slow to make vows, brethren--very slow. They should be but very seldom presented, because all that you can do for God you are bound to do as it is; and a vow is often a superfluity of superstition. But if the vow be made, let it not wait beyond its time, and complain of thee to thy God. An old and forgotten vow will rot and breed most solemn discomfort to thy heart; at first it will gnaw at thy conscience, and if thy conscience at last grows hardened to it, others of thy powers will suffer the same petrifying process. Moreover, a vow forgotten will bring chastisement on thee, and perhaps the rod will fall upon thy family.
4. It appeared to Jacob, next, that if he was to fulfil his vow, it was necessary to reform his whole house; for he could not serve the Lord and worship other gods. He said to all that were with him--to his sons first, and then to his hired servants and the rest--Put away the strange gods that are among you. Yes, it must come to that. If I am to get back to my old position with God I must break my idols. And then next he said, Be clean. There was to be, I suppose, a general washing, indicative of purgation of character by going to God with repentance and seeking forgiveness. Jacob also said, Change your garments. This was symbolic of an entire renewal of life, though I fear me they were not all renewed. At any rate this is what was symbolized by Change your garments. Alas, it is easier to say this to our families than it is to get them to do it. And do we wonder? Since it is so much easier for ourselves to say than it is for ourselves to do. Yet, beloved, if your walk is to be close with God, if you are to commune with the God of Bethel, you must be cleansed.
5. Well, then, the next and last thing which they were to do was to celebrate special worship. Let us arise, and go up to Bethel, and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went. When we get wrong and feel that there must be a decided change, we must set apart special times of devotion. Family prayer is the nutriment of family piety, and woe to those who allow it to cease. I read the other day of parents who said they could not have family prayer, and one asked this question: If you knew that your children would be sick through the neglect of family prayer, would you not have it? If one child was smitten down with fever each morning that you neglected prayer, how then? Oh, then they would have it. And if there was a law that you should be fined five shillings if you did not meet for prayer, would you find time for it? Yes. And if there were five pounds given to all who had family prayer, would you not by some means arrange to have it? Yes. And so the inquirer went on with many questions, and wound up with this: Then it is but an idle excuse when you, who profess to be servants of God, say that you have no time or opportunity for family prayer! Should idle excuses rob God of His worship and our families of a blessing? Begin to pray in your families, and especially if things have gone wrong get them right by drawing near to God more distinctly.
II. And now I come to my second point--WHAT HAPPENED IN THE DOING OF IT? Well, several things happened, and one or two of those were rather surprising.
1. The first was that all heartily entered into the reforming work. I am sure they did, because the fourth verse says, They gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hands--all of them--and all their earrings which were in their ears. He had not said anything about their earrings. Was there any hurt in their earrings? For a woman to wear an earring is not such a dreadful thing, is it? Perhaps not, but I suppose that these earrings were charms, and that they were used in certain incantations, and heathenish customs. Now, as soon as Jacob speaks they all give up their idols and their earrings. I like this. It is a blessed thing when a man of God takes a stand, and speaks, and finds that his family are all ready to follow. Perhaps it was the fear that was upon them just then, the fear of the nations round about which made them so obedient. I am not sure it was a work of grace; but still, as far as outward appearance went, there was a willing giving up of all that could have grieved the Lord. And you will sometimes be pleased, Christian friends, when things get wrong and you determine to set them right, to see how others will yield to your determination. You ought to take courage from this.
2. Another circumstance happened, namely, that protection was afforded him, immediate and complete. They journeyed: and the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. When a mans ways please the Lord, He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him; and now that Jacob has determined to set things right he walks unharmed. You do not know how much of personal trouble which you are now bearing will vanish as soon as you determine to stand out for God. You do not know how much of family difficulty that now covers you with dread will vanish when you yourself have feared the Lord, and have come forth decidedly and determinedly to do the right.
3. In the next place the vow was performed. They came to Bethel, and I can almost picture the grateful delight of Jacob as he looked upon those great stones among which he had lain him down to sleep, a lonely man. He thought of the past, rejoiced in the present, and hoped for the future, for now he had come to be with God and to draw near to Him.
4. But what else happened? Why, now there came a death and a funeral. Deborah, Rebekahs nurse, died. Her name means a bee. And we have had old nurses ourselves, have we not, who have been like busy bees in our household. The good nurse died when they seemed to want her most, but it was better for her to die then than that she should have departed when Dinahs shame and Simeons crime had made the household dark. It was better that she should live to see them purged from idols and on the road to her old master Isaac, for then she would feel as if she could say, Now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according to Thy word: for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation. The moral of the incident is that the Lord may heat the fire all the more when He sees the refining process going on, and we must receive the further trial as a token of love and not of anger if He smites us heavily when we are honestly endeavouring to seek His face.
III. Now we close with the third head, namely, WHAT FOLLOWED THEREON. All this putting away of idols and going to Bethel--did anything come of it? Yes.
1. First, there was a new appearance of God. Read the ninth verse. And God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came out of Padan-aram, and blessed him: this was a new appearance of God. It is worth while to have been purged and cleansed, and to have done anything to be favoured with one of those Divine visits in which we almost cry with Paul, Whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell: God knoweth. A clear view of God in Christ Jesus and a vivid sense of Jesus love is a sweet reward for broken idols and Bethel reformations.
2. The next thing that came of it was a confirmation to Jacob of his title of prince, which conferred a dignity on the whole family. For a father to be a prince ennobles all the clan. God now puts upon them another dignity and nobility which they had not known before, for a holy people are a noble people. You that live in Gods presence are in the peerage of the skies. Such honour have all the saints who follow the Lord fully. God help us to keep close to Jesus, and enjoy daily communion with Him.
3. And then, next, there was given to Jacob and his family a vast promise, which was, in some degree, an enlargement of a promise made to Isaac and to Abraham before. I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins. I do not remember anything said to Abraham about a company of nations, or about kings coming out of his loins, but out of the loins of Israel, a prince, princes may come. God puts upon His promise a certain freshness of vastness and infinity now that Jacob has drawn near to Him. Brethren, God will give us no new promise, but He will make the old promises look wondrously new. He will enlarge our vision so that we shall see what we never saw before. Have you ever had a painting which hung neglected in, some back room? Did it one day strike you that you would have it framed and brought into a good light? When you saw it properly hung on the wall did you not exclaim, Dear me! I never noticed that picture before. How wonderfully it has come out? And many and many a promise in Gods Word will never be noticed by you till it is set in a new frame of experience. Then, when it is hung up before you, you will be lost in admiration of it.
4. I will not detain you except to say that you may also expect very familiar communion. Notice the thirteenth verse, God went up from him in the place where He talked with him. Talked with him! Talked with him! It is such a familiar word. God talking with man. We say conversing when we are speaking in a dignified manner; but talking! Oh that blessed condescension of God when He speaks to us in the familiar tones of His great love in Christ Jesus. There is a way of converse with God which no tongue can explain: they only know it who have enjoyed it. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
The revival
1. Observe, a season of prosperity is too frequently a season of religious decline. The religion of the Gospel, though it is a scheme of mercy, is a system of discipline. An undisturbed enjoyment of the goods of this world has, at the best, a sensualizing tendency. Now it is in these circumstances of repose--of gradual yielding to allowed indulgence--of lethargic sinking into spiritual self-complacency and inactivity, that men are apt to forget the vows of their distress, and, even within the sphere of their own influence and authority, to suffer sin around them without marking it with that holy indignation with which, at one time, it would have been reprobated and discountenanced. Without meaning to justify any thing decidedly wrong, the declining Christian, from the consciousness of his own listless and unprosperous state, and from a false application of the very principle of justice, deals more leniently with the faults of those around him than he would have done formerly, and remains silent when he ought to administer reproof. In the midst of comforts and indulgence we lose something of that holy jealousy, circumspection and activity, to which the heavy pressure of affliction and temptation had given birth.
2. But observe that God will not suffer His people to sink habitually into this state of spiritual sloth. He will, in His own time, deal strictly and retributively with the true Israel. We see this in the case of Jacob. Painful and humiliating as was the visitation to which he was exposed, yet the whole evil might easily be traced to one source. The disgrace of his daughter, the fraud and cruelty of his sons, the dishonour and danger of his whole family, and the stain brought upon the cause of God and truth, might be all fairly attributed to his incautious sojourning among an unenlightened and careless people, at a time when he should have hastened to Bethel for the performance of his vow. The more we are enabled to look into the history of individual Christians, the more we shall find that their respected afflictions are especially calculated to correct the prevailing evil of their characters; and that they may be traced to close connection with some of their prominent moral defects. The naturally proud man is frequently touched in the very core of his pride. The covetous man is often annoyed by worldly anxieties and losses. Still even the afflictions which are permitted to arise out of a Christians errors have a merciful intention. Their specific object is the more ample sanctification of his soul and body. They are to work out for him the peaceable fruits of righteousness.
3. But observe, that when God really calls a man to a review, and a cleansing of his ways, He makes him serious and in earnest. Any attempts at reformation which originate in merely human effort, are in their extent partial, and in their duration transitory. And it is indeed a beautiful sight when we see the soul of a sincere Christian thoroughly awakened by the dispensations of providence, and by the quickening power of the Spirit of grace, to renewed devotion and activity for God. When the command comes with power into the soul, Arise, and go up to Bethel, then there is no more parleying, delaying, or excuse. The same spirit is shown in the conduct of Jacob. He appears at once to have been roused to aim strenuously at the revival of religion both in himself and his family; and he addresses himself without delay to the confession of his neglect, to the performance of his duty, and to a close inspection into the state of his household, that they also, in whatsoever thing they had sinned against the Lord, should be thoroughly reformed and corrected. Such a work of revival is the work of God; and wherever it occurs, it will be marked by certain characteristics which cannot easily be mistaken; for they savour too strongly of that heaven from whence alone grace and holiness flow, to be fairly attributed to any other source. The call of God to renewed devotion produces a sincere surrender of all idolatrous attachments, either to the things or the persons of this world. Put away your strange gods. And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods that were in their hand, and all their earrings which were in their ears, and Jacob hid them in the oak which was Shechem. The call of God produces a cessation from all impurity of the flesh and of the spirit. The reviving call of God will appear in an honest endeavour to repair those breaches which negligence has made, and to remedy by greater effort the evil of time wasted, opportunities lost, evil habits acquired and strengthened, and vows unpaid. Let us arise, and go up to Bethel, and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress. The call of God to a revival of religion will appear in a renewed and faithful application, in the means of grace, to God, as a reconciled and covenant God; and this one of the most prominent features--one of the most satisfactory indications of a sincere revival of religious hope and devotion. Again; a sincere revival of religious influence in the heart leads to renewed endeavours to produce a gracious change in those connections over whom we have any influence. It is not sufficient to a gracious spirit to serve God alone. If we feel His love, and value His salvation, we shall be anxious for others--both for the honour of God, and for their eternal welfare. The unfailing mercy of the Lord extended yet farther; for we observe that when the humbled and penitent patriarch presented himself at last at Bethel, and built his promised altar there, God appeared unto him again, in unchanging faithfulness and grace, and blessed him, and renewed with him there His covenant and His promise. The subject addresses itself especially to one class of hearers--to those who, by experience, can sympathize with Jacob in this part of his history. It speaks to those who have felt the powers of the world to come, and tasted of the heavenly gift. (E Craig.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1 Genesis 35
JACOBS RETURN
Genesis 35
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"As for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan in the way."- Gen_48:7
The words of the Wrestler at the brook Jabbok, "Let me go, for the day breaketh," express the truth that spiritual things will not submit themselves to sensible tests. When we seek to let the full daylight, by which we discern other objects, stream upon them, they elude our grasp. When we fancy we are on the verge of having our doubts for ever scattered, and our suppositions changed into certainties, the very approach of clear knowledge and demonstration seems to drive those sensitive spiritual presences into darkness. As Pascal remarked, and remarked as the mouthpiece of all souls that have earnestly sought for God, the world only gives us indications of the presence of a God Who conceals Himself. It is, indeed, one of the most mysterious characteristics of our life in this world that the great Existence which originates and embraces all other Beings should Himself be so silent and concealed: that there should be need of subtle arguments to prove His existence, and that no argument ever conceived has been found sufficiently cogent to convince all men. One is always tempted to say, how easy to end all doubt, how easy for God so to reveal Himself as to make unbelief impossible, and give to all men the glad consciousness that they have a God.
The reason of this "reserve" of God must lie in the nature of things. The greatest forces in nature are silent and unobtrusive and incomprehensible. Without the law of gravitation the universe would rush into ruin, but who has ever seen this force? Its effects are everywhere visible, but itself is shrouded in darkness and cannot be comprehended. So much more must the Infinite Spirit remain unseen and baffling all comprehension. "No man hath seen God at any time" must ever remain true. To ask for Gods name, therefore, as Jacob did, is a mistake. For almost every one supposes that when he knows the name of a thing he knows also its nature. The giving of a name, therefore, tends to discourage enquiry, and to beget an unfounded satisfaction as if, when we know what a thing is called, we know what it is. The craving, therefore, which we all feel in common with Jacob-to have all mystery swept from between us and God, and to see Him face to face, so that we may know Him as we know our friends-is a craving which cannot be satisfied. You cannot ever know God as He is. Your mind cannot comprehend a Being who is pure Spirit, inhabiting no body, present with you here but present also hundreds of millions of miles away, related to time and to space and to matter in ways utterly impossible for you to comprehend.
What is possible, God has done. He has made Himself known in Christ. We are assured, on testimony that stands every kind of test, that in Him, if nowhere else, we find God. And yet even by Christ this same law of reserve if not concealment was observed. Not only did He forbid men and devils to proclaim who He was but when men, weary of their own doubts and debatings, impatiently challenged him, "If thou be the Christ tell us plainly," He declined to do so. For really men must grow to the knowledge of Him. Even a human face cannot be known by once or twice seeing it; the practised artist often misses the expression best loved by the intimate friend, or by the relative whose own nature interprets to him the face in which he sees himself reflected. Much more can the child of God only attain to the knowledge of his Fathers face by first of all being a child of God, and then by gradually growing up into His likeness.
But though Gods operation is in darkness the results of it are in the light. "As Jacob passed over Peniel, the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh." As Jacobs company halted when they missed him, and as many anxious eyes were turned back into the darkness, they were unable still to see him; and even when the darkness began to scatter, and they saw dimly and far off a human figure, the sharpest eyes among them declare it cannot be Jacob, for the gait and walk, which alone they can judge by at that distance and in that light, are not his. But when at last the first ray of sunlight streams on him from over the hills of Gilead, all doubt is at an end; it is Jacob, but halting on his thigh. And he himself finds it is not a strain which the walking of a few paces will ease, nor a night cramp which will pass off, nor a mere dream which would vanish in broad day, but a real permanent lameness which he must explain to his company. Has he missed a step on the bank in the darkness, or stumbled or slipped on the slippery stones of the ford? It is a far more real thing to him than any such accident. So, however others may discredit the results of a work on the soul which they have not seen-however they may say of the first and most obvious results, "This is but a sickness of soul which the rising sun will dispel; a feigned peculiarity of walk which will be forgotten in the bustle of the days work"-it is not so, but every contact with real life makes it more obvious that when God touches a man the result is real. And as Jacobs household and children in all generations counted that sinew which shrank sacred, and would not eat of it, so surely should we be reverential towards Gods work in the soul of our neighbour, and respect even those peculiarities which are often the most obvious first-fruits of conversion, and which make it difficult for us to walk in the same comfort with these persons, and keep step with them as easily as once we did. A reluctance to live like other good people, an inability to share their innocent amusements, a distaste for the very duties of this life, a harsh or reserved bearing towards unconverted persons, an awkwardness in speaking of their religious experience, as well as an awkwardness in applying it to the ordinary circumstances of their life, -these and many other of the results of Gods work on the soul should not be rudely dealt with, but respected; for though not in themselves either seemly or beneficial, they are evidence of Gods touch.
After this contest with the angel, the meeting of Jacob with Esau has no separate significance. Jacob succeeds with his brother because already he has prevailed with God. He is on a satisfactory footing now with the Sovereign who alone can bestow the land and judge betwixt him and his brother. Jacob can no longer suppose that the chief obstacle to his advance is the resentment of Esau. He has felt and submitted to a stronger hand than Esaus. Such schooling we all need: and get, if we will take it. Like Jacob, we have to make our way to our end through numberless human interferences and worldly obstacles. Some of these we have to flee from, as Jacob from Laban; others we must meet and overcome, as our Esaus. Our own sin or mistake has put us under the power of some whose influence is disastrous; others, though we are not under their power at all, yet, consciously or unconsciously to themselves, continually cross our path and thwart us, keep us back and prevent us from effecting what we desire, and from shaping things about us according to our own ideas. And there will, from time to time, be present to our minds obvious ways in which we could defeat the opposition of these persons, and by which we fancy we could triumph over them. And what we are here taught is, that we need look for no triumph, and it is a pity for us if we win a triumph over any human opposition, however purely secular and unchristian, without first having prevailed with God in the matter. He comes in between us and all men and things, and, laying His hand on us, arrests us from further progress till we have to the very bottom and in every part adjusted the affair with Him-and then, standing right with Him, we can very easily, or at least we can, get right with all things. And it should be a suggestive and fruitful thought to the most of us that, in all cases in which we sin against our brother, God presents Himself as the champion of the wronged party. One day or other we must meet not the strongest putting of all those. cases in which we have erred as the offended party could himself put them, but we must meet them as put by the Eternal Advocate of justice and right, who saw our spirit, our merely selfish calculating, our base motive, our impure desire, our unrighteous deed. Gladly would Jacob have met the mightiest of Esaus host in place of this invincible opponent, and it is this same Mighty One, this same watchful guardian of right Who threw Himself in Jacobs way, Who has His eye on us, Who has tracked us through all our years, and Who will certainly one time appear in our path-as the champion of every one we have wronged, of every one whose soul we have put in jeopardy, of every one to whom we have not done what God intended we should do, of every one whom we have attempted merely to make use of; and in stating their case and showing us what justice and duty would have required of us, He will make us feel, what we cannot feel till He Himself convinces us, that, in all our dealings with men, wherein we have wronged them we have wronged Him.
The narrative now prepares to leave Jacob and make room for Joseph. It brings him back to Bethel, thereby completing the history of his triumph over the difficulties with which his life had been so thickly studded. The interest and much of the significance of a mans life come to an end when position and success are achieved. The remaining notices of Jacobs experience are of a sorrowful kind; he lives under a cloud until at the close the sun shines out again. We have seen him in his youth making experiments in life; in his prime founding a family and winning his way by slow and painful steps to his own place in the world; and now he enters on the last stage of his life. a stage in which signs of breaking up appear almost as soon as he attains his aim and place in life.
After all that had happened to Jacob, we should have expected him to make for Bethel as rapidly as his unwieldy company could be moved forwards. But the pastures that had charmed the eye of his grandfather captivated Jacob as well. He bought land at Shechem, and appeared willing to settle there. The vows which he had uttered with such fervour when his future was precarious are apparently quite forgotten, or more probably neglected, now that danger seems past. To go to Bethel involved the abandonment of admirable pastures, and the introduction of new religious views and habits into his family life. A man who has large possessions, difficult and precarious relations to sustain with the world, and a household unmanageable from its size, and from the variety of dispositions included in it, requires great independence and determination to carry out domestic reform on religious grounds. Even a slight change in our habits is often delayed because we are shy of exposing to observation fresh and deep convictions on religious subjects. Besides, we forget oar fears and our vows when the time of hardship passes away; and that which, as young men, we considered almost hopeless, we at length accept as our right, and omit all remembrance and gratitude. A spiritual experience that is separated from your present by twenty years of active life, by a foreign residence, by marriage, by the growing up of a family around you, by other and fresher spiritual experiences, is apt to be very indistinctly remembered. The obligations you then felt and owned have been overlaid and buried in the lapse of years. And so it comes that a low tone is introduced into your life, and your homes cease to be model homes.
Out of this condition Jacob was roughly awakened. Sinning by unfaithfulness and softness towards his family, he is, according to the usual law, punished by family disaster of the most painful kind. The conduct of Simeon and Levi was apparently due quite as much to family pride and religious fanaticism as to brotherly love or any high moral view. In them first we see how the true religion, when held by coarse and ungodly men, becomes the root of all evil. We see the first instance of that fanaticism which so often made the Jews a curse rather than a blessing to other nations. Indeed, it is but an instance of the injustice, cruelty, and violence that at all times result where men suppose that they themselves are raised to quite peculiar privileges and to a position superior to their fellows, without recognising also that this position is held by the grace of a holy God and for the good of their fellows.
Jacob is now compelled to make a virtue of necessity. He flees to Bethel to escape the vengeance of the Shechemites. To such serious calamities do men expose themselves by arguing with conscience and by refusing to live up to their engagements. How can men be saved from living merely for sheep-feeding and cattle-breeding and trade and enjoyment? how can they be saved from gradually expelling from their character all principle and all high sentiment that conflicts with immediate advantage and present pleasure, save by such irresistible blows as here compelled Jacob to shift his camp? He has spiritual perception enough left to see what is meant. The order is at once issued: "Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments: and let us arise, and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went." Thus frankly does he acknowledge his error, and repair, so far as he can, the evil he has done. Thus decidedly does he press Gods command on those whom he had hitherto encouraged or connived at. Even from his favourite Rachel he takes her gods and buries them. The fierce Simeon and Levi, proud of the blood with which they had washed out their sisters stain, are ordered to cleanse their garments and show some seemly sorrow, if they can.
If years go by without any such incident occurring in our life as drives us to a recognition of our moral laxity and deterioration, and to a frank and humble return to a closer walk with God, we had need to strive to awaken ourselves and ascertain whether we are living up to old vows and are really animated by thoroughly worthy motives. It was-when Jacob came back to the very spot where he had lain on the open hillside, and pointed out to his wives and children the stone he had set up to mark the spot, that he felt humbled as he cast his eye over the flocks and tents he now owned. And if you can, like Jacob, go back to spots in your life which were very woful and perplexed, years even when all continued dreary, dark, and hopeless, when friendlessness and poverty, bereavement or disease, laid their chilling, crushing hands upon you, times when you could not see what possible good there was for you in the world; and if now all this is solved, and your condition is in the most striking contrast to what you can remember, it becomes you to make acknowledgment to God such as you may have made to your friends, such acknowledgment as makes it plain that you are touched by His kindness. The acknowledgment Jacob made was sensible and honest. He put away the gods which had divided the worship of his family. In our life there is probably that which constantly tends to usurp an undue place in our regard; something which gives us more pleasure than the thought of God, or from which we really expect a more palpable benefit than we expect from God, and which, therefore, we cultivate with far greater assiduity. How easily, if we really wish to be on a clear footing with God, can we discover what things should be cast revengefully from us, buried and stamped upon and numbered with the things of the past. Are there not in your life any objects for the sake of which you sacrifice that nearness to God, and that sure hold of Him you once enjoyed? Are you not conscious of any pursuits, or hopes, or pleasures, or employments which practically have the effect of making you indifferent to spiritual advancement, and which make you shy of Bethel-shy of all that sets clear before you your indebtedness to God, and your own past vows and resolves?
"But," continues the narrative, "but Deborah, Rebekahs nurse, died": that is, although Jacob and his house were now living in the fear of God, that did not exempt them from the ordinary distresses of family life. And among these, one that falls on us with a chastening and mild sadness all its own, occurs when there passes from the family one of its oldest members, and one who has by the delicate tact of love gained influence over all, and has by the common consent become the arbiter and mediator, the confidant and counsellor of the family. They, indeed, are the true salt of the earth whose own peace is so deep and abiding, and whose purity is so thorough and energetic, that into their ear we can disburden the troubled heart or the guilty conscience, as the wildest brook disturbs not and the most polluted fouls not the settled depths of the all-cleansing ocean. Such must Deborah have been, for the oak under which she was buried was afterwards known as "the oak of weeping." Specially must Jacob himself have mourned the death of her whose face was the oldest in his remembrance, and with whom his mother and his happy early days were associated. Very dear to Jacob, as to most men, were those who had been connected with and could tell him of his parents, and remind him of his early years. Deborah, . by treating him still as a little boy, perhaps the only one who now called him by the pet name of childhood, gave him the pleasantest relief from the cares of manhood and the obsequious deportment of the other members of his household towards him. So that when she went a great blank was made to him: no longer was the wise and happy old face seen in her tent door to greet him of an evening; no longer could he take refuge in the peacefulness of her old age from the troubles of his lot: she being gone, a whole generation was gone, and a new stage of life was entered on.
But a heavier blow, the heaviest that death could inflict, soon fell upon him. She who had been as Gods gift and smile to him since ever he had left Bethel at the first is taken from him now that he is restored to Gods house. The number of his sons is completed, and the mother is removed. Suddenly and unexpectedly the blow fell, as they were journeying and fearing no ill. Notwithstanding the confident and cheering, though ambiguous, assurances of those about her, she had that clear knowledge of her own state which, without contradicting, simply put aside such assurances, and, as her soul was departing, feebly named her son Benoni, Son of my sorrow. She felt keenly what was, to a nature like hers, the very anguish of disappointment. She was never to feel the little creature stirring in her arms with personal human life, nor see him growing up to manhood as the son of his fathers right hand. It was this sad death of Rachels which made her the typical mother in Israel. It was not an unclouded, merely prosperous life which could fitly have foreshadowed the lives of those by whom the promised seed was to come; and least of all of the virgin to whom it was said, "A sword shall pierce through thine own soul also." It was the wait of Rachel that poetical minds among the Jews heard from time to time mourning their national disasters -Rachel weeping for her children, when by captivity they were separated from their mother country, or when by the sword of Herod, the mothers of Bethlehem were bereaved of their babes. But it was also observed that that which brought this anguish on the mothers of Bethlehem was the birth there of the last Son of Israel, the blossom of this long-growing plant, suddenly born after a long and barren period, the son of Israels right hand.
Still another death is registered in this chapter. It took place twelve years after Joseph went into Egypt, but is set down here for convenience. Esau and Jacob are, for the last time, brought together over their dead father-and for the last time, as they see that family likeness which comes out so strikingly in the face of the dead. do they feel drawn with brotherly affection to greet one another as sons of one father. In the dead Isaac too, they find an object of veneration more impressive than they had found in the living father: the infirmities of age are exchanged for the mystery and majesty of death; the man has passed out of reach of pity, of contempt: the shrill, uncontrolled treble is no longer heard, there are no weak, plaintive movements, no childishness; but a solemn, august silence, a silence that seems to bid on-lookers be still and refrain from disturbing the first communings of the departed spirit with things unseen.
The tenderness of these two brothers towards one another and towards their father was probably quickened by remorse when they met at his deathbed. They could not, perhaps, think that they had hastened his end by causing him anxieties which age has not strength to throw off; but they could not miss the reflection that the life now closed and finally sealed up might have been a much brighter life had they acted the part of dutiful, loving sons. Scarcely can one of our number pass from among us without leaving in our minds some self-reproach that we were not more kindly towards him, and that now he is beyond our kindness; that our opportunity for being brotherly towards him is forever gone. And when we have very manifestly erred in this respect, perhaps there are among all the stings of a guilty conscience few more bitterly piercing than this. Many a son who has stood unmoved by the tears of a living mother-his mother by whom he lives, who has cherished him as her own soul, who has forgiven and forgiven and forgiven him, who has toiled and prayed, and watched for him-though he has hardened himself against her looks of imploring love andturned carelessly from her entreaties and burst through all the fond cords and snares by which she has sought to keep him, has yet broken down before the calm, unsolicitous, resting face of the dead. Hitherto he has not listened to her pleadings, and now she pleads no more. Hitherto she has heard no word of pure love from him, and now she hears no more. Hitherto he has done nothing for her of all that a son may do, and now there is nothing he can do. All the goodness of her life gathers up and stands out at once, and the time for gratitude is past. He sees suddenly, as by the withdrawal of a veil, all that that worn body has passed through for him, and all the goodness these features have expressed, and now they can never light up with joyful acceptance of his love and duty. Such grief as this finds its one alleviation in the knowledge that we may follow those who have gone before us; that we may yet make reparation. And when we think how many we have let pass without those frank, human, kindly offices we might have rendered, the knowledge that we also shall be gathered to our people comes in as very cheering. It is a grateful thought that there is a place where we shall be able to live rightly, where selfishness will not intrude and spoil all, but will leave us free to be to our neighbour all that we ought to be and all that we would be.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 Gen_35:2. The strange gods.] These were such as the…
CRITICAL NOTES.—
Gen_35:2. The strange gods.] These were such as the teraphim that Rachel had hidden (Gen_31:19), and possibly other idolatrous images used by the Shechemites.—
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Gen_35:4. Ear-rings.] “The ear-rings were connected then, as they are now, with incantations and enchantments, and were idolatrous in their use. (Hos_2:13.) (Jacobus.) The oak which was by Shechem. “In the repetition of this same act of purification by Joshua (Jos_24:26) mention is again made of an oak (or terebinth) at Shechem. The Hebraists tell us that we must not understand by this term any particular tree, but one tree among many.” (Alford.)—
Gen_35:7. El-beth-el.] God of Bethel. “Jacob adds to it here the name of God, repeated as indicating a repeated manifestation. (Gen_32:30).” (Jacobus.) God appeared unto him. Heb. There God was revealed unto him. It is not the same word as appeared in Gen_35:1. The verb is plural, probably to indicate that it was the vision of God accompanied by the holy angels.—
Gen_35:8. Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse.] This nurse had accompanied her from Mesopotamia to Canaan. (Gen_24:59.) She was such a nurse as performed the functions of a mother in giving suck. Allon-bachuth. “The oak of weeping.”—
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Gen_35:1-15
JACOB’S SECOND JOURNEY TO BETHEL
I. It was undertaken at the call of God. God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel.” (Gen_35:1.) We need not suppose that he heard the voice of God outwardly speaking to his ear of flesh, but rather that inward voice of God which speaks to the conscience. A strong conviction had grown up within his soul which could no longer leave him at rest. Jacob had now tarried at Shechem for eight years, and he had not yet performed the vow which he made at Bethel. The sense of a solemn duty rests upon him, growing stronger until it really becomes to him the voice of God urging him to action.
II. It was accomplished in the spirit of obedience and consecration.
1. Obedience. Jacob and his people went up to Bethel at God’s command. In order that he might preserve the purity of God’s worship, he puts away from his company all the remains of idolatry. (Gen_35:4.) By getting rid of these possible sources of temptation, he would be able to render to God a pure offering of service and worship. He intended that the performance of his duty should be extensive and complete.
2. Consecration. He erected an altar unto God, as he had been commanded. (Gen_35:1-7.) And here he consecrated himself afresh to the service of his God. These outward aids to devotion would make God more deeply felt, and His presence more definitely realised. If we form part of a spiritual history of close and intimate dealings with God, we must have our sacred places. They are so to us, and for our sakes alone; for God, who fills all space, does not require such aids. Jacob erects a pillar of memorial, pours an offering upon the stone, and anoints it with oil. (Gen_35:14.) And God, who is essentially present everywhere at the same moment, met Jacob at Bethel. Thus to His saints God is not a cold abstraction, or a vaguely diffused Spirit of the universe, but a living—a felt Presence.
III. It was accompanied by the Divine protection. God who commanded Jacob also protected him on his journey. The people were kept from pursuing after the sons of Jacob, which they naturally would have done in order to avenge the slaughter of the Shechemites. (Gen_35:5.)
IV. It was followed by increased spiritual blessing.
1. The old promises were renewed. All what God had formerly said to him by way of promise was now consolidated and confirmed. (Gen_35:9-12.) Jacob’s name had been changed to Israel, and now this honour is here renewed. (Gen_35:10.) This was to him an assurance that he should still go on to prevail. In order to confirm his faith, God’s all-sufficiency to fulfil His promises is assured. “I am God Almighty.” (Gen_35:11.) Jacob acknowledges this confirmation of his faith and hope by repeating his former acts of devotion. (Gen_35:14-15.) God may appear unto us by the revival of old truths as well as by the revelation of new ones. We may glorify Him, not by absolutely new modes of obedience, but by doing our first works. We may make the old life, and the scenes and circumstances of it, altogether new by a fresh consecration.
2. He has increased knowledge of God. He now knows God as the Almighty (Gen_35:11)—like Abraham of old. (Gen_17:1.) Thus our knowledge of God increases as we go on. It comes as the reward of long and faithful service.
3. His religious character is purified and raised. Jacob was a selfish man, and his religion, at first, partook too much of the spirit of barter. (Genesis 29) His language formerly was that of one who was ready to drive a bargain on advantageous terms; for though we may not press his words too far, yet surely there was a trace of this spirit in them. “If God will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, then shall God be my God.” Now he is grateful that God has accomplished His word. He knows the truth of that word, and that God shall be his God. He was answered in the day of his distress, and God had been with him throughout all his journey. (Gen_35:3.) This is serving God, because it is true happiness to do so, a higher motive than that which he first started with, but not the highest of all. It falls short of that higher stage of godliness which leads the believer to say in all things “Thy will be done.”
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Gen_35:1. Take the phrase “and God said” literally, and then we must believe that God spake to Jacob but does not speak to us; then we must look upon Him as a different God from what He was to Jacob; but no, He is the same. God is not extinct, but a living God; His voice is now no more silent than in Jacob’s time. If He seem silent, the fault lies in us, our ears are become dull of hearing, we want faith.—(Robertson.)
This is not the first time that God tells him of that vow, and calls for its performance. (Gen_31:13.) It is with us as with children—eaten bread is soon forgotten. Deliverances, commonly, are but nine days’ wonderment at most; and it is ten to one that any leper returns to give praise to God. If anything arouse and raise up our hearts to thankful remembrance of former mercy it must be the sense of some present misery, as here.—(Trapp.)
Gen_35:2. To Gideon began his reformation at his father’s house. David also would walk wisely in the midst of his house; and this he calls “a perfect way,” a sign of sincerity. (Psa_101:1.)—(Trapp.)
God’s service must be entered upon with due preparation. This is one of the first principles of religious service, and is expressed in the idea of baptism which preaches to us, “Be clean and change your garments.” The saints must wash their hands in innocency, and so compass God’s altar.—(Psa_26:6.)
Gen_35:3. He had become so comfortably settled as to be careless about this vow, until charged with it solemnly by God Himself. “Woe to them that are at ease in Zion.” True reformation as an evidence of repentance is a preparatory to public consecration.—(Jacobus).
Gen_35:4. When going to perform his vow he puts away these idols. But wherein lay the evil? Not in the use of forms and symbols, for these were afterwards given to the Jews by God. Idolatry consists in this: The using of forms and images which give unnecessarily ideas of God; unnecessarily I say, for though all our notions are inadequate they ought not to be unnecessarily so. So Jacob buried the images under the oak. It was most wise. It was not sufficient to say: Let them not be worshipped, let the gold be kept merely for ornament. He knew human nature better; he knew that the same feelings would be suggested again wherever they were seen. And in our own day the things which have been the symbols of idolatry must be parted with. We may say that crucifixes and stone altars, and lighted candles are nothing in themselves; but if they give the idea of localizing God, or in any way degrade His pure worship, then they must at once be buried. Happy for England is it that she has resolved to throw away all such things.—(Robertson).
Gen_35:5. The kind care which God exercised on this occasion was no less contrary to the parent’s fears than to the deserts of his ungodly children; and its being extended to them for his sake, must appal their proud spirits and repress the insolence with which they had lately treated him.—(Fuller).
Gen_35:6-7. There are sacred places, not sacred for their own sake, but sacred to us. Where we have loved and lost, where we have gained new light and life, the church where our forefathers worshipped, the place where we first knew God—these are by instinct hallowed. Hence we are told that God met Jacob in Bethel, not that He came down from another place, for He is everywhere, but that Jacob experienced a feeling of awe, a feeling that God was then specially near to him.—(Robertson).
Gen_35:8. This notice of the death and burial of Deborah shows—
1. That old and faithful servants were esteemed in the household of Jacob, as they were in Abraham’s household. The venerable nurse, Deborah, may be regarded as the counterpart to the aged Eliezer.
2. That the bond between master and servant was one of affectionate attachment and sympathy, not of lucre or slavery. The one rendered faithful service, the other afforded generous sustenance and protection. Such relations were not degraded by the commercial spirit, but elevated by the nobler spirit of humanity.
3. The undying love of Jacob for his mother. The loving regard in which Jacob held Deborah is remarkable when we consider that she belonged not to his family, but to that of Isaac. It is probable that Jacob visited his father, and finding that his mother was dead, he took her faithful old nurse to his own home. We hear nothing of her since the time when she left Padanaram with her young mistress. Jacob tenderly cherished all that belonged to his mother. He was one of those men who lived in the past, rather than in the future.
4. The sacredness of sorrow for the dead. Deborah was now about 180 years old, and had lived through three generations of the family. Now this last tender link, connecting the wandering son with his beloved and doating mother, was snapped asunder by death. This grave renewed the heavy griefs of past years, and we do not wonder that Jacob called the tree which marked this grave, Allon-bachuth, “the oak of weeping.”
Gen_35:9-12. At Bethel He renews the change of name, to indicate that the meetings here were of equal moment in Jacob’s spiritual life with that at Penuel. It implies also that this life had been declining in the interval between Penuel and Bethel, and had now been revived by the call of God to go to Bethel, and by the interview. The renewal of the naming aptly expresses this renewal of spiritual life.—(Murphy.)
Abraham and Isaac had each only one son of promise. Now the time of increase is come. Jacob had already eleven sons and one daughter, and the number of sons was to be increased to twelve; and from this time the increase is rapid. Twenty-six years after this he goes down to Egypt with seventy souls, besides the wives of his married descendants, and two hundred and fifteen years after that he leaves Egypt with one million and eight hundred thousand, which was a nation and a congregation of nations, while “kings” were to come afterwards.—(Jacobus.)
Gen_35:13-15. Here for the first time we meet with the libation. Wine and oil are used to denote the quickening and sanctifying power of the Spirit of God.—(Murphy.)
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 The name given to the old oak-tree speaks of…
Gen 35:8
The name given to the old oak-tree speaks of mourning, of very thoughtful and sorrowful, if not of very bitter tears; of kindly remembrances of old days and faithful duties; of the utter blotting out of every recollection but such as are kindly, sad, and hopeful. Deborah was only an old servant,—one who had served the family so long, so faithfully, that she had grown one of it,—prized in her active life, cared for in her failing age, wept over at the last with this memorable weeping. All the realities, the uttermost commonplaces of human life and history, and the passing on of time, are infinitely touching when really brought home to us. The wearied-out old frame laid in the last sleep, the hopeful young days 125 years ago, the busy, helpful life of work and worry, you see them all. There are practical suggestions here. (1) There could not have been this near and warm relation, but that the relation had lasted long. (2) We ought not to have mere money relations with those who serve us. (3) Those who serve may see from this how honourable is their calling, if they abide in it with God.
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A. K. H. B., The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson, 3rd series, p. 45.
Reference: Gen 35:18.—Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 68.
Gen 35:28-29
The lives of Abraham and Jacob are as attractive as the life of Isaac is apparently unattractive. Isaac’s character had few-salient features. It had no great faults, no striking virtues; it is the quietest, smoothest, most silent character in the Old Testament. It is owing to this that there are so few remarkable events in the life of Isaac, for the remarkableness of events is created by the character that meets them. It seems to be a law that all national, social and personal life should advance by alternate contractions and expansions. There are few instances where a great father has had a son who equalled him in greatness. The old power more often reappears in Jacob than in Isaac. The spirit of Abraham’s energy passed over his son to his son’s son. The circumstances that moulded the character of Isaac were these. (1) He was an only son. (2) His parents were both very old. An atmosphere of antique quiet hung about his life. (3) These two old hearts lived for him alone.
I. Take the excellences of his character first. (1) His submissive self-surrender on Mount Gerizim, which shadowed forth the perfect sacrifice of Christ. (2) His tender constancy, seen in his mourning for his mother, and in the fact that he alone of the patriarchs represented to the Jewish nation the ideal of true marriage. (3) His piety. It was as natural to him as to a woman to trust and love: not strongly, but constantly, sincerely. His trust became the habit of his soul. His days were knit each to each by natural piety.
II. Look next at the faults of Isaac’s character. (1) He was slow, indifferent, inactive. We find this exemplified in the story of the wells (Gen 26:18-22). (2) The same weakness, ending in selfishness, appears in the history of Isaac’s lie to Abimelech. (3) He showed his weakness in the division between Jacob and Esau. He took no pains to harmonise them. The curse of favouritism prevailed in his tent. (4) He dropped into a querulous old age, and became a lover of savoury meat. But our last glimpse of him is happy. He saw the sons of Jacob at Hebron, and felt that God’s promise was fulfilled.
S. A. Brooke, Sermons, p. 333.
References: Gen 35:29.—F. W. Robertson, Notes on Genesis, p. 126. Gen 35—Ibid., p. 121; R. S. Candlish, Book of Genesis, vol. ii., p. 103; M. Dods, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, p. 119. Gen 36:24.—Expositor, 2nd series, vol. vi., p. 352.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v1
Genesis
A FORGOTTEN VOW
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Gen 35:1.
Thirty years at least had passed since Jacob’s vow; ten or twenty since his return. He is in no haste to fulfil it, but has settled down at Shechem and bought land there, and seems to have forgotten all about Bethel.
1. The lesson of possible negligence.
{a} We are apt to forget vows when God has fulfilled His side of them. Resolutions made in time of trouble are soon forgotten. We pray and think about God more then than when things go well with us. Religion is in many men’s judgment for stormy weather only.
{b} We are often more resolved to make sacrifices in the beginning of our Christian course than afterwards.
Many a brilliant morning is followed by cloudy day.
Youth is often full of enthusiasms which after-days forget.
2. The reasons for the negligence.
Jacob felt a gradual fading away of impressions of need. He was comfortably settled at Shechem. He was surrounded by a wild, godless household who cherished their idols, and he knew that if he went to Bethel idolatry must be given up.
3. The essentials to communion and service.
Surrender. Purity. Must bury idols under oak.
4. The reward of sacrifice and of duty discharged.
The renewed appearance of God. The confirmation of name Israel. Enlarged promises. So the old man’s vision may be better than the youth’s, if he lives up to his youthful vows.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 Jacob journeys by way of Bethel to Hebron. Death…
Jacob journeys by way of Bethel to Hebron. Death of Rachel and of Isaac
1. Jacob is commanded to go to Bethel and fulfil the vow he had once made there (Gen_28:20, Gen_28:22).
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2. Strange gods] Perhaps the idols of some of Jacob's people who had come with him from Haran, such as the teraphim which Rachel carried off (Gen_31:19). Be clean, and change your garments] rites symbolising purification from idolatry.
4. Earrings] worn superstitiously as charms, and often inscribed with magical formulæ. The oak] It was here perhaps that Joshua, hundreds of years later, bade the Israelites put away the strange gods which were among them (Jos_24:23-26).
5.They were divinely protected from any revenge the Shechemites may have meditated.
7. El-beth-el] 'the God of Bethel,' or 'the God of the House of God.'
8. Allon-ba-chuth] 'oak of weeping.' Deborah and Eliezer (Genesis 24) are good examples of the honourable position assigned to servants in times of patriarchal simplicity. Deborah means 'bee.'
9-13. These vv. give the origin of the names 'Israel' and 'Bethel' from the Priestly source. Note the absence of anthropomorphisms as compared with the account in Gen_32:22-32.
14. A pillar] see on Gen_28:18. A drink offering] a libation of wine in token of thankfulness. Under the Law meat and drink offerings accompanied the burnt sacrifice.
16. Ephrath] or Bethlehem, 4 m. S. of Jerusalem: cp. Gen_48:7; Mic_5:2.
18. Ben-oni] 'son of my sorrow.' Benjamin] perhaps 'son of my right hand,' that being the fortunate side, and so a name of better omen. Another rendering is 'son of days,' i.e. of Jacob's old age
21. Tower of Edar] lit. 'tower of the flock,' probably between Bethlehem and Hebron. The name is used symbolically of Jerusalem in Mic_4:8.
22. By this crime Reuben, the eldest son, forfeited the birthright (Gen_49:3-4) like Simeon and Levi before him: see on Gen_34:28.
27. Jacob rejoins his father after thirty years' separation. City of Arbah] Hebron: see Gen_23:2.
28, 29. Isaac was buried in the cave at Machpelah, Gen_49:31.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 CHAPTER 35 Jacob at Bethel and Three Deaths
CHAPTER 35 Jacob at Bethel and Three Deaths
1. The divine commandment (Gen 35:1)
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2. The defilement put away (Gen 35:2-4)
3. The journey to Bethel and the altar (Gen 35:5-7)
4. Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, dies (Gen 35:8)
5. God appears to Jacob (Gen 35:9-15)
6. Benoni-Benjamin and Rachel’s death (Gen 35:16-20)
7. The twelve sons of Jacob (Gen 35:21-26)
8. Isaac’s death (Gen 35:27-29)
The Lord did not leave Jacob in Shechem amidst the evil and corrupting influences. The Lord now reminded him of what had happened long ago and of the unfulfilled vow he had made when he had his dream-vision. And he responded. His house, however, was first cleansed from the defilement; the strange gods among them, most likely teraphim. or household gods, had to be put away. After that was done he gave the order to go to Bethel to make an altar there unto God. They gave up their gods and earrings; the latter must have been in the shape of figures representing idols. And after this cleansing they became a mighty host, the terror of God fell upon the cities through which they journeyed. The altar is built and the place called El Bethel (God of the House of God). Rebekah’s nurse died. After Gen 49:31 Rebekah is no longer mentioned; not even her death. This corresponds with that which she typifies, the church. Jacob as we learned foreshadows the history of the earthly people of God and as that is related no more mention of Rebekah is made. Then God met him again and Jacob becomes Israel in reality.
Rachel gives birth to another son at Ephrath and dies there. The one born has a double name. “Benoni,” which means “son of sorrow”; “Benjamin,” which is “the son of the right hand.” Here we have another type of the Lord Jesus Christ, His humiliation and exaltation. Bethlehem is here mentioned for the first time in the Bible.
After the names of the twelve sons of Jacob are given and Reuben’s evil deed is recorded we hear of the death of Isaac. He died 180 years old and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him. We now add a little diagram, which gives the family tree of the patriarchs down to the end of this book.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 Jacob Moves to Bethel
Jacob Moves to Bethel
v. 1. And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there; and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau, thy brother. Ten full years had now elapsed since Jacob had returned from Mesopotamia, and still he had not fulfilled the special vow of Bethel, Gen 28:20-22. Cf Gen 31:13. Whether it had been a matter of precaution against a mingling with the Edomites or simply tardiness on Jacob’s part, the Lord, at any rate, found it necessary to remind him of his vow, in which he had promised the erection of an altar unto God, who had appeared to him at Bethel.
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v. 2. Then Jacob said unto his household, and to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments. This was an act of repentance, since Jacob, up till now, had permitted Rachel to keep her father’s idols, Gen 31:32, and had not turned the hearts of the members of his household from idolatry. His order went forth that all the strange gods and everything that savored of superstition and idolatry be removed from their midst, that they should purify themselves, moreover, through religious washings and by a complete change of garments.
v. 3. And let us arise, and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went. The journey was to be from the lowlands near Shechem southward to the mountainous country of what was later Northern Judea. Jacob openly confessed his debt to the Lord, who had answered him in the day of his trouble, when he fled before his brother Esau, and declared his intention of fulfilling his vow.
v. 4. And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and all their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem. Jacob’s command was so strict that his wives and his servants readily gave up not only the images, the strange gods which they had retained till now, but also their earrings, which were used as amulets and for other superstitious purposes. Jacob laid aside all his weakness which had yielded such terrible fruits, and buried all the symbols of idolatry and spiritual death which were to be found in his entire household, including now also the Shechemite women and children. Only then is it possible to serve God in the Spirit and in truth, if we cleanse our hearts from all idolatry and from all love of creatures.
v. 5. And they journeyed; and the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. That they struck their tents and removed from the neighborhood of Shechem without interference on the part of the heathen inhabitants in the neighboring cities was due entirely to the divine protection.
v. 6. So Jacob came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan, that is, Bethel, he and all the people that were with him. Cf Gen 28:19-22.
v. 7. And he built there an altar, and called the place El Bethel (God of Bethel), because there God appeared unto him when he fled from the face of his brother. By thus instituting the worship of the true God Jacob paid his vow of some thirty years before, for he distinctly remembered the revelation of God at that time, which seems to have indicated also the plurality of persons in the Godhead.
v. 8. But Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and she was buried beneath Bethel under an oak; and the name of it was called Allonbachuth (oak of weeping). It seems that Rebekah had died and Jacob had persuaded Deborah to make her home with him and his children. The old faithful servant had endeared herself to all to such a degree that her death was keenly felt by the family. The oak below Bethel figures also in later history, Jdg 4:5; 1Sa 16:3. The story shows that the relation between masters and servants may well be one of cordial regard.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 4 go up to Bethel
go up to Bethel
The phrase "go up" is used because Bethel is higher in elevation than Shechem.
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Build an altar there to God
God speaks about himself in the third person. AT: "Build an altar there to me, your God" (See: First, Second, or Third Person)
said to his household
"said to his family"
Put away the foreign gods that are among you
"Throw away your idols" or "Get rid of your false gods"
purify yourselves, and change your clothes
This was the custom of cleansing oneself morally and physically before going to worship God.
change your clothes
Putting on a new clothes was a sign that they had made themselves clean before approaching God. (See: Symbolic Action)
in the day of my distress
"in the time of my distress" or "when I was in trouble"
translationWords
God
Jacob
Bethel
altar
Esau
household
false god
pure
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1–3 35:1-29 This chapter highlights God’s promises, Jacob’s vow, and…
35:1-29 This chapter highlights God’s promises, Jacob’s vow, and the transition to Jacob’s sons’ carrying on the covenant. Deborah, Rachel, and Isaac all died, marking the end of an era and of the account of Isaac’s family (25:19–35:29). • Idols were removed (35:1-4) and pure worship was established (35:6-7). During this transition, the faith had to be revitalized so that the covenant could be carried forward by Jacob’s sons.
35:1-7 Jacob returned to Bethel, about fifteen miles south of Shechem, to complete the vows he had made there (28:20-22).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.