Return to Bethel

35 God said to Jacob, “Get up! Go to Bethel and settle there.^(A) Build an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.”^(B)

² So Jacob said to his family and all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods that are among you.^(C) Purify yourselves and change your clothes.^{(D) 3} We must get up and go to Bethel. I will build an altar there to the God who answered me in my day of distress.^(E) He has been with me everywhere I have gone.”^(F)

⁴ Then they gave Jacob all their foreign gods and their earrings, and Jacob hid them under the oak near Shechem. ⁵ When they set out, a terror from God came over the cities around them, and they did not pursue Jacob’s sons.^{(G) 6} So Jacob and all who were with him came to Luz (that is, Bethel^(H)) in the land of Canaan. ⁷ Jacob built an altar there and called the place God of Bethel^[a] because it was there that God had revealed Himself to him when he was fleeing from his brother.

⁸ Deborah, the one who had nursed and raised Rebekah,^[b](I) died and was buried under the oak south of Bethel. So Jacob named it Oak of Weeping.^[c]