Beginning
27 When Isaac was old and his eyes were so dim that he could hardly see, he called Esau his older son and said to him, “My son?”
He said to him, “I am here.”
2 Isaac said, “Look, I am very old, and I do not know when I am going to die. 3 So please take your gear, your quiver, and your bow, and go out to the open country, and get some wild game for me. 4 Make me tasty food, the kind I love, and bring it to me, so that I may eat and I may bless you with all my soul before I die.”
5 Rebekah had been listening when Isaac spoke to Esau his son. After Esau went to the open country to hunt for game and to bring it back, 6 Rebekah spoke to Jacob her son and said, “Listen, I heard your father speak to Esau your brother and tell him, 7 ‘Bring me some wild game and make tasty food for me, that I may eat and give you a blessing from the Lord before my death.’ 8 Therefore, my son, obey my voice and do what I am commanding you. 9 Go now to the flock, and get me two of the best young goats. I will make them into tasty food for your father, the kind he loves. 10 You will bring it to your father, so that he can eat it and bless you before his death.”
11 Jacob said to his mother Rebekah, “But Esau my brother is a hairy man, and my skin is smooth. 12 What if my father touches me? I will be exposed to him as a deceiver, and I will bring a curse on myself and not a blessing.”
13 His mother said to him, “Let your curse be on me, my son. Just obey my voice, and go get them for me.”
14 He went and got them and brought them to his mother. His mother made tasty food, the kind his father loved. 15 Rebekah took the good clothing of Esau, her older son, which was with her in the house, and put it on Jacob, her younger son. 16 She put the skins of the young goats on his hands and forearms and on the smooth part of his neck. 17 She put the tasty food and the bread that she had prepared into the hand of her son Jacob.
18 He came to his father and said, “My father?”
He said, “I am here. Who are you, my son?”
19 Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn. I have done what you asked me to do. Please get up, and sit here and eat some of my wild game, so that you may bless me with all your soul.”
20 Isaac said to his son, “How is it that you have found it so quickly, my son?”
He said, “Because the Lord your God gave me success.”
21 Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come near, so that I may feel you, my son, whether you are really my son Esau or not.”
22 Jacob went close to Isaac his father, who felt him and said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” 23 He did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy, like his brother Esau’s hands. That was why he blessed him. 24 But he asked again, “Are you really my son Esau?”
He said, “I am.”
25 He said, “Bring it to me, and I will eat some of my son’s wild game, so that I may bless you.”
Jacob brought it to him, and he ate. He brought him wine, and he drank. 26 His father Isaac said to him, “Come near now, and kiss me, my son.” 27 He came near and kissed him. He smelled his clothing, so he blessed him and said:
Yes, the smell of my son is the smell of the open field
that the Lord has blessed.
28 May God give you the dew from the sky,
the richness of the earth,
and plenty of grain and new wine.
29 Let peoples serve you,
and nations bow down to you.
Be lord over your brothers.
Let your mother’s sons bow down to you.
Cursed be everyone who curses you.
Blessed be everyone who blesses you.
30 As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had just gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, Esau his brother came in from his hunting. 31 He also prepared tasty food and brought it to his father. He said to his father, “Let my father get up and eat his son’s wild game, so that you may bless me with all your soul.”
32 Isaac his father said to him, “Who are you?”
He said, “I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.”
33 Isaac trembled violently and said, “Then who was it that hunted wild game and brought it to me? I ate all of it before you came, and I have blessed him. And, yes, he will be blessed.”
34 When Esau heard the words of his father, he let out a very loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me—me too, my father.”
35 He said, “Your brother came deceitfully and has taken away your blessing.”
36 Esau said, “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob? For he has tripped me up these two times. He took away my birthright. And look, now he has taken away my blessing.” He also asked, “Haven’t you reserved a blessing for me?”
37 Isaac answered Esau, “You see, I have made him your lord, and I have given all his brothers to him as servants. I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I do for you, my son?”
38 Esau said to his father, “Have you only one blessing, my father? Bless me—me too, my father.” And Esau wept loudly.
39 Isaac his father answered him,
Know this:
Your dwelling will be away from the richness of the earth
and away from the dew from the sky above.
40 By your sword you will live, but you will serve your brother.
Then when you break loose, you will shake his yoke off your neck.
41 Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him. Esau said in his heart, “The days of mourning for my father are at hand. Then I will kill my brother Jacob.”
42 The words of Esau, her older son, were told to Rebekah. She sent and called Jacob, her younger son, and said to him, “Listen, your brother Esau is consoling himself in regard to you by planning to kill you. 43 Now, therefore, my son, obey my voice. Get up. Flee to Laban, my brother, in Haran. 44 Stay with him a few days, until your brother’s fury turns away, 45 until your brother’s anger turns away from you, and he forgets what you have done to him. Then I will send for you and get you from there. Why should I be deprived of both of you in one day?”
46 Rebekah said to Isaac, “I am tired of my life because of the daughters of Heth. If Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth, these daughters of the land, what good will my life do me?”
Jacob’s Flight to Laban
28 So Isaac called Jacob, blessed him, and commanded him, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. 2 Get up. Go to Paddan Aram,[a] to the house of Bethuel, your mother’s father. Take a wife from there from the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother. 3 May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, so that you may become a community of peoples. 4 May he give you and your descendants along with you the blessing he gave to Abraham, so that you may inherit the land where you have been living as an alien, the land God gave to Abraham.”
5 So Isaac sent Jacob away. He went to Paddan Aram to Laban, the son of Bethuel the Aramean. Laban was the brother of Rebekah, who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.
6 Esau observed that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan Aram to take a wife from there, and that as he blessed him, he had commanded him, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan.” 7 When he saw that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Paddan Aram, 8 Esau realized that the daughters of Canaan did not please Isaac, his father. 9 So Esau went to Ishmael, and he took Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebaioth, to be his wife, in addition to the wives that he already had.
10 Jacob set out from Beersheba and traveled toward Haran. 11 He came to a certain place and decided to spend the night there, because the sun had set. He took one of the stones from that place, put it under his head, and lay down to sleep in that place. 12 He had a dream in which he saw a stairway set up on the earth with its top reaching to heaven. There were angels of God ascending and descending on it. 13 There at the top stood the Lord, who said, “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. The land on which you are lying, I give to you and to your descendants. 14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. In you and in your seed[b] all the families of the earth will be blessed. 15 Now, I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back again into this land. Indeed, I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised to you.”
16 Jacob woke up from his sleep, and he said, “Certainly the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” 17 He was afraid[c] and he said, “How awe- inspiring is this place! This is nothing other than the house of God, and this is the gate to heaven.”
18 Jacob got up early in the morning. He took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up as a sacred memorial stone and poured oil on top of it. 19 He named that place Bethel. (Before this, the name of the city had been Luz.) 20 Jacob took a vow, “If God will be with me to keep me safe on this journey I am making, and if he gives me food to eat and clothing to put on, 21 and I come back to my father’s house in safety, the Lord will be my God, 22 and this stone that I have set up as a memorial stone will be God’s house, and I will certainly give you a tenth of everything that you give me.”
Jacob and Laban
29 Then Jacob continued on his journey and came to the land of the people of the east.[d]
2 He looked around and noticed a well in the field, and he saw three flocks of sheep lying there beside it. (That well was used to water the flocks. There was a large stone over the mouth of the well. 3 All the flocks would gather there. Then the shepherds would roll the stone away from the mouth of the well and water the sheep. Then they would put the stone back in its place over the mouth of the well.)
4 Jacob said to the men waiting there, “My brothers, where are you from?”
They said, “We are from Haran.”
5 He said to them, “Do you know Laban, the grandson of Nahor?”
They said, “We know him.”
6 He said to them, “Is he doing well?”
They said, “He is. Look, there is his daughter Rachel, coming with the sheep.”
7 He said, “Look, it is still the middle of the day. It is not time to gather the livestock together. Water the sheep and go pasture them.”
8 They said, “We cannot, until all the flocks are gathered together, and they roll the stone from the mouth of the well. Then we water the sheep.”
9 While he was still speaking with them, Rachel arrived with her father’s sheep because she took care of them. 10 When Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of Laban, his mother’s brother, and the sheep of Laban, his mother’s brother, Jacob went up, rolled the stone away from the mouth of the well, and watered the flock of Laban, his mother’s brother. 11 Jacob kissed Rachel and wept loudly. 12 Jacob told Rachel that he was her father’s relative and that he was Rebekah’s son. She ran and told her father.
13 When Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister’s son, he ran to meet Jacob. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house. Jacob repeated all these things to Laban. 14 Laban said to him, “Certainly you are my own flesh and blood.”[e]
Jacob lived with him for a month. 15 Then Laban said to Jacob, “Because you are my relative, is that any reason you should serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be?”
16 Laban had two daughters. The name of the older one was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. 17 Leah had attractive eyes,[f] but Rachel had a beautiful face and figure. 18 Jacob loved Rachel. He said, “I will serve you seven years for Rachel, your younger daughter.”
19 Laban said, “It is better for me to give her to you than to give her to another man. Stay with me.”
20 Jacob served seven years for Rachel. They seemed to him like a few days, because of the love he had for her.
21 Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife, for my time of service is finished, so that I may go to her.”
22 Laban gathered together all the local people and made a feast. 23 When evening had arrived, he took Leah his daughter and brought her to Jacob, and Jacob went to her. 24 (Laban gave his maid Zilpah to his daughter Leah as her maid.) 25 When morning came, Jacob realized it was Leah. So Jacob said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? Didn’t I serve you for Rachel? Why have you deceived me?”
26 Laban said, “That is not the way we do it here. We do not give the younger before the firstborn. 27 Fulfill the marriage week for this one, and we will give you the other one too—for seven more years of service.”
28 So that is what Jacob did. When he fulfilled the marriage week, Laban gave him Rachel his daughter as his wife. 29 (Laban gave his maid Bilhah to his daughter Rachel to be her maid.) 30 Jacob also went to Rachel, and he loved Rachel more than Leah. He served Laban seven more years.
Jacob’s Family
31 The Lord saw that Leah was not loved, and he allowed her to conceive, but Rachel had no children. 32 Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son, and she named him Reuben,[g] because she had said, “The Lord has looked at my misery. So now my husband will love me.”
33 She conceived again and gave birth to a son and said, “Because the Lord has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son also.” So she named him Simeon.[h]
34 She conceived again and gave birth to a son. She said, “Now this time my husband will be attached to me, because I have given birth to three sons for him.” That is why he was named Levi.[i]
35 She conceived again and gave birth to a son. She said, “This time I will praise the Lord.” So she named him Judah.[j] Then she stopped having children.
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.