More on Jacob

Here's some stuff that didn't go into the chapel meditation on Genesis 29:21-30 (mostly inspired by or directly stolen from Wenham, Jordan and Cotter).

• Rachel's name means (apparently) 'ewe' or 'lamb' or something like that. This makes an interesting parallel between her and the flock(s) Jacob gains from Laban, and of course the flock Jesus snatches from the clutches of the 'strong man.'

• Rachel is therefore the bride of the heir, and as such is his flock/lamb, but also she is described as a Shepherdess (and is the only person thus designated in the scripture). Cue some thoughts on the church as the bride/flock/shepherdess of Christ the husband/shepherd. The Church both receives Christ's shepherdly care as well as partnering him in it.

• This also sets up an interesting parallel with Leah, whose name means 'wild cow.' Not sure what to make of that.

• The key to the whole Jacob narrative seems to be when the LORD wrestles with him and we find that all of Jacob's struggles have been divinely appointed as the means to his prevailing. Jacob's limp becomes a sign of victory-through-weakness.

• Jacob's question in 29:25 resembles the LORD's (to Eve) in 3:13, Pharaoh's (to Abraham) in 12:18 and Abimelech's (to Isaac) in 26:10. They all refer to occasions of deception.

• Also, there must be something in the fact that Jacob has to work seven years for each wife, and that the seven-day wedding feast is called a 'week' , especially given that this is Genesis - the book that begins with the first ever week. But what I'm not sure yet.

• The positive portrayal of Jacob flows in some senses from the somewhat more negative portrayal of Isaac. Given how much of the Abraham narrative is about the birth of Isaac in some way or another, given that he's the child of promise, his whole part in the story is a bit of a let down to some extent. If anything, we might have expected him to be the one who had lots of sons and gave birth to a nation. But in some senses his part in the story doesn't move the promises on to fulfillment very much at all. That is left rather to Jacob who plays a far more significant role in the founding of the nation, and whose sojourner experiences mirror the future experiences of Israel. Could this relate to the way that Jacob talks about Isaac in 31:42 where he says the LORD is the God of Abraham but the 'fear' of Isaac?

Jacob, Leah and Rachel

I had the privilege of preaching on Genesis 29:21-30 this morning in chapel. Here's the gist of it.

The passage is not really about Jacob getting a taste of his own medicine, but comes as part of a wider narrative which emphasises the hardship the LORD puts him through en route to promised blessing. Genesis is more positive than negative about Jacob - every time the LORD speaks to or about him it is to promise blessing. He has, after all, chosen Jacob over Esau, and Jacob is described as a 'blameless' or 'complete' man back in 25:27 ('quiet' in the ESV seems an odd translation).

The route to blessing in the land is paved with hardship as a sojourner and a servant (32:4) in a foreign land. Jacob faces exclusion from his family (Laban treats him as a hired hand), deception and exploitation, and has his claims to being heir mocked by Laban (in 29:26 Laban echoes God's choice of Jacob over Esau and says 'that's not how we do it round here mate!'). The one whom the nations were supposed to serve (27:29) becomes a servant himself.

Yet, this is the LORD's doing. In fact, the LORD uses the hardship instrumentally in his fulfilling of the Abrahamic promise. All four women mentioned in the passage feature in the very next section as mothers to Jacob's children- the patriarchs of Israel. Whatever we may want to say in another context about polygamy, here the LORD turns Laban's deception into Jacob's blessing. A similar pattern follows, such that when Jacob leaves Laban Exodus-style to head to the promised land he has wives, servants, children and sheep all in tow.

As such, Jacob serves as an echo of Israel's own experience in Egypt and eventually in exile too. Moreover, the heir par excellence to the Abrahamic promises undergoes treatment like that Jacob faced. He is the heir who takes the place of a servant, who submits to his enemies deception and exploitation in order to win his bride, is excluded from his family and has his claims to sonship mocked. Yet, this is all used by God to fulfill the promise to Abraham. The Son will have his bride, his children and his land. The nations will bow down and serve him.

As God's heirs we too should expect to receive the blessings of the covenant via hardship. Whether it is blessings we experience now or the final blessing in the new creation-land, the route there is paved with hardship. We know that, whatever hard times we go through, God has designed them to be our necessary route to glory and blessing. So, we must learn to be like Jacob by grabbing a hold of Jesus' coat tails and following him.

Genesis 22

We were taught from Genesis 22 today in chapel and challenged to trust the LORD in the way Abraham exemplified. There I was also reminded of how common it is (and especially was in my church background) to see Christ-typology in Isaac and/or the ram. I suspect the typology runs deeper than that though;

Jesus 'is' Isaac the only son who went willingly to be sacrificed (Isaac remains passive throughout Genesis 22).

Jesus 'is' Abraham - totally obedient to the LORD thus winning the benefits of the covenant for his family and all the families of the earth (cf. Genesis 26 vs. 5 where Isaac receives the covenant promise on the basis of Abraham's obedience, not his own, a verse which probably refers back to Abraham's obedience in ch 22, especially given vs. 16-18. Thanks to Thomas Renz for first pointing this out to me).

(NB: Thus we are brought into covenant blessing by Christ's passive (dying on the cross) and active (fulfilling the demands of the LORD) obedience? Or is that splitting hairs? )

Jesus 'is' the lamb provided by God so that the sons of Abraham might live

Jesus 'is' the mountain of the LORD/temple (the mountain of Genesis 22 was later the site for the temple) where provision is made.

And finally, as pointed out this morning, Jesus is the LORD (this one's not typology because he actually is the LORD) who demands that his people love him more than their family (cf. 22:12 with Luke 14:26).

No doubt there are others I have missed.

Abraham, Sarai, De ja vu & Christ

No doubt these thoughts are not original to me (especially points 3 and 4, I’m sure I’ve heard them from someone else), but I think there are some striking similarities between Genesis 16 and the fall narrative of Genesis 3.

1. A misrepresentation of God
Does Sarai’s assertion that ‘the LORD has prevented me from bearing children’ in 16:2 echo Εve’s extension of God’s prohibition of eating the tree to touching it in 3: 3? Could both be cases of a skewed view of God as more harsh than in reality? Could both cases be evidence of the husband’s failure to communicate what God had really said adequately?

2. An arrogant attempt to grasp what God alone would provide
This is certainly true of Abraham and Sarai, they failed to trust God as the one who would provide them with a child as he had promised and tried to do it their way. Similarly, God emerges in Genesis 1 and 2 as the source of knowledge about what is good and evil (cf. 1:31, 2:18) and presumably humanity, rather than remain in innocence, where to progress to wisdom and maturity over time and under God (cf. this blog entry). Snatching at the knowledge of good and evil becomes then an arrogant attempt to become wise without God.

3. A husband who failed in his responsibilities
Adam should have listened to God not to Eve since after all he was created first and therefore received the word of God about the tree directly from the LORD. Similarly, Abraham should not have listened to Sarai’s reasoning instead of the promises of God he had received (in Ch 12:1-9 but also in Ch 15 where God addressed Abraham’s concerns over his childlessness and established a covenant). Compare the similarity between 3:17 and the end of 16:3.

4. A wife who ‘took’ and ‘gave’ when she shouldn’t have
See how the language of 16:3 compares with and echoes 3:6. Accidental? Coincidental? We think not.

5. A bout of blame-shifting
Hagar hates Sarai, Sarai blames Abraham, Abraham shrugs his shoulders and passes the buck back to Sarai. Is all this meant to echo the blame shifting in Genesis 3:10-13?

6. An intervention by the LORD in judgment mixed with mercy
The LORD intervenes in the crisis, beginning by asking a question (cf. 3:9 with 16:8) and following by pronouncing the way things will be from now on, a mixture of mercy and judgment.

7. A judgment which involved ongoing family tension
Ishmael will fight with his brothers (16:12) whilst Adam and Eve will engage in a power-struggle (3:16b). Also, could 16:12 be meant to evoke memories of the family tension that flowed out of the fall in Genesis 4 with Cain and Abel? This is surely judgment on Abraham and Sarai who have failed to be any better than Adam and Eve, a cursing of their attempts to obtain blessing independent of God?

8. A display of divine mercy in the promise of offspring
Compare 16:10-11 and 3:15 and examine them in the context of Genesis 12:1-3 and Genesis 15:1-5.

So what then? Is this any more than a neat literary trick? Or does this passage indicate that we should expect Israel’s history, covenant/bible history and human history to contain a repetition of the mistakes of the fall. The tragic drama of Genesis 3ff. is played out across the bible, across history, across our lives. We really are like our parents Adam and Eve, we repeat their choices every time we fail to trust God, or seek to find what God alone has promised from our own resources (see Paul’s use of the Hagar story to illustrate salvation by works vs. salvation by grace in Galatians 4:21ff.).

Similarly God's intervention in judgment and mercy is repeated throughout the bible and throughout history. Especially, scripture testifies that salvation comes through child-bearing. Though not the legitimate heir (and hence why the Messianic promise of 3:15 and that given to Abraham will not be ultimately fulfilled through Ishmael’s line) there is a measure of blessing for Hagar and her line which must surely be understood in relation to the Abrahamic promises and as a mini-experience of the original creation blessing (1:28) to which all the offspring promises of scripture relate. This offspring theme finally reaches climax in the true seed and heir of Abraham and the blessing to the nations which comes through him. In him, who experienced the full judgment of God (including the social/relational/familial dynamic in the curse found in Genesis 3-4 and 16:12 – he was truly hatred by his ‘brothers’) the promises of God are graciously fulfilled and the Ishmaels of the world are invited to become full heirs and sons of Abraham by faith (Galatians 4:1-7).