Exodus 5 - 11: Let Us Go, Or Else!

Note:  Sorry this is so long, but it just all goes together...

Moses and Aaron go to Pharaoh and ask if they could all take a three-day trek into the wilderness for a sacrifice and feast.

Pharaoh says, "HA! Get back to work. Know what? Work just got harder. We're not going to give you straw for your bricks anymore. Get your own damn straw. Oh, but we still need just as many bricks. Hop to it. Those pyramids don't build themselves yanno."

They start gathering straw and complain, "This sucks. Why are you doing this to us?"

Pharaoh answers, "Hey, you have time for feasts, you have time to get straw."

Moses says to God, "I told you this wasn't going to be easy. You're mean to us."

"Now, now," says God. "Not so fast. I'm listening, and I'll get you out. Patience. Go tell him to let you go."

"Sigh, fine, but I don't know why he's going to listen to me. I'm not even circumcised."

"Hey, don't worry. I'll tell you what to say. But no, it's not going to be easy. He's not going to let you go. I thought I told you that. So when you go in, show them that trick where you turn the staff into a snake."

Moses and Aaron go in to Pharaoh and ask him to let them go. Aaron tosses his staff down and it turns into a snake.

"Cool trick," says Pharaoh, summoning his court magicians. They all toss their staffs down and they turn into snakes too. But Aaron's snake eats all their snakes.

"Yeah, know what?" says Pharaoh. "Get back to work. And you owe us all staffs."

"Ok, ok," says God to Moses as he's leaving the Pharaoh's house. "Time for plan B." And he whispers the plan.

The next morning Moses goes out to the Nile while Pharaoh is there washing up. He reaches out his staff and touches it to the water and all the water turns to blood, all the fish die, and the water is undrinkable.

"Take that," says Moses.

"Big deal... my magicians can do that too," says Pharaoh.

Seven days later Moses visits Pharaoh and says, "Let us go, or you'll be plagued with frogs!"

"Frogs?" says Pharaoh. "Whatever. Get back to work."

You think it's no big deal until they're all over the place.

Aaron stretches out his staff and the land is suddenly covered with frogs. But Pharaoh's magicians can do the same, so Pharaoh is not impressed.

But he is annoyed. "Alright, listen," he says, kicking a frog off his foot. "You get rid of these damn frogs and I'll let you guys go have your feast."

So Moses calls out to God and the frogs all die. They pile them all in big smelly heaps.

"Thanks," says Pharaoh, "but I changed my mind. No feast."

So Aaron strikes the dust of the ground with his staff and causes a plague of gnats. The Pharaoh's magicians try to make gnats, but they don't know this trick. They suggest that maybe Pharaoh might want to take these guys a little seriously. Pharaoh says, "Meh. It's just gnats. Not like it's flies or locusts or anything."

Moses goes to Pharaoh the next day and says, "Let us go or I'll cover your people with flies." The next day all the Egyptians are plagued by flies.

Pharaoh calls Moses and Aaron. "Hey, how about you guys hold your feast right here and get rid of these flies?"

"No can do," says Moses. "We need to go three days away for our sacrifices to be acceptable."

"Fine. Take your walk. But get rid of the flies."

Moses asks God to get rid of the flies and they all disappear.

"Thanks," says Pharaoh, "but I changed my mind. No feast."

Moses tells Pharaoh, "If you don't let us go, all your animals will die tomorrow. But all ours will be ok."

"Yeah right," says Pharaoh, and the next day, all the Egyptian's animals die.

"You guys suck," says Pharaoh.

The next day God tells Moses and Aaron to take handfuls of ashes and throw them in the air. They do this and suddenly all the Egyptians are covered in boils.

"Not funny," says Pharaoh.

The next morning Moses goes to Pharaoh and says, "Let us go, or tomorrow I'll bring down a giant hail storm."

"Pttt, whatever," says Pharaoh and the next day the hail comes down and destroys trees and crops and kills everyone who is outside. Pharaoh calls them in and says, "Alright alright! Stop the hail and I'll let you go!"

Moses goes out and stops the hail.

"Thanks," says Pharaoh, "but I changed my mind. No feast."

The next morning Moses goes to Pharaoh and says, "Let us go, or tomorrow I'll bring locusts."

Pharaoh's servants plead, "This is getting just plain silly. Let them go."

"Fine," says Pharaoh. "The men can go have their feast."

"Oh no," says Moses. "We all have to go. Kids and wives too. It's a family thing."

"Screw that," says Pharaoh. "Just the men, or no feast."

BUGS!!!

So Moses brings down locusts on the Egyptians. Pharaoh calls them in and says, "Alright alright! Stop the locusts and I'll let you go!"

Moses goes out and stops the locusts.

"Thanks," says Pharaoh, "but I changed my mind. No feast."

The next day God tells Moses to bring on darkness. He raises his staff and everything becomes dark. After three days Pharaoh calls them in and says, "Ok, you can all go have your sacrifices and feast with your families, but leave your livestock here."

"No," says Moses. "We need all those. You know... for the burnt offerings. God likes those so we might need all our animals."

"No deal," says Pharaoh.

God pulls Moses aside. "Ok," he says. "Time to play hardball."

"Pharaoh," says Moses, "if you don't let us go, the firstborn of every Egyptian household will die, including firstborn slaves and cattle. But our people will be fine."

"Do your worst," says Pharaoh.

Exodus 1 - 4: Meet Moses

After a while a new Pharaoh comes to power. He looks around and says, "These Hebrews... they took our jobs!"

So they decide to give them all the really undesirable jobs and then not pay them. They went from well-off to slavery.

The Pharaoh also told all the midwives, "When the Hebrew women have children, kill all the boys." The midwives refused and when the Pharaoh asked why they told him, "They give birth really fast... by the time we get there, the baby's already been born." So the Pharaoh commanded all the boy Hebrew babies to be chucked into the Nile.

Levi's wife has a son and she hides him for a while, but hiding a squalling infant is no easy task. She builds him a little boat and puts him in the river. Pharaoh's daughter comes along and finds him, hires a nanny, and names the baby Moses.

Moses grows up. One day he is walking among his people to see how they are doing and he notices an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave. He looks around, doesn't see anyone watching, clubs him, and buries him in the sand.

The next day he's out for another walk and he sees two Hebrews fighting.

"Hey," he says, "What's going on here?"

"None of your business," one replies. "And anyway, what are you going to do, Killer? Murder us like you did that Egyptian? Yeah, we know what you did."

Moses realizes that word has gotten out, and Pharaoh has heard of it, so he flees to Midian. When he gets there, he sees the Midianite priest's seven daughters trying to draw water from a well. Some shepherds were harassing them and he runs them off and helps the ladies water their flock. They return home and tell their father about the nice Egyptian man that helped them. The priest, Jethro, invites him over for dinner, gives him one of his daughters to marry, and Moses stays with them.

God, in the meantime, sees how the Hebrews are being treated by the Egyptians and remembers that promise he'd made to bring these people back to Canaan. He thinks it's about time to make good on that.

While Moses is watching over his father-in-law's flock in Midian, he sees a bush on fire, but notices that the bush itself isn't really getting burned in the process.

"What the heck is that all about?" he says and walks over to investigate.  If this is an acacia tree (which are mentioned frequently in the Bible) it is interesting to note that this tree contains a very powerful hallucinogenic substance.

Duuuuuuude....

God calls to him, "MOSES!"

"Aaahh! I'm right here! No need to yell."

"Sorry. Take your shoes off and don't come any closer because this place is holy. This is God talking by the way. Not just some ordinary bush. The Hebrews have been crying to me and I see that this new Pharaoh has made you all into slaves. That won't do. I'm going to bring you all back up to your own land. I want you to go talk to Pharaoh and then I need you to lead them all out of here."

"Me? Why me?" says Moses.

"Oh, I'm totally going to help you," says God. "Don't worry."

"How am I going to get all these people to follow me? How on earth am I going to get them to believe me?"

"Seriously? You tell them that I AM GOD. They'll listen to that. Tell them that we're going home and that home will be awesome, all milk and honey and stuff. But listen,"God continues. "Pharaoh isn't just going to let you walk off. So I'm going to do a lot of really neat and scary stuff to them and convince him to let you out of here."

"God, I really don't think they're going to believe all that," says Moses. "I mean, I was raised by Egyptians. I'm kind of an outsider around here."

"Alright," says God. "Now for my first trick. Throw your staff on the ground."

"Um, ok?" Moses tosses his staff on the ground. BAM! It becomes a snake, and Moses freaks out and runs away.

"Moses get back here," says God. "Watch. Catch it by the tail, ok?"

Moses catches the tail and BAM! It becomes a staff again.

"Ohhh...."

"See," says God. "They'll believe you if you show them that one. Now let's try another one. Put your hand in your robe and then take it out."

Moses puts his hand in his robe and then draws it out again, only to see it's leprous.

Before Moses totally loses it, he says, "Ok now put your hand back in your robe." Moses does and when he takes it out, it's healed. God says, "Only do that one if they don't believe the snake trick, because the leprous sores trick might not win you many friends."

"God, I really don't want all this responsibility," says Moses, "and I suck at public speaking. Can't you pick someone else?"

"Fine," says God, who is getting a little aggravated. "Here comes your brother Aaron. I'll have him help you."

Moses says goodbye to Jethro and goes back down the Egypt with his wife and son. On the way, God reminds him to show Pharaoh the snake and leper miracles. And he tells him to relay the message that if he doesn't let the Hebrews go that God will kill his firstborn.  Moses's wife realizes that they totally forgot to circumcise one of their sons, so she does that on the trip.  They meet up with Aaron and Moses and Aaron talk to the people of Israel and they believe them.

Genesis 43 - 50: Hey, Let's All Go to Egypt!

Jacob and his sons and their families eventually eat all the food that they'd brought up from Egypt.

Jacob suggests that they maybe should go down and see about getting some more.

"Dad," they say, "you know he said we need to bring Benjamin down with us. So that's the only way we're getting anything else."

"You stupid knuckleheads, why did you have to go and blab about having another brother?"

"Well... he asked us," they reply. (If you go back a couple chapters, he didn't ask... they just kind of mentioned it.) Judah says, "Listen I promise he'll be fine. If you'd let me do this back when we got back I could have gone back and forth twice already."

"Alright, alright... take the kid. And take some other stuff... nuts and perfume and honey and some gum... everyone likes gum. And for crying out loud, don't forget to pay the man this time! Take extra money just in case."

They again travel all the way down to Egypt. Joseph sees them arrive and prepares a feast and tells his people to bring the travelers up to his house. His brothers are nervous because they think maybe they're in trouble for not paying the last time they were here and they try to explain the situation to Joseph's people.

"Ohhhh no, you're fine," says Joseph's steward. "You paid me. God must have put that money in your sacks. Amazing, right?"

They bring Simeon up from the jail, and everyone washes up for dinner. Joseph comes in for lunch and makes some small talk, asking about their father and such. But he gets a little overwhelmed with emotion at seeing Benjamin and has to step out a moment and compose himself before dinner.

After they eat, Joseph tells his steward, "Make sure they have food, then put their money back in their sacks. And here... take my cup that they know is mine and put it in Benjamin's sack. Don't let anyone see you."

Just after they leave, Joseph sends the steward after them. "Accuse them of stealing my cup. Really scare them, ok? Freak them out good.  This is going to be hilarious!  We'll all laugh about it later."

The steward catches up to them and yells at them. They deny taking anything, but a search turns up the cup in Benjamin's sacks. Busted. Back to Egypt they go.

They fall down in front of Joseph and beg forgiveness. Joseph replies, "Yeah, only the person who had it has to stay with me and be my servant. So the little one stays.  The rest of you can go home."

Jacob is not going to like it at all if they return without Benjamin. Judah tries to explain to Joseph how much this will hurt their father if Benjamin doesn't go home and he offers himself as a servant instead.

Joseph can't stand it anymore and bursts into tears. He sends all his servants out and when they're alone, he says, "DUDES! It's ME! JOSEPH! The one you sold into slavery! But hey, it's fine. Because if you hadn't sold me, I wouldn't have been here to interpret the Pharaoh's dream about the famine. Because of that, there's all this stored up food. So see? If I hadn't come here, we all would have died. God did that. Cool, right? So buzz back up to Canaan, tell our father that I'm down here, and bring the whole family down. We Hebrews are just going to fit right in here in Egypt! The Egyptians are awesome people. They love us!"

Pharaoh hears that Joseph's brothers are visiting him and agrees. "Oh look at your family! I'm so happy to meet you all!  You must bring everyone here and I'll give them the best of all we have.  I insist!"

I hate moving...

They load up the donkeys with a ton of stuff to prove the goodwill of the Pharaoh and with provisions for the trip to Canaan and then the return trip back to Egypt. They go and pick up Jacob and their wives and kids and families (all 70 of them) and make the trip back to Egypt. On the trip, God tells Jacob that they will be a great nation and, not to worry... that he will bring them up out of Egypt... eventually. And everything will be just fine.

Joseph meets up with them in Goshen and is reunited with his father. He tells them all, "I'm going to tell Pharaoh that you guys are all shepherds. So if he happens to ask, remember that. He'll give us the area of Goshen. Egyptians don't really like shepherds so we'll be ok here."

Pharaoh gives them Goshen and they settle there.

The famine continues and times get worse. People run out of money to buy food. Joseph tells the Egyptians that come for food that he'll take livestock in exchange for food. For a whole year he collects livestock in exchange for food.

The people run out of animals to trade. They start to give him their land for Pharaoh in exchange for food, and all the people become Pharaoh's servants. Joseph gives them seeds and tells them to sow this land, but that Pharaoh shall always get a fifth of the harvest. They agree.

Jacob's family does well in Goshen and accumulate wealth. Jacob grows old, and at 147 years, calls Joseph to him. "Promise me you'll bury me in Canaan." Joseph promises that he will. Jacob blesses Joseph's two sons and Joseph. Joseph sees that Jacob's right hand is on the younger son's head and tries to switch it over to the older son's.

"Nope, sorry," says Jacob. "Your younger son will be greater."

Then everyone gathers around Jacob as he's dying and Jacob tells them what's going to happen:

Reuben won't be the leader because he slept with that concubine. Simeon and Levi killed all those people after Dinah was raped and are too violent and rash to lead.

Judah will be praised by all his brothers and his descendents will be a strong tribe.

Zebulun will be a sea merchant and his area will be a harbor for ships.  Issachar will work hard and till the soil.  Dan will be a judge of the people of Israel.  Gad will be plagued by raiders, but he'll win in the end.  Asher's food will be really good and they'll be a rich people.

Naphtali is the pretty one.  Joseph is still my favorite.  Benjamin will be a great warrior.

And he dies. Joseph has the Egyptians embalm him and they mourn him for 70 days. Joseph asks Pharaoh for permission to go bury his father in the cave in Canaan. Everyone, including Pharaoh and all the elders of Egypt make the trek to bury Jacob.

Joseph's brothers worry that now that Jacob is gone, maybe Joseph will be mad at them again for that whole "faking his death and selling him into slavery" prank. So they tell Joseph that Jacob told them that he needs to forgive them. Joseph tells them not to worry since it all seems to have worked out pretty well.

Joseph lives 110 years, long enough to see his great great great grandchildren. Before he dies he reminds everyone about God's promise to bring them up out of Egypt and asks that when that happens, to please bring his bones with them. He dies and they embalm him and put him in a coffin.

Genesis Chapters 40 - 42: Joseph's Dream Interpretation Gig Pays Off and He Messes with His Brothers

A note:  I am hoping to finish writing Genesis by the end of the month.  I am currently about 25% of the way through reading the Bible (I'm on 2 Samuel).  This just takes longer to write it.  The Bible will be read in a year.  I suspect the blog will take longer.

After Joseph's been in prison for a while, the Pharaoh’s chief cup bearer and chief baker get thrown in jail. They end up in Joseph's section.

While they're there, they have terrible dreams on the same night (I can imagine that I would also have terrible dreams while in prison). Joseph sees them and asks, "Hey, why so glum? Well, other than for being in prison and all, but you look especially glum today."

They tell him that they have both had terrible dreams.

"Oh I love interpreting dreams! Tell me what they were!"

The cup bearer starts, "There was this vine with three branches and all these grapes grew out of them. And I took them and squeezed them into Pharaoh's cup and gave it to Pharaoh." (Horrible nightmare, that one.)

Joseph says, "Oh, ok, the three branches are three days, and in three days the Pharaoh will get you out of here and restore you to your position as cup bearer. Hey, when that happens, tell him that I'm innocent and put in a good word for me so I can get out of here."

The baker, seeing that the cup bearer's dream was positive says, "Mine next! So in my dream I had three baskets on my head, all filled with delicious baked goods. But the birds kept flying over and eating the stuff out of the top basket."

"Oh, that's bad," says Joseph. "The three baskets are three days, but in three days, Pharaoh is going to chop your head off and hang it from a tree and the crows are going to eat you as you rot."

"Shit," says the baker.

And in three days, which happened to be Pharaoh's birthday, the cup bearer was restored to his position at court, but the baker was hanged. Unfortunately, the cup bearer completely forgets to tell Pharaoh about Joseph.

I'm so hungry I could eat a cow.

Two years pass and Pharaoh has a dream that he was standing by the Nile and seven nice fat cows came out of the river and started feeding on the reeds. Then seven ugly skinny cows came out of the river, walked over to the nice cows and ATE them, but after they'd eaten them, the skinny cows were just as skinny as before. He wakes up, says, "Wow, weird dream. I need to lay off the hummus before bed."

He falls back asleep and has another dream. In this dream, seven big, beautiful ears of grain were growing on one stalk. And then seven scrawny thin ears sprouted nearby and gobbled up the seven healthy ears.

He wakes up again and says, "Really weird. Maybe it means something." And in the morning he calls all his magicians and wise men to him, but no one can figure out what it means.

Then the cup bearer suddenly remembers. "Pharaoh, there was a Hebrew guy down in the prison that's really good at this... What was his name...? Jimmy... John... NO! Joseph! Man, I wonder if he's still even down there... I suck at remembering stuff."

Pharaoh summons Joseph out of the prison. They clean him up and send him out and Pharaoh tells him his dreams.

"Oh that's an easy one! See the dreams are the same. The seven nice cows and seven nice ears of grain are both seven years. And the seven skinny cows and skinny ears of grain are seven years of famine. God's telling you that this is going to happen. So you're going to have seven really good years, and then seven years of famine that will consume everything from the good years. You should have someone in charge of preparations and store a fifth of everything now while it's good so that when the famine comes, everyone doesn't die."

Pharaoh says, "Wow, you are good! Ok, you're in charge of all that. Know what? I'm just going to put you in charge of my whole household." And Pharaoh dresses Joseph up and parades him all around Egypt to let everyone know that this guy is his Number One. He gives him a wife and promises to consult him about everything. During the good years, Joseph stores up tons of food, so much that they lose track of the stores. His wife bears two sons.

After seven years, the famine arrives. But Egypt has so much stored that they do alright. Even other countries come to Egypt for food because they've prepared so well.

Jacob (aka Israel, but we're calling him Jacob again now) hears that there's food in Egypt and tells ten of his sons to go down and see if they can get some grain. Benjamin, the youngest, stays behind.

They get to Egypt and bow in front of Joseph. Joseph recognizes them, and remembering his dream about the sheaves of grain bowing before him, says, "You're spies. You just came to see how much the drought has affected us."

"No, we're not spies," they say. "We're twelve brothers coming to buy food. "

"No you're spies. And not even good spies since there's only ten of you."

"Yeah, the youngest is at home and the other one.... died."

"I still say you're spies. I'm holding you here until your youngest brother comes to Egypt. I'll send one of you back home to go get him." And he tosses them all in jail for three days to mull it over.

In three days Joseph comes back and says, "Ok maybe I was a little harsh. I'll just hold one of you. The rest of you go back with grain and supplies, then you send the last brother over here and then I'll believe you."

The brothers talked among themselves and they start feeling a little guilty about selling Joseph to the Egyptians (though they really don't know that this is Joseph standing in front of them). Reuben says, "See I told you guys not to be jerks. Now we're all going to pay for that little stunt."

Joseph keeps Simeon and loads up their donkeys with grain and traveling supplies and sends the rest of the brothers on their way back to Canaan. They pay him for everything, but while no one is looking, Joseph puts each man's money back into the sacks.

On the trip home, one brother opens a sack to feed his donkey and notices the coins are there. "Oh no! Did I forget to pay? This is bad."

They get home and tell Jacob everything that happened. They unpack and realize that ALL their money is in the sacks. Jacob yells at them, "You fools! Joseph is dead, now Simeon probably is or will be, and you want to take Benjamin down there to die too. No way. Not gonna happen. Idiots."

Reuben says, "Listen, if I take Benjamin down and they kill him, you can kill my two sons. That's fair, right?"

"No," Jacob says. "Absolutely not."

Genesis Chapters 37 - 39: Hey, Nice Coat. Wanna Make Out?

FAB-U-LOUS!!!!

Joseph is Israel's favorite boy and he makes him a fancy, colorful robe. Naturally, all the other kids think he's a spoiled little goody two shoes.

Then he has this great dream and tells his brothers about it. In this dream they're all binding grain into sheaves in a field. His sheaf stood proud and upright and all his brothers' sheaves came and bowed down to it.

"See," said his brothers, "and you wonder why we hate you."

Then he has another dream that the sun and moon and stars bowed down to him. He told this dream to his father.

"Kid, you're getting a big head," says Israel, but he keeps this in the back of his mind.

One day the other brothers are with the flock near Shecham and Israel sends Joseph out to check on them and report back. He puts on his fancy rainbow robe and goes out to find them.

They spot him coming (he is wearing a brightly colored coat, so he's easy to spot) and say, "Aw, man... Here comes Mr. Big Dreamer. Hey, let's kill him, toss him in a pit, and say an animal ate him!"

Reuben is horrified at the suggestion. "What the hell? We can't kill him! Let's just toss him in the pit without killing him. That's much more humane." He figures he can go back later and rescue him. But everyone else thinks he's such a spoiled brat and hates him so much that they agree that this is a good idea.

"Hi guys!" says little Joey cheerfully as he approaches. "Whatcha doin?"

They rip his coat off and toss him in the pit. Then they sit down and eat dinner.

"Guys? Hello...? Can I have a sandwich?"

While they're eating a caravan of merchants passes by on their way to Egypt. "Ohhhhh guys!" says Judah. "Let's not kill Joey. Let's SELL him!" They sell their brother off for 20 shekels. The caravan takes him to Egypt and he is sold to Potiphar, who is a captain for the Pharoah.

Reuben returns to the pit and sees that his youngest brother was gone and knows that Israel will probably be a little bit angry with him. So they kill a goat and pour the blood on Joseph's coat and sent it home to Israel with a note saying, "Isn't this Joey's coat?"

Israel is inconsolable.

Judah takes a Canaanite wife and she has some sons. He finds his firstborn, Er, a wife named Tamar. But God doesn't like Er much, so he smites him. Judah tells his second son, Onan, to take over the role of husband to this poor woman. Onan doesn't want to be responsible for children by his dead brother's wife (since they would technically be his brother's offspring), so he pulls out every time. God doesn't like this, so he smites Onan too.

Judah says to Tamar, "Gee, sorry about that... why don't you go back home to your father's house until my youngest son Shelah grows up."

Judah's wife dies and when he's done mourning he goes to Timnah with a friend to sheer his sheep. Tamar hears he's coming to town so she takes off her widow's clothes, figuring Shelah is probably old enough to marry her now. She wraps herself in a veil and waits for them to come. Judah sees her and takes her for a prostitute because of the veil.

He propositions her and she asks for a goat as payment.

"Well, I don't have a goat with me, but I'll send you one later."

"Alright, give me your cord and your staff and that ring and I'll send them back when I get my goat."

He agrees to this and he bangs his daughter-in-law, not knowing that she's his daughter-in-law.

Judah sends his friend with the goat, but he can't find the prostitute anywhere. They decide to cut their losses.

Three months later, Judah hears that Tamar is pregnant.

"BURN HER!" After all, that's the only sensible solution.

She whips out the signet and the cord and the staff and says, "Hey... remember these... daddy?"

"Oh snap," says Judah. "Yeah, my bad. Never mind." She has twins.

Meanwhile, down in Egypt, Joseph is sold to Potiphar. He does pretty well, even though he's a slave, and Potiphar puts him in completely charge of the household.

Joseph grows up to be quite handsome and Potiphar's wife can't help but notice him. She says, "Hey baby... how you doin'?"

"Um, good... But I'm really not interested."

Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me... Aren't you?

She continues to pursue him day after day, and day after day, he turns her down.

One day she catches him alone in the house and grabs his robe and tries to have a go at him. He slips out of his coat and runs off.

She's had enough. She calls the household guards. "That Hebrew fellow just tried to rape me! See! He took his coat off, but when I yelled, he ran off!"

Potiphar is angry that Joseph, who he's trusted, has allegedly tried to rape his wife. He tosses Joseph in prison. But just as he was successful as a slave, he's successful as a prisoner, and the warden puts him in charge of all the prisoners.

Genesis Chapters 34 - 36: Strange Justice and Jacob's Final Son Is Born

Jacob's daughter Dinah (the one he had with Leah in the baby war a few chapters ago), goes to visit the women of the town. Shecham, the prince of the town, sees her walking along, grabs her, and rapes her. But it's absolutely ok because he loves her and talks to her kindly. Shecham asks his father Hamor to get this woman for his wife.

Jacob hears about it, but since his sons are out with the sheep, he decides to wait until they come back. Hamor knocks on the door and explains that his son is smitten and wants to marry Dinah, so proposes that they join their families and lands and property.

Jacob and his sons talk a bit and say that this is ok, but only if all their men get circumcised.

"DONE!" says Shecham. "Pass me a knife." Everyone in town gets circumcised.

Three days later, while the whole town is still nursing their hurting boy parts, Dinah's brothers Simeon and Levi go to town and kill all the males, including Shecham and Hamor. They grab Dinah and leave town. The rest of Jacob's sons go in and plunder all the loot, livestock and take the women and children.

Now I understand that they raped your sister and that's not cool. But that seems like a really dirty trick. Jacob isn't happy about this either, since now they've probably pissed off people from the neighboring towns.

So God tells Jacob to go to Bethel (aka Luz) and build an altar. Jacob tells his entire family and crew to get rid of all the foreign gods that they're hauling around. "Seriously guys, God's been helping me all through this and now we've gone and made everyone mad, so show some respect please." He collects all the idols and everyone's earrings as well and hides them under a tree.

As they leave, God strikes fear into the hearts of the neighboring towns people, so no one attacks them and they make a clean getaway.

They get to Bethal and Jacob builds the altar at the place where God had revealed himself to him when he first fled from his brother. God appears to him again and blesses him and says, "By the way, since you didn't seem to hear me the first time I told you, your name isn't Jacob any more. It's Israel. Must be you forgot because I hurt your hip like that. Sorry."

He goes on, "You'll be the father of nations. Just like I told Abraham and Isaac, all this land will be yours and your children's." And God went back up to heaven and Jacob sets up a pillar as a marker of this spot.

On their way out of Bethel, Rachel goes into labor with the last son. She has a son and names him Ben-oni and then she dies. Jacob calls him Benjamin, since Ben-oni isn't the greatest name he's ever heard. They bury Rachel and set up another pillar as a marker.

As an aside, Jacob's son Reuben has a little fling with one of Jacob's concubines and his father hears about it.

Jacob now has 12 sons. Remember them. They're important.

In order:

Reuben

Simeon

Levi

Judah

Dan

Naphtali

Gad

Asher

Issachar

Zebulon

Joseph

Benjamin

Want a mnemonic for the order?  

Repentant Sinners Love Jesus. Do Not Give Animals In Zoos Jelly Beans.

Jacob finally comes home and his father Isaac is STILL ALIVE! Wasn't he on his deathbed over 20 years ago when Jacob dressed up like Esau and stole his blessing? Anyhow, Isaac dies and Jacob and Esau bury him.

Next is a list of Esau's descendents. It goes on and on and no one's name jumps out at me as someone I should recognize so we'll skim it for now.

And God's told Jacob twice now that his name is Israel.  Why are we still calling him Jacob?

Genesis Chapters 31 - 33: Jacob Goes Home

Jacob has now been working for Laban for 20 years and he decides he's had it up to his eyeballs. He's also noticing that Laban has caught on to his little trick with the speckled sheep and goats. So he pulls his wives aside and says, "Ladies, your dad's getting a leeeeeetle annoyed with me, so we need to get the heck out of Dodge. It's not MY fault that God made my spotted sheep so completely incredible, so I don't really know why he has his linens all in a twist, but that's the way it is. So grab your stuff, because we're leaving."

Family road trip!

They pack up the camels to go while Laban is out of town sheering his inferior white sheep. They take off, with all the speckled sheep and Jacob's accumulated wealth. Without anyone else's knowledge, Rachel also swipes Laban's household gods and slips them into a saddlebag.

Three days later Laban returns and sees that Jacob and his daughters are gone. Not only that, his idols are missing! He gives chase and as he draws near, God warns him in a dream to not to ask Jacob any leading questions.

Laban catches up and says, "Jacob! C'mon man, why'd you leave? If you would have just told me we'd have had a sweet going away party! The way you left, you made this look like you're kidnapping my daughters and running off with my property. I could rightfully have your head for stealing my daughters and my household gods, but you're pretty lucky that your God told me not to. So just hand over the stuff and no one gets hurt."

"Yeah," Jacob replies, "I guess that was kind of silly of me, but really I just wanted to be able to keep your daughters and I was worried that you'd make them stay. But I can tell you for sure that I most certainly did NOT take your idols. If you can find the person that took them, you're absolutely welcome to kill them."

Laban goes through all the tents and doesn't find the idols anywhere. He searches the camels and comes to the one that Rachel is sitting on with the idols hiding under the saddle. He tells her to get off the camel so he can look.

"Dad," she says. "I have my period. I can't get off the camel right now. But you can look around me if you like."

This is universally embarrassing to men, especially your own father. You can be sure he didn't look too closely.

"Yeah, I don't see them anywhere. Huh. Wonder where I left them..."

Jacob totally loses it and yells at Laban. "See? I told you so! And here you are chasing me half way across the holy land accusing me of taking your stupid gods after I've busted my ass for you for twenty years. I took good care of your animals the whole time, even though you switched daughters on me, changed my wages and screwed me over at every turn. I only profited from this whole thing because God loves me, not because you've done anything to help me. That's why God told you to not lop off my head last night. So take your stupid scrawny white sheep and go home."

"Ok ok! Geez, calm down," says Laban. "Let make a pact right here. We'll build a big pile of rocks and call it Jegar-sahadutha."

"Sure," says Jacob, "but Jegar-sahadutha is a stupid name. I want to call it Galeed."

"Fine. Galeed."

They eat dinner at the pile o' rocks and agree that one side is Jacob's and the other side is Laban's and no one can cross this line to do the other person harm.

The next morning, Jacob and his wives continue home. He's a little worried that Esau might still be really mad about that whole inheritance and stolen blessing thing, so he sends some messengers ahead to go find Esau and tell him that he's on his way home and has lots of stuff.

The messengers return and say that Esau is coming to meet him. And he has 400 men with him. And strangely... no other details. Was he happy to hear that Jacob's coming home? Did he look angry? 400 men with weapons or a large catering crew? Nope. No details. Just that he's on his way with either a large angry mob or a party revelers and well-wishers.

He divides up his people and goods into two camps, figuring if one gets attacked at least the other will get away, and prays that he doesn't get killed.

To appease his potentially angry brother and his army, he makes a gift of hundreds of sheep and goats and camels and cows and donkeys. He sends them ahead in little groups with instructions to say that the animals are for Esau from Jacob and that Jacob will be on his way shortly.

He takes his wives and children and sends them across a stream in a different direction, leaving him alone. Suddenly a man appears and begins wrestling with him. The wrestle all night long and when the man realizes he isn't winning, he touches Jacob's hip socket, dislocates his leg, and asks to be let go.

"No way," says Jacob. "Not unless you bless me. And maybe fix my leg because that hurts like crazy."

"Ok," says the hip-dislocating man. "What's your name?"

"Jacob."

"Alright. Your name isn't Jacob anymore. It's Israel."

"Thanks. And what's your name?"

"None of your bee's wax," says the man, and blesses him.

It seems that Jacob at this point realizes that this is not just some ordinary man, but God. And he limps back to camp on his hurt leg only to see Esau and his 400 men approaching.

He gathers his family and approaches his brother, bowing repeatedly.

Esau runs up and gives him a great big hug and they have a good cry (Jacob probably from relief since he thought he was going to get killed). Esau looks behind Jacob and says, "So introduce me to the family!" Jacob introduces everyone.

"And, brother, what's with all the animals I met on the way? Really? You can't give me all those!"

"No, no, Esau. They're yours."

"Jacob I have plenty of animals, really. Keep them."

"Esau, please. I truly insist. It's the least I can do." And Esau gives in and accepts the animals, and offers to lead Jacob and his camps to his home. But Jacob says that they're all really tired.

"You go on ahead and we'll follow you slowly to Seir."

"Ok," says Esau, "but let me leave you some of my men to help you out."

"Nah, I got people of my own."

Esau goes to Seir, expecting his brother to follow him. But Jacob decides to go to Succoth instead and builds a house and stables for his animals, then travels to Caanan and the city of Shechem.

So what could have been a really nice story of brotherly reconciliation turns into an awkward reunion and another parting of ways.

Genesis Chapters 29 - 30: More Lies and Deceptions, Plus a Baby-Making Contest

Jacob goes off toward Haran. On the way he sees some shepherds with their sheep waiting around a well. The well had a large rock on top to keep it safe. He stops by and makes small talk, and asks if they know his uncle Laban.

“Know him?” they answer. “Heck, that’s his daughter Rachel coming with his sheep right now!”

Jacob replies, “Wow… she’s pretty. Hey, so, like, why don’t you guys water your sheep and skedaddle, know what I mean?”

“No way, man. That rock is heavy. We wait for everyone to get here so we only have to move it once. Don’t tell us how to do our jobs.”

Rachel gets there and being the nice guy that he is, Jacob moves the rock and waters her sheep, then plants a big wet kiss on her lips and introduces himself as her cousin. Rachel runs home and tells her father, and Laban welcomes Jacob into his home.

After a while, Laban says, “Hey you’ve been working here a while. I should probably pay you. How much do you want?”

Jacob offers seven years labor for the hand of Rachel. Laban agrees.

Seven years goes by quickly and Laban holds a marriage feast for Jacob and Rachel. But in the evening, once it’s dark, Laban pushes his other daughter Leah into Jacob’s tent. Jacob wakes up in the morning and is shocked to see that he’s slept with the wrong daughter.

“LABAN! WHAT THE HECK?” he cries.

“Oh, yeah, about that,” Laban says. “Well, you know Leah’s the older daughter and it wouldn’t be proper for her younger sister to be married before she is. So I switched them. Hope you don’t mind. How about this – I’ll give you Rachel, too, but you owe me another seven years. Sound good?”

“Ugh, fine…”

So Jacob gets both sisters (plus their female slaves), but he loves Rachel more. But he doesn’t dislike Leah so much that he doesn’t sleep with her, and she has some sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah. Each time she thinks the birth of a child will make Jacob love her more, and each time she is disappointed.

Rachel gets jealous that she doesn’t have any children, and tells Jacob that if she doesn’t have a baby she will die! Jacob says he’s trying, but God’s in charge of the baby-making success rate. So Rachel gives him her female slave Bilhah for baby-making purposes. Jacob gets Bilhah pregnant twice with sons named Dan and Naphtali.

Now Leah sees that Rachel is catching up to her and gives Jacob her servant Zilpah for more babies. Zilpah has sons named Gad and Asher.

If you’ve lost track of the baby score, it’s Leah 6, Rachel 2.

One day Leah’s son Reuben finds some mandrakes and brings them home. Rachel asks if she can have some.

Leah replies, “Seriously? You stole my husband and now you’re taking my son’s mandrakes? What kind of scheming wench are you?”

“Fine… you can have Jacob tonight in exchange for some mandrakes.”

(Mandrakes are hallucinogens and are sometimes used in pagan fertility rituals.)

When Jacob comes home, Leah informs him that it’s her turn to sleep with him tonight since she bought him with mandrakes. And she gets pregnant again and has a son named Issachar. Then she has another son named Zebulun and a daughter, Dinah.

Rachel finally has a son of her own named Joseph.

Final tally: Leah 9 (well, 8, since one is a girl), Rachel 3. But Jacob still loves Rachel more.

As soon as Rachel has Joseph, Jacob asks Laban if he can go home. Laban says that Jacob is really a valuable member of the team and the reason he’s doing so well right now, so asks him to stay on for a while longer and offers Jacob a raise.

Jacob asks for all the speckled and spotted and black sheep and goats. Laban decides that’s fair and Jacob goes and splits up the flocks. He sends the spotted flock off with his sons to separate them from the white ones. He keeps watch over Laban’s white herd.

I get the cool looking ones, k?

Then he peels some sticks and puts them in front of the animals’ watering trough when the animals come to drink and mate. Somehow, looking at striped and spotted sticks while mating causes Laban’s white animals to have striped and spotted offspring. Jacob sends these animals off to his sons, since the agreement was that Jacob gets all the speckled animals.

He also makes sure that he only does this with the really nice strong animals. Any of the weaker or smaller animals, he lets them breed without sticks. Since they’re not looking at the magic striped sticks, those animals are just plain white.

Eventually, Jacob’s herd has a lot of strong speckled and spotted sheep and goats. And Laban’s herd is full of weak, puny all-white animals.

And Laban is not happy.

Genesis Chapters 27 - 28: Jacob and Rebekah's Deception of Esau and Isaac

Isaac grows old and blind and thinks his time is growing short. So he calls his favorite son Esau over and asks him to go hunting and make him a home cooked meal. In exchange for this, he will bless him.

Rebekah overhears this. As soon as Esau is out the door, she calls Jacob over and whispers to him, "Hey... your dad told Esau to get him some dinner and he'll get a blessing. But I think you should get that blessing. So go get a couple of goats and I'll make him some dinner. You bring it in to him and he'll bless you because he can't see at all anymore anyway."

Jacob says, "But mom, Esau is hairy and I'm not. If he reaches out and touches me, he'll know we scammed him and then he'll curse me instead of blessing me."

"Not problem, Jacob. I have a plan. Go get goats."

"Oh, Esau... It's ewe."

Rebekah cooks up the goats. She dresses Jacob in Esau's clothes, and takes the hairy goat hide and puts it on the back of Jacob's hands and on his neck. She puts the tray of food in his hands and pushes him into his father's room.

"Hey dad."

"Who's there?"

"It's... Esau... I brought you some food, just like you asked."

"Esau? You just left! How'd you find food so quickly?"

"Um. Yeah. God knew you wanted food so there was game like right outside the camp."

"You expect me to believe that? Come here so I can touch you."

Jacob moves close enough for Isaac to touch him.

"You sound like Jacob, but you're hairy as a goat, just like Esau. And you smell like Esau, too. And goat..."

Isaac blesses Jacob and eats the home cooked meal that Rebekah made.

As soon as the blessing is done, Esau comes home. Esau cooks the game that he caught, and brings it in to his father.

"Hey dad, here's your dinner!"

"WHAT? I just ate! Who are you?"

"Uh, it's Esau. Don't you remember? You said you wanted dinner."

"Ahhh! Someone else came in here and fed me and I blessed him! CRAP! I gave that blessing to someone else!"

Esau cries out, "NOOOOOO!!! That was mine! Bless me anyway!"

Isaac says, "I only had one blessing! Sorry! I gave it to Jacob!"

"ARGH! He cheated me again! Ok, maybe the stew thing was my fault for being overly dramatic and saying I would die of hunger when really I could have waited until dinner time, but this just takes the cake." Esau starts to cry, "You don't have a blessing for me at all?"

Isaac tells him that he's his brother's servant but when he grows restless he'll break the yoke from his neck.

Esau is furious and vows to kill Jacob. Rebekah catches wind of this and warns Jacob and sends him back to live with her brother in Haran until Esau cools off a bit. Then she goes in to Isaac and says she hates her life because of the Hittite women and that her life will be totally worthless if Jacob marries one of them.

Hittite women? Esau's wives? They weren't even involved. Surprisingly, there's not a lot written about them, especially since Rebekah's rant about them seems to comes totally out of the blue. One site says it's a warning about not marrying ungodly nonbelievers.  But Rebekah was the one that set up this whole scam, tricking Isaac to bless her favorite kid Jacob instead of his favorite kid Esau. How is that godly? It's a stretch to blame this on the stress that comes from living with Esau and his ungodly Hittite wives. But sending Jacob back to Haran will ensure that he picks a nice wife from their own people.

Esau sees that Isaac and Rebekah told Jacob not to marry foreigners, so Esau marries a third woman, one of Ishmael's daughters. The poor guy just tries to make his parents happy but can't seem to do anything right in the eyes of his mother.

On the way to Haran, Jacob has a dream. In this dream, angels are walking up and down a ladder that stretches to heaven. God is standing on the top of this ladder and reaffirms to Jacob that he and his descendants will inherit the land he is in. He says he will be with him wherever he goes and says he will not leave him until he has done what he promised.

Jacob wakes up and say, "I didn't know God was in this place!" (So much for him being the godly one.) He sets up the rock he'd been using as a pillow and promises that if God will be with him and provide for him and see him safely back home, then he will accept the Lord as his God. Again... Jacob was supposed to be the godly one, but here he is, making a deal that he'll accept the lord as his god only if he gets him home safely. And then he'll give him 10% of everything.

Genesis Chapters 23 - 26: Isaac's New Family and Some Bad Decisions Regarding Stew

Abraham grows old and tells his oldest servant to come and put his hand under his thigh and swear that he will go to his homeland and find Isaac a suitable wife. The servant doesn't have a name,but it's mentioned back in Chapter 15 that his name is Eliezer. So we'll call him Eli.

There are several explanations of "putting your hand under my thigh." It's a Patriarchal Oath. However... it may not actually involve the thigh. It seems that a circumcised penis is important enough to swear an oath by.

He tells Eli to go back to Mesopotamia, where Abraham's brother Nahor lives, and find Isaac a wife. The servant worries that he might not be able to convince a woman to follow him all the way back to Caanan and Abraham tells him that if he absolutely can't find a girl to follow him that he can bring Isaac back to her.

That's a lot of camels

Eli takes ten camels and some nice things that girls like as gifts, and he makes the camels lie down by the well. He prays and comes up with a plan. He decides that he will ask the girls who come to the well for a drink. If any of them gives him a drink AND offers his camels a drink, well, that's the girl for Isaac.

A woman named Rebekah comes to the well and the servant thinks she's really pretty, so he asks for a drink. She lets Eli drink and then she gives the camels water. He's flabbergasted and gives her some jewelry and asks who she is and if he could stay the night with her family.

She says that she Nahor's granddaughter. (So I think that makes her a second cousin to Isaac.) And she says of course he and his herd of smelly camels are welcome to spend the night.

Eli is welcomed and his camels cared for. They offer him dinner, but he insists that he tell them why he is there first.

He tells them that he is there at the behest of Abraham, who is now very rich and powerful. He tells how he was sent to find Isaac a wife and how he knew Rebekah was the one because she gave the camels water without him even asking.

Rebekah's brother and father say, "WOW! That's amazing! She's all yours!"

He gives her even more jewelry, and gives her mom some jewelry too, and they eat. After dinner, Eli gets up to go, but Rebekah's brother and mom ask if she can stay a few more days and then go back. Eli says they really ought to be on their way, and amazingly, they decide to ask Rebekah what SHE wants to do. She says that they can leave immediately. They bless her and she packs up her stuff and she and Eli return to Abraham and Isaac. Isaac thinks she's lovely and marries her.

Abraham takes another wife and has a bunch of children with her. He also has some children by some concubines, though he sends those children east. Abraham dies at 175 years old, and Ishmael comes home for the funeral. He and Isaac bury their father with Sarah in the cave that Abraham bought. Ishmael by the way has twelve sons.

Rebekah has no children for a long while, so Isaac prays for some kids. When she is 60, God gives her twins, but tells her that one will be stronger than the other and that the older will serve the younger.

The oldest, Esau, is born first, covered in red hair. Jacob follows him out hanging on to Esau's heel.

Esau becomes a skilled hunter and is their father's favorite. Jacob is a quiet man and is their mother's favorite.

What's this soup worth to you?

One day Jacob was home cooking some lentil stew. Esau comes in from hunting and says, "Ohhhhh red stew! Smells great! I am so hungry I'm about ready to pass out. Let me have some."

Jacob says, "Sure you can have some stew. In exchange for your birthright."

"Seriously? I'm your brother, about to DIE right here in front of you from starvation and you're bribing me with freaking stew?  Eh...whatever.  If I'm about to die, you'll get my birthright anyway won't you?  HA! Ok. It's yours. Give me some."

A drought and famine comes into the land and Isaac travels to Gerar, the land of Abimelach, the king that Abraham had dealt with back in Caanan.

And, surprise, surprise, Isaac tells Rebekah to pretend to be his sister. No one stole Rebekah, but the king looked out a window one day and saw Isaac and Rebekah laughing and from that he knew that they were not brother and sister. (My version says they were laughing. Other versions say "caressing" or "sporting".)

"Isaac," the king asks, "Again with the 'she's my sister' trick? What the heck is wrong with you people? Your father did the same thing. One of us could have slept with your wife and gotten us all in trouble!" And he tells Isaac to go away.

Isaac moves a little way off. There's some more quarreling over wells and Isaac moves farther away until they stop bothering him.

The king comes to visit and to let him know that he doesn't want any trouble since he know Isaac has God on his side.

Meanwhile, Esau marries two Hittite women which ticks Isaac and Rebekah off to no end.