That it oracle foreshadows new stress which can define the connection between the girl sons, Jacob and Esau, because numbers regarding Genesis story and also as eponymous forefathers off Israel and you may Edom
The next (after Sarah) of your matriarchs regarding ancestor tales out of Genesis, Rebekah is one of the most common Houston escort reviews female-when it comes to the girl effective part along with her control of situations-on Hebrew Bible. The newest incredibly built narratives within the Genesis twenty four–twenty-seven determine just how she will get Isaac’s wife, provides beginning so you can dual sons shortly after initially barrenness, lastly get the key added the descent on her behalf more youthful boy, Jacob, that is destined to feel predecessor of all Israel. Even if challenging to some, her deceit inside the influencing Isaac getting Jacob’s benefit causes the girl depiction just like the a keen admirable and assertive lady.
, the longest chapter in the Book of Genesis. A spouse for Isaac is to be obtained from his uncle Nahor’s family; the ensuing cousin marriage, with Rebekah and Isaac both members of the same kinship group, serves to emphasize the importance of their lineage. Abraham dispatches a trusted but unnamed servant to Mesopotamia, the land of his birth and where some of his family still resides, to find a wife for his son. Rebekah secures her role as wife-elect for Isaac by befriending the servant and his ten camels in the famous well scene, which has been called a type-scene-a narrative episode with certain expected motifs that appears at the critical juncture in the life of a hero. Indeed, the account of Rebekah at the well is the premier biblical example of such a scene. It ostensibly draws attention to Isaac, but, in his absence, reveals the beauty and especially the virtues of his wife-to-be.
After the well incident, Rebekah brings the servant home, enters into the marriage arrangement, and sets off to meet her future husband. She seems to have some input into the marriage negotiations, or at least into the decision about her departure from her homeland and birth family (–58). When she first sees Isaac in Gen –65, she dismounts from her camel and veils herself, a nonverbal act perhaps signaling her status as a soon-to-be betrothed woman as it does for elite women in ancient Assyria. That she dons the betrothal veil herself may also indicate her independence. Once she arrives in the promised land, she enters Isaac’s home (called “his mother Sarah’s tent,” ).
Just after two decades out of matrimony, when Rebekah does not become pregnant, Isaac prays so you’re able to God, which has the new prayer you to definitely she get conceive. Other type of-world, that the newest barren partner, thus goes into this new Rebekah tale, getting in touch with awareness of the new special character of college students ultimately produced to the lady. A great divine oracle was treated so you’re able to her when she actually is pregnant; Jesus proclaims one “a couple of nations” have been in this lady uterus and will take on one another ().
Around she is “loved” () by this lady husband, the original lady about Hebrew Bible having who marital like is proclaimed
In the next episode in the Rebekah story, Isaac passes her off as his sister. This narrative, similar in many ways to two such accounts about Sarah, at first seems to contribute little to the role or character of Rebekah. However, it does differentiate her in a significant way from Sarah; in one of the two wife-sister episodes in which she figures (Gen –14, 19), Sarah seems to have had sexual relations with Pharaoh to ensure the safety of her husband and their household, although this is not the case in the second wife-sister story involving Sarah (Gen 20: 1–8). Rebekah’s marital fidelity, in contrast, is never compromised (Gen 26:7–11). Her relationship with her husband is consistently monogamous, unlike the other matriarchs of Genesis: Sarah, who provides her husband with the slave wife Hagar and perhaps has extramarital sex with the pharaoh; and Rachel and Leah, who are co-wives and also provide slave wives to Jacob.