Child Wars: Jacob’s Household of Rivalry and Names

Okay. This passages scripture, this story about Jacob and his family, is absolutely, we've reached a fascinating chapter. We're going to see the birth of 11 children in the span of a pretty short time. We're going to see a war and the weapons used for that war are children within one household. And we're going to see a naming war, okay, who can get the upper hand through the names of our children. We're going to see superstition used, and rakes used to help with fertility. And then we're going to see a second form of superstition used in order to try and achieve fertility. And through it all, the Lord has promised things to these people. And they end up attributing, in some cases, their success to the superstitions, and not to the God and Thomas, right, as a very human thing. All right, this is an extremely valuable chapter in scripture to watch people attributing to their own genius or attributing to magical powers or

whatever, things that God is doing behind the scenes. All right, so verse 31 of 29. Okay, so if you recall, within one week, Jacob had two weddings. He married the girl that he didn't want on the first day of a week, apparently, and then at the end of the week, he got the girl that he intended to marry after all, but he had to work another seven years. Okay, in this seven years, going to be a whirlwind. All right, verse 31, when the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he hated by whom? By Jacob, her husband, that is, if he wants little to do with her. Okay, remember, she conspired with her father. In some way, she was complicit in the deception. So Jacob has even more hands against her. When the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb. But Rachel was barren. Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Rudin, where she said, because the

Lord has looked upon my affliction, for now my husband will love me. Now my husband will love me. Okay, the Lord has looked. Excuse me, that's the root of Rudin's name. Ryu in Hebrew would be something like the holder look. And then Ben is the Hebrew for son of or son. So that Rudin is see a boy were a son. And then she has an explanation for it. The Lord has looked upon my affliction. This came as a result of the unfortunate circumstances. I mean, and now my husband will love me. She doesn't say maybe we are big. She conceived again and bore a son and said, because the Lord has heard that I am hated, he has given me the son also. So apparently, in the between times, Rudin did not produce the fruit that she expected. Okay, he apparently still didn't change his mind about her. And now she's having a second one. And she says, the Lord has heard that

I'm hated. So I'm going to name him Simeon, which means heard. Again, she conceived and bore a son and said, now this time, my husband will be attached to me. I says, husband, my husband, my husband. And then me, me, me, he will love me. I've been, he has hated me. And now he'll be attached to me because I have boarded three songs. And so she called his name Levi, Levi needs attached or connected or made one. And she conceived again and bore a son and said, this time, I will praise them. Therefore, she calls his name Julia. Julia means it means praise in Hebrew. It's one of two words that means praise. The other is hallel, like hallelujah. This time, I will praise the Lord. All right. So she has, she's given up on being loved by Jacob. Now she's just going to the Lord loves me. It's a good place to, good place to arrive at in life. This time, I

will praise the Lord. She has in some sense pushed into the background, the indifference of her husband and has now turned her life to focus upon the Lord. I will praise the Lord. Then she ceased bearing. Don't know why yet. We don't know if this is just biology or her own, her own body's biology, but there's probably another reason for her not bearing after this for a while. Chapter 30 now. When Rachel saw that she born Jacob, no children, she indeed her sister. So we have a, we have another sister, two sisters married to the same man. And we can imagine that there's been some kind of competition all of their lives, presumably. And Rachel has never really had any trouble. She's always been the beautiful one, the desired one. But now she finds herself on the other side of the equation. She's the one that's coming up behind biologically, reproductively. She envies her sister. Envy's a really bad place to be. It

eats your heart out, creates bitterness and great unhappiness. No way he's happy to be envy. Every other sin, there's at least a pleasure for a season. You're eating somebody and feel good. There's the pleasure at least of getting the old gotten goods for a little while. Okay. And pleasure has at least a season where you experience something good, some kind of pleasure from the sin. But Envy's not that way. Envy is the kind of sin that ashamed to have right from the start. She said to Jacob, it's the first time we really, it's the first time. Post marriage conversation that we have between Rachel and Jacob. Last time we saw Jacob and Rachel, but if you see, we saw two people in love with each other. He worked for seven years and seemed like a debt. All right, that honeymoon is over. Look what she says. Give me children or I shall die. Jacob's mother said something similar about he saw James' brother

Mary in Canaanite. This has got to change around a guy. Now, Rachel's saying, give me children or I should die. Now, the obvious question is what you're probably thinking is exactly what Jacob was thinking. I don't think I'm in charge of that. Jacob's anger was kindled against Rachel. And he said, am I in the place of God? Am I God? He has withheld from you the fruit of the womb. And she said, oh, fine. Here's my servant, Billa, go into her so that she may give birth on my behalf that even I may have children through her. All right. We hear that Jacob loved Rachel, but we never hear that Rachel loved Jacob. And here, you see right here, your marriage to me is not enough in my life. I've got your children. Give me children or I shall die. All right, so look at this household that we have here. We have Leah. She doesn't have the love of Jacob, but she

has children. Rachel has the love of Jacob, but has no children. Leah wants Jacob, wants Jacob's love. Jacob wants Rachel's love. The only person in this whole scenario who's not getting what, who's the rest of all benefit is, well, God, God's kind of being overlooked in this whole scenario. Give me children or I shall die. My life is worthless if I don't have children. And Jacob, I can't do anything about that. My part in reproduction is fulfilled and it's not happening. I'm having children with this other lady. So I don't know what, what to say. Then she said, here's my servant, I want to go into her. She may give birth on my behalf that I may have children through her. And we came across this in the key scenario with Sarah, it was kind of ugly and terrible. Sarah says, well, I like, I'm not going to have a child, let me give to you my mates or a tag are, and

you can have a child by her and then that child will be mine. You end up with a really fought situation there too. All right, so when we go through these, when we go through, especially the bulk of Genesis, we see these kinds of marriages as really disturbing to us. It's so against our sensibilities. What am I supposed to think of a patriarch like Abraham or Jacob or even Moses who has multiple lives? How can we derive benefit in instruction from people who do not share our morality? Let me just say real quick, this is all occurring before the law of Moses. So there's no rule against any of these. The only kind of rule that we could conceivably derive from previous scripture up to this point is, well, God made Adam and Eve in the garden, one man but one woman. We didn't give him multiple wives. And so we could implicitly say that there's a commandment. But let me just forewarn

you, when we get to the law of Moses, we're still not going to get a law that prohibits multiple wives. That's unsettling too. It's not until the New Testament. So we're listening with Christian ears. Even somebody who's not a Christian still carries a Christian morality with them in the sense that, well, they understand or feel the sting of adultery. If they're cheated on and they're atheists, they still feel like it was wrong. That's kind of a Christian sensibility. That way back here, it seems to be completely different. Okay, God's plan all along was for one man, one woman, but then there's the fall and there's all kinds of problems. And you see in every single case in the Bible where there's more than one wife, there's trouble. That's another implicit way of the Bible telling you don't do this. It's maybe the most powerful way of telling, but then when you get to the New Testament, again, there's very specific commandment. So thank

God for the New Testament. It's not humorous. It's not funny, but it is at least ironic. You could be an anti-Christian, but still get offended over the idea of multiple partners in the narrative. Where do you get that offense from? Yeah, it's not built into human nature, not at least following human nature. It's just not going anywhere else in the world, even today. And you'll see, especially in the Eastern world, multiple partners is not a problem. So again, out of one side of the mouth, condemn Christianity out of the other side. Hold on to it. All right, so let's keep going. Verse 5, And Billa conceived and poured Jacob a son. And then Rachel said, God has judged me and has also heard my voice and given me a son. Therefore, she called his name Dan. Dan is the Hebrew word for judge. God has judged me. That is God has vindicated me. By the way, the Old Testament, the verbiage is just

a little bit different from the New Testament in terms of judgment. In the New Testament, judgment is kind of a negative thing. Jesus Eden says, don't judge that you're not judged. But in the Old Testament, frequently the saints, particularly in the book of Psalms, pray out to God and ask for him to judge them. That is, judge whether or not I'm right between me and somebody who's wrong. All right, so the judgments of God in the Old Testament were viewed as a positive that would be a benefit to God's people and a consequence to God's enemies. So she says, God has judged me. That is, Rachel has now had a child. Let's do a serenity. And she, she determines that this is God indicated. Rachel served and Billa conceived again. And poured, I mean, hearing the chance, take a breath. We've got another baby on the way. And, and the name. So we have to guess all kinds of things. Rachel served and

Billa conceived again at Borgia, the second time. Then Rachel said, with mighty wrestling, I had wrestled with my sister and have prevailed. So she called his name Naftali. I've wrestled with my sister and overcome her victory is mine. Well, he has got to still be sitting over there in the corner of the house saying, but it wasn't you. But, but this is such a, this is a consolation for Rachel somehow. And she says that she's wrestled with I imagine being Naftali in your 12 years old. Hey, Naftali, how'd you get your name? Oh, I got a story to tell you. I mean, fortunate. My name is the result of my mom saying she'd eat her sister and contest. What a messed up family this is. It's so bad. And it's everything. And house I grew up in, that was rough. And maybe I, my house doesn't seem to have it together. Look at this family. And this is the family that God's going

to build the nation of Israel. God does miracles. He oftentimes trumps people. Stugating the tongue just says, I'm going to make it even better. All right. First, I, when Leah saw that she had ceased their very children, you know, went back to Leah and we're back where we left off. She had ceased bearing children. She took her servant and gave her to Jacob as a wife. So she picks up on Rachel's strategy and was, okay, she's catching up in the swordboard, four to two. I got to bring him closer. So, so the mate servant becomes like a second, uh, a second, uh, or Sarah get wound for Leah. And she bore Jacob a son and Leah said, who had fortune has come. So she named his, she named him Gadd. Gadd, it means lucky. Kind of like the word fortune itself goes back to the Roman goddess, the goddess who supposedly sits in the sky and turns her wheel of fortune. Okay. And

whoever's at the top, it's the blessings. But if you're at the top with the turn of the wheel, you're starting to go down. I guess Roman goddess, there was a Babylonian god called Gadd and his name that lucky, the god of luck. So she names her, her son after vacating God yet. Leah's serving Zilpa bore Jacob a second son and now there are six total from Leah's side, Leah, and her, and her racer. And Leah said, happy and lie for women have called me happy. So she called his name as happy. Um, in the days of wheat harvest, all right. So the score is six to two. Leah has six in her domain and about racialized two. Now, in the days of wheat harvest, Ruben, that's the oldest son went and found, oh, how old would he be at this point? Well, Jacob is still working in that seven year era of employment. So Ruben's judging from the number of children we've had.

We've now had Leah's had four of her own. And then she's had a couple years where she hasn't had her own body. So he's probably around seven, six or seven years old, right here, maybe even five. And sometimes kids go out into the field and they give flowers and bring them home to mom. And that's what happened one day. Ruben went and found mandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother. Now let me explain that a little bit about that. Ty, do you have that picture? Okay, that's the root of a mandrake. I wish I could have gotten the mandrake in all of its stages. But it was often thought to be like the, it has the appearance of the lower half of the human body. And also it was thought to be a kind of aphrodisiac. He seemed to have fertility benefits. I don't know if that was through eating the fruit of it or eating the flower. I don't

know. I don't think really anybody knows. But it seemed to have been a superstition because apparently no one today would use a mandrake for the same reason. It doesn't seem to actually have the benefits that it was thought to have. But the superstition was or maybe the old legend was that the mandrakes will make you produce a child or serve as a way of attracting somebody. I'm not sure which. All right, she, Ruben, who's a little boy, brings these, looked at these flowers and she sees that they're mandrakes. And Rachel's sitting in the same room, it seems. And maybe Leah has put them in a vase or pot with water. And presumably Ruben is completely innocent of what any of this means. But Leah's not. And neither is Rachel. And then Rachel said to Leah, maybe she's sitting over at the rocking chair, please give me some of your son's memories. She said to her, is it a small matter that you take

away my husband? Would you take away my son's flowers also? Like, boy, that was a handy hub. Just lobbing grenades at each other. Jacob. Jacob, by the way, as your brother wants to see is completely under the thumb of Rachel. She's in charge of the house. And Leah just absolutely in the sense that you've taken away my husband. In other words, it sleeps with you every night. You're going to take away my flowers to my son's flowers. When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, you must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son's mechanics. The first case that I can see of a man being his body being purchased for sex. I mean, it's just what a story, what a sort of story we have here. And so he made with her that night and God listened to Leah and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. Notice

verse 17 is really important. You see the first line there and God listened to Leah, wasn't the superstition. That had nothing to do with God listened to Leah. The Bible wants you to know that. That's why the very next word is and God. Listen, don't attribute this kind of thing to a superstition. God listened to Leah. And she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. Leah said, God has given me my wages. Wages, there's a reference to hiring Jacob's body for the evening. God has given me my wages because I gave my servant to my husband. And so she I'm presuming that she thinks that she did a magnanimous thing by sending her mates her and over to her husband. So she called his name Isacar. Isacar means wages are hired. So built into his name too is really something that is to his father's shame. Typically you try to give your kids good names. Names that speak of a bright future involve

her. I'm not sure you heard. Maybe I should presume that you have. But Alcomphile well wrote this book and he's always writing good signals but makes usually good point or two in each of them. But I remember him telling a story about the woman who had a child and she named him or she named her Sadaash or Sadaash. And Sadaak she grew up and Sadaak she ended up leading leading up to her name and then she was brought into court and she and some kind of charges against her and the judge sentenced her but also took the further step of punishing the mother for naming her Sadaak and he said something like what were you thinking when you in the child don't you know that that has weighed upon her and this probably brought us to this very day. What could what other future did she have with a name like Sadaak? That's a pretty good point but it's also probably more important.

It wasn't the name Sadaak that made her do these things. It was the fact that she was raised by the kind of mother who would name her Sadaak. That led to her deviating this way. That's the far more influential. But typically you give your child a name that's going to be to their honor and you can see that hardening any of this is happening. Maybe for Asher and Judah but everything else is about complaint. A child within the center's amount of some kind of community and it's a car. All right and Leah conceded that she bore a son and Leah said God has endowed me with good endowed. Now my husband will honor me because I have born him six sons. I just looked at this effort through life to try to get somebody's admiration and if you think that this is strange it probably if we look through our lives enough we probably might see some of Leah and lastly each of

us this constant now and then every single term and still get the difference. Somebody was their parents on the dad. You can't see and seem to ever get the cat on the back. And you don't forget about that when you grow up. You carry that for a really long time or maybe it's maybe it's a spouse or maybe it's a child. Now my husband will honor me because I have born him six sons. No I had three sons. Adam had three sons. You see somebody else had somebody wanted the other major. One's had three sons. Whatever the case three is good. Leah's had twice that six and that's not including the two from the concubine. She's had six so she has doubled. She's doubled and she names him Zebulan which means endowed. Again it's almost like something named Rachel. It's scored Jacob. Maybe I'll be modern now but it seems deemed at Rachel. I'm the one who's endowed. I'm still having not born

a child from your life. Verse 21 afterwards she bore a daughter and called her Dina. That's Leah. Leah this is her seven seventh child of her own. Am I counting right? Yeah seventh child of her own and Zebulan this time and she names him the female form of Dan Dina. What's going on there? Remember Rachel's first child through the through the matron? His name is Dan. She's not going to be she's not going to be dusted so she should give. Remember what Rachel said when Dan was born? God has vindicated me because he seemed like he has vindicated me. Leah is basically saying I vindicated. Verse 22 then God remembered Rachel. Now the way we read that in English is oh you forgot about her. It just popped into his head today. The same thing when you read the book of the story of Noah. Noah's up there floating on the ark. He's almost up. He's almost inside the ark for a year.

He'd have rained for 40 days but they didn't get right off the boat. They had to wait for the waters to recede forever on this boat forever and ever and ever and the text says and God remembered Noah with Abraham and Sarah. They're a hundred years old and ninety years old and right before Isaac is born yeah Isaac is conceived the scripture says and God remembered Abraham. All the great moments in scripture it's God remembering. It's not that it wasn't in mind and then now suddenly in does what? Instead refers to God never forgot. He never forgot. He always he was always in it. He hadn't forgotten about Rachel no more than he'd forgotten about Noah or forgotten about Abraham. He doesn't forget anything. The covenant that God made with the trouble of Israel said I remember my people. I remember my covenant with my people and I shall keep it forever. I remember it. I mean that means I never ever forget

you. I never forget you. I have not forgotten you. Not for one centile of a second. I never forgotten you. Great. Thirty years ago William Nelson saying you were always on my mind. No that was 50 years ago and now it isn't. And then and then think about the castle the last time. Do this in remembrance about me. It's telling you don't forget. Don't forget. Don't forget this. And God remembered Rachel and God listened to her and opened her room. She conceived them more a son and said God has taken away my reproach and she called his name Joseph saying may the Lord God to me another. It's it's a it's a beautiful septum that right here. It's just it tickles me old that she she's already thinking about my next child. But sadly sadly the next child is one to be Rachel's death. He's a Benjamin. He's not the one in this story right here. He's the only son of Jacob born

in Canaan in the Thomas. All the rest are born in Syria. She says may the Lord have to me another son unless we have we have a brand new Joseph in here. It means at or in addition. Oh, Joseph, Mark Downey. That's right. Joseph Braves hitting more justices. I'm adding up. That's good. All right. May the Lord ask me another son. All right. Really, really there's the end of the child wars. And now we're going to we segue into Jacob's side of the story. Okay, verse 25. As soon as Rachel had born Joseph, Jacob said to Layden, send me away that I may doze my own calm in country. Remember, LEAs aren't going to ask Layden a generation before that send me away. I've been here long enough. I have what I need to go home and Layden tried tricks in order to keep them there in the house. He's time the perilous ghosted. And Jacob knows his tricks and he wants to

get out. He's been here 14 years now. I'm done. Let's go. Give me my wives and my children for whom I have surgery, that I may go for you know the service that I have given you. But of course, but Layden said to him, if I have found favor in your sight, I have learned by divination that the Lord has blessed me because of you. Now it doesn't take divination to know that you've become wealthy in the last 14 years. But here's a second time in the test in this passage of scripture where we have a superstition being applied. I don't know what he used for divination, but he's not a Hebrew. So presumably he has consulted some kind of occultic service and he says that the Yahweh or your God has blessed me because of you. Name your wages and I will get it. So in other words, he's saying I don't go all paying and he's trying to get in control.

And Jacob by saying your wages, the cell is nice, but it's not nice. It's a way of staying in lawyer. And Jacob said to him, you yourself know how I've served you and how your livestock has spared with me or you had a little before I came and it has increased abundantly and the Lord has blessed you wherever I turn. But now when shall I provide for my own household also? In other words, I'm tired of being the house of Layden. Let me say real quick, it's probably a good spot to say it, when your children get married, they have families, that's their family. They're I mean, they're my family, but I want them to think of themselves as they are independent, that they need to take care of their own marriage, they need to see to their own children, they need to take care of things, they need to see themselves as a household. Really important, of course, hopefully there's a good

relationship, but I think that might help if you give children the space to have their own family and you're not making all the decisions for that. That's a better recipe for longevity in the relationship. Okay, Jacob, I want to be my own house. Verse 31, he said, what shall I give you? He just completely ignored it. What shall I give you? Jacob said, you shall not give me anything. Okay, Jacob's already, okay, I'll say I only have my wives and children now. You're the one that's rich, I have nothing. All I have is my family. All right, it turns out Jacob may have been demanding to leave right now, knowing that Laban was not going to have to negotiate with him. He can't leave with nothing. He came with nothing. He doesn't want to leave with that. He doesn't want to go back home with nothing. Must feel and revive for his house. Okay, so he said, what shall I give you? Jacob

said, you shall not give me anything. If you will do this for me, I will again pass through your flock and keep it. All right, I'm going to read through the whole thing through right here what happens. Let's come to here, I'm really confusing. Now just after I'm done reading through it, I'll just explain. I'll try to explain. Here's the strategy. I will pass through your flock now, Peter. Let me pass through all your flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep in every black land and the spotted and speckled among the goats, and they shall be my wages. So my honesty will answer you later or for you later, for me later, when you come to look into my wages with you. Everyone that's not speckled and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs is found with me shall be counted stolen. Laban said, good, let it be as you have said. But that day, Laban removed the

male goats that were spiked and spotted and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, everyone that had white on it and every lamb that was black and put them in the charge of his sons. And he set a distance of three days journey between himself and Jacob and Jacob pastured the rest of laymen's flocks. Oh, okay, that was confusing. In a flock of sheep and goats, the sheep are mostly all white genetically. Remember the spotless lamb of the Mosaic Covenant had to be a man with a spot or blanish sheep are generally white, only about 10 to 20% of them have carrier recessed gene for spas. So the so the even fewer than 10 to 20% have the spas. The goats, though, are the opposite. Genetically, they're usually they're usually black or brown, all black or all brown. They're the multicolored sheep and the multicolored goats are pretty rare. And Jacob is suggesting that all the multicolored animals will be his

wage and that the pure white sheep and the dark goats will be laymen's wage. What is more, laymen can remove all the multicolored animals to start with so that Jacob will have only the white sheep and the dark goats to care for. And these will be laymen's not his. Any multicolored lambs or kids subsequently born in that flock, Jacob will have it as his own. As Jacob describes the arrangement, it does look as though he's asking for nothing. Laymen might well think that if he removes all the multicolored sheep and goats to start with, few multicolored lambs or kids may be born from a flock of pure white and pure brown or black sheep and goats. Laymen will be able to check this easily too. Jacob's honesty is easy to check in this case. And any white sheep or black goats in his flock will be laymen's. The multicolored sheep would be Jacob's. Okay, so here's what laymen does. Okay, very well. Any

sheep that are multicolored or goats that are multicolored that are the product of your pasture or your flock will also be yours. So what does he do? Laymen gathers out all of those sheep that carry the recessive gene and removes them three miles away and has his three sons watch over them to keep them away from the pure white or the non multicolored sheep and goats who don't carry the recessive gene up here. Rarely do. So he stacked the deck against Jacob. But Jacob has a plan. All right, let me hear this. Then Jacob took fresh sticks of poplar and almond and plain trees and peeled white white streaks and exposing the white of the sticks. He set the sticks that he yet peeled in front of the flocks in the troughs, that is in the watering places where the flocks came to drink. And since they bred when they came to drink, the flocks bred in front of the sticks and so

the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted like the sticks they were looking at. And Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks towards the striped null of black in the flock of laymen. He put his own droves apart and did not put them with layman flocks. Whenever the stronger the flock were breeding, Jacob would lay the sticks and troughs before the eyes and flocks that they might breed among the sticks. But of the feedler of the flock, he would not lay them there. So the feedler who delayed them and the stronger would be Jacob's, thus the man increased greatly and had large flocks, female servants, male servants, and camels, and donkeys. All right, another superstition has entered into the discussion. If I put striped and spotted things in front of the goats and the sheep when they are reproducing, what they see is what they will produce. All right, so the female sheep would go to the trough and

there the man would happen and he would just probably spot in tree branches to inspire them to have a multicolored sheep and goats to put up the picture, the second picture they're tying. That's a plot or tree trunk that you might see in the Middle East and that's sort of like he peeled some of it to some of the branches he puts in the trough. Again, what the sheep see is having nothing to do with the transmission of genetics, nothing to do. It's another superstition in this story. Jacob wasn't producing through his ingenious strategy. He wasn't multiplying the flocks that way. That was happening because, remember, when he was laying on the ground with his head on the stone, he saw the addition of the heads of them and a ladder staircase and he was just sending and descending and the Lord God said to him, I will be with you everywhere you go and I will bless you and I will increase

you. Close with this. Something I said earlier, just really, when we're blessed in life, it's because the Lord is dying. The things that happen are often not attributable to oftentimes to our strategies, but to the goodness of the Lord. God has had to, you don't want to get misted up in our hearts and our minds about ourselves because here's the thing, we might be smart. We might be smart. We do a lot of dumb things to millions and God has had to be merciful. So when God makes a promise to you, he sees it through and sometimes we misattribute him. We'll say, I did that or somebody else did that. This strategy done is the Lord did that.