Which oracle foreshadows the tensions which can define the relationship between their sons, Jacob and you will Esau, due to the fact jeevansathi app data throughout the Genesis story and as eponymous forefathers from Israel and Edom
Next (just after Sarah) of matriarchs in the predecessor reports regarding Genesis, Rebekah is one of the most prominent women-regarding her effective role along with her power over occurrences-regarding Hebrew Bible. The brand new incredibly built narratives within the Genesis twenty-four–27 explain how she becomes Isaac’s spouse, brings birth so you can dual sons just after very first barrenness, lastly gets the key input the new descent for her young child, Jacob, that is destined to be predecessor of all of the Israel. Though challenging for some, the woman deceit when you look at the influencing Isaac to own Jacob’s work with results in this lady portrayal while the an enthusiastic admirable and you can assertive girl.
, 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,” ).
Once two decades away from relationships, whenever Rebekah doesn’t get pregnant, Isaac prays to help you God, who provides the newest prayer that she could possibly get conceive. Various other form of-world, compared to the bare spouse, thus gets in the Rebekah tale, calling attention to this new unique part of the college students ultimately created to their. An excellent divine oracle is addressed so you’re able to her when the woman is pregnant; God proclaims one “a couple nations” can be found in her womb and certainly will take on each other ().
There she is “loved” () because of the the lady partner, the first lady throughout the Hebrew Bible for whom marital love are declared
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.