This is my second post today so if you want to read about Marriage Monday and Frugal ideas, click here. Also, during the month of November I will be participating in NaBloPoMo where I blog every day during November. Last year I blogged every day about things I was thankful for. Well this year I'm going to combine two of the most successful challenges I've been a part of. I'm going to blog YOUR thankful lists each day.
You can be as creative as you want---a list, a post, an article, a poem, as long as it is thankful and family oriented (which I have the right to decide, same goes for comments) then it's a go. First come, first serve so e mail your thankful entry to jarduini@faithwriters.net. I tell you, it really transformed my thinking last year and in this season of doom and gloom, I believe PRAISE and THANKSGIVING are key. I look forward to hearing from you, and I hope to let you know I received your entry and when it will post.
Okay,so this week is a look at the gal who would have made a great soap opera character. Maybe even her own LifeTime movie. It's Leah, the unloved wife. This is a fascinating story of two sisters with intense jealousy. Let's dig in!
Right off the bat the good I see in Leah's story is it is her, not beautiful Rachel that gets to be an ancestress of Christ. Also, through her adversity she really gained God confidence and knew who she was in Him. When you have that, I'm quite sure any circumstance is unsurmountable.
Her story is found in Genesis 25-34. I knew part of what Leah's name meant, but Susan gives more detail I find revealing.
“Leah” is Hebrew in origin and means “delicate,”
“weary,” or “faint from sickness.” As she is
described in the Bible in reference to her eyes:
“tender-eyed” (KJV), “eyes that didn’t sparkle”
(CEV), “weak eyes” (NIV) it seems as if there
was some deficiency there.
I'm not sure why, but sisters tend to get labeled. There is the smart one, the pretty one, the tall one, the older one, the friendly one, the too friendly one, you've heard them all I'm sure. It was the same for Leah and Rachel. Picture a baby sister who is drop dead gorgeous. Picture an older sister who is at best, average. In the world we live in guess which one gets the attention? Well it was the same back then---it was Rachel, Rachel, Rachel...
In his defense, Jacob never meant to put himself in this predicament. His heart was always for Rachel. So much so, writes Susan, that he worked Laban's fields for seven years. And to Jacob, that work seemed like a few days.
Jacob’s name means “the supplanter” or, to put it in
modern day terms the usurper, claim jumper, or wrong doer. He showed
up at Laban’s place (Leah and Rachel’s father) because he was running from
his twin brother, Esau. You see, Jacob had stolen his older brother’s
rightful birthright and familial blessing from his father Isaac, and was
fearing for his life. At this point in Jacob’s life, despite the fact that he is
Abraham and Sarah’s precious grandson and the one destined to continue
The Promised Covenant with The One True God, he had a rather dubious
track record.
Back then it was ordinary for a man to pay the bride to be family for her. What Jacob paid in seven years of labor was saying quite a lot about the value he was placing on Rachel. Laban got a free shepherd for seven years.
Susan gives interesting backstory to Jacob's past which is far from perfect. Yet, on his way to Uncle Laban's house, he had his staircase dream and as Susan writes, got right with God.
So in short order he falls hard for Rachel, wants to marry her, and works for seven years. When that time was up, he wanted Rachel. I mean wanted. There was a huge wedding party where the wine flew. Susan sets up quite a Lifetime movie scene---Jacob waited seven years for this day and most likely enjoyed his wine in celebration. He gets to the wedding tent and flash forward to the morning. He doesn't wake up next to Rachel, but Leah! Weak eyed Leah.
Laban of course goes legalistic. Custom has the older married before the younger, and Jacob is trapped. Laban in his generosity said Rachel could be his after his bridal week with Leah and if he promised to work another seven years. Jacob agreed and got his second wife. Rachel. The one he truly loved.
I've read this story before and Susan brings to light something I never questioned. Oh I totally got what a "great" father in law Laban was, but the sisters. They played a role in this. They had to have agreed to it. Was it logic, just as he gave Jacob? Whatever it was, they cooperated.
As Susan explains, it appears that the sisters cared for each other. Whether it was so much they couldn't bear be separated so went through the plan of let's both marry Jacob, I don't know.
Whatever good intentions the sisters started out with, they probably didn't think long term. Who would think Rachel would be jealous of Leah? Did Leah have the capacity to truly know just how second rate she was going to be?
But what both young women never factored in was the power of the heart when it comes
to relationships and intimacy. That cannot be understood until it is
experienced. Based on the way the Lord responded to Leah, it would seem that
while Leah may have been accustomed to being second best, she experienced
true heartache once she became officially the unloved wife of Jacob.
“Because Leah was unloved, the Lord let her have a child …” (Genesis
29:31) Apparently, things were more difficult than Leah had
comprehended they would be.
Having a son didn't transform Jacob'e heart for Leah. Oh he kept visiting her and procreating but by son number four, Leah apparently knew she was always going to be second rate.
After Leah’s fourth son, Judah, (“Praise”) was born, she said,
“Now I will praise the Lord!” completely
eliminating Jacob from the equation. (Genesis 29:35) It would seem that
finally Leah had begun to focus on Someone worthy of her devotion.
I'm thinking during all this fertility over at Leah's camp, Rachel was less than thrilled, especially after the fourth son born to Leah and Jacob. Given her reaction, I'm thinking this just stressed Jacob out all the more.
“Give me children, or I’ll die!” she shouted at Jacob. “Am I God?” Jacob shouted back at her.(Genesis 30:1-2) Uh-oh. Trouble in paradise. Probably for the first time in her life Rachel found herself jealous of her sister. I can only begin to
imagine the emotions Rachel faced: the inadequacy of her infertility, while
at the same time struggling with the green monster of jealousy for the sister
to whom she had always been held superior.
It is at this point that the journal entry records that Leah stopped
having children. Hmmm. Wonder why?
Did Leah, recognizing her sister’s distress,
cease to seek out Jacob for familial relations?
Did Rachel, jealous and hormonal, give
Jacob an ultimatum, “Don’t come to my tent
if you’re going to keep going to Leah’s!”
Did Jacob try to pacify his favorite wife by
distancing himself from Leah? “I’ve already
got four strapping sons. What’s the harm in
just concentrating on Rachel?”
What's missing in all these equations? God. Not once do we read that He was consulted by Leah, Rachel or Jacob. Only after the last son does Leah praise God and turn her affections to Him.
Rachel, goes all Plan B Sarai and gets her servant to spend time in the tent with Jacob. Of course the servant is pregnant and has a son, Dan. Rachel sends the servant back to the tent and again, the servant conceives. What are Rachel's thoughts during this time?
because, as Rachel put it, “I have had an
intense struggle with my sister, and I am winning.” (Genesis 30:8)
Well. Sounds like she was on the right track, huh? (I hope you’re
picking up sarcasm in my tone.) Suddenly this whole childbirth thing is
revealed to be a competition with her sister?! For the first and only time in
her life, Leah had been more successful than her sister, and Rachel couldn’t
stand it. God’s vindication that Rachel claimed at Dan’s birth was not for
the child Rachel so desperately wanted but, it seemed, it was because she
was at last on the road to besting her sister. Which begs the question why
did Rachel want a baby in the first place? Because she desired to be a
mother or because she couldn’t stand being in her sister’s fruitful shadow?
Whether Leah was not conceiving because her body wasn’t
cooperating, or she was trying to mollify her jealous sister and not welcome
Jacob to her bed, or Jacob was avoiding her because of Rachel’s threats,
Leah jumped on the “sleep with my servant and get me a child” bandwagon
and good ‘ole Jacob obliged. Zilpah, Leah’s servant woman, conceived and
bore a son whom Leah named Gad (“good fortune”). “See how fortunate I
am!” Leah exclaimed at Gad’s birth. (Genesis 30:11) Son number two for
Zilpah Leah named Asher (“Happy”) and Leah said, “What joy is mine!
The other women will consider me happy indeed!” (Genesis 30:13) Hmm.
I hope that Leah meant that sincerely and the real translation isn’t, “Are you
keeping count, Rachel? I’m up to six sons! Nah, nah, na, nah, nah!”
Are you tired? I am,
just reading and writing about all these kids.
This has more twists and turns than a soap opera. Jacob has now fathered children by Leah, Rachel's servant, and now Leah's servant. It has become a contest between the sisters! Real mature, right?
Now the kids get involved. Observe what Susan shares as the next twist:
One day Rueben, Leah’s eldest son, found some mandrake roots
during the wheat harvest. Mandrakes are a yellowish, sweet-tasting fruit
that is a relative to the potato. It had a narcotic quality about it and may
have been used for medicinal purposes. But what made it most valuable
was that it was referred to as “the love apple,” and was considered a type of
love potion. Based on Rachel’s reaction, mandrakes were not easily found.
The Bible says she “begged” Leah to give some of them to her. (Genesis
30:14) Nothing else had worked to get her pregnant, maybe this would!
The claws came out though. Leah said in anger, “Wasn’t it enough
that you stole my husband? Now will you steal my son’s mandrake roots,
too?” (Genesis 30:15a)
It's no longer love Leah is after, and Jacob has to be one tired, stressed guy. She rents him once for the price of some mandrake roots, conceives, and then gets him in her bed again where she...yep, conceives again. Kids are what makes her feel needed and this is her success. She might not have beauty, she might not have love, but she has honor.
Yet with these children, she names them in honor of the Lord. She was now seeing all that she was, not what she was not. She didn't need Jacob pining away for her as he always had for Rachel. She had her idenity in God and she finally was very comfortable with that.
Susan wonders, did Jacob notice? Did he realize that Leah was beautiful on the inside because after all the years, she was not bitter, but better? Rachel, the hot one, was whining and quite vocal about her infertility.
But wait, even though she complained, it's evident by Genesis 30 that someone started praying. Rachel!
“God remembered Rachel’s plight and answered her prayers by giving her a
child.” (Genesis 30:22) Did you catch it? God answered her prayers. Hello?
That’s the first time anyone in the Jacob family is recorded as praying.
Why now? Perhaps Rachel surrendered her fertility and realized this was so much bigger than her. For when she had her first child, she was basically praying a name. So Rachel is living in thanksgiving and prayer. Leah is secure in who she is in Him. Jacob also is maturing. He after years feels it's time to go back home, even though Esau could kill him. He sits his wives down to share his heart, and they agree. They pack it all (and I mean ALL) up and follow their man, leaving daddy in the dust.
But daddy doesn't just fade in the sunset. He had it good for a looonnnng time. He caught up to them and cried foul. He announces his household gods are missing and demands a search. Jacob is clueless. But Rachel, she learned from the master of deception and when daddy wants to search, she announces she is having her period and can't get off her horse. Laban of course wants no part of her being unclean and he leaves her alone. Laban cries over his losses, which Jacob gives a rebuke. With that, Laban says goodbye and returns home. And Rachel...had the gods the whole time.
Susan goes into the different theories on why Rachel would do such a thing. Was it lack of trust in God? Greed? Vengence?
The remainder of the chapter talks about the rest of their journey, still keeping with the Lifetime drama plot, how the kids fare as adults, and Jacob's future. It's a fascinating story.
So did you learn anything new? Did you feel sorry for Leah? Did you find her ending victorious? What did you think about Rachel?
I hope you enjoyed this look at the life of Leah.
Next week: Tamar
Remember, you can learn more about this book by purchasing it here. I am only giving you small detail on what each chapter represents.
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