Gentle Reader,
If you are just joining us, start here.
The next two sections of this paper are short, so I’ve combined them into one for this post. I find that I want to dig even deeper into this story. That’s one of the beautiful things about Scripture. We can understand it, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, but we can never get to the bottom of it. There’s always a new layer. Always new connections. Praise God for giving us this extraordinary gift!
When the LORD Saw Leah: Out Manned – Simeon and Out Numbered – Levi
Leah’s hopes are dashed. Jacob does not love her. In fact, the text implies he is actively hostile toward her in some way. “The LORD has heard that I am hated.”37 The word used here, śânê’, can be used to describe an enemy.38 Nevertheless, Jacob continues to sleep with her, and she conceives again, giving birth to another son, Simeon – “heard.”39 With his appearance, we see the beginning of Leah’s shift in perspective. Simeon’s very name will forever remind Leah that God heard her cries. Cries for another child or cries of loneliness – it does not matter. God heard.
This is a powerful statement. Outmanned by the team that is Jacob and Rachel, Leah remains on the outside, not quite in the position of a servant and not really in the position of a wife. Yet, she is the one God hears. She is the one to whom God responds.
Leah is human, and like all humans, her path toward reliance upon God for her sense of identity and safety is not a smooth one. The text is not clear regarding the timeline, but again reading 29:31-35 within the context of 29:30, it is safe to say that Leah is having children at least every other year during the first seven years of her shared marriage. Rachel, the beloved one, is not so blessed. Her jealousy reveals itself in desperate, venomous language: “Give me children, or I shall die!”40 In another moment where the reader is able to sympathize with Jacob, he fights back: “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?”41 Jacob may be a man who grasps for position and power, but even he recognizes that he is unable to cause a baby to magically appear.
Did Rachel spit these words after Leah revealed her third pregnancy? Two toddlers running around the camp, with another on the way. Rachel’s status as Jacob’s beloved is not enough for her. She wants her own children. Leah has the children; her family within the family obviously outnumbers that of Rachel, but that is not enough for Leah. She gives birth to Levi – “joined”42 – and believes that Jacob will finally be joined to her.43 If she can’t have his love, at least she can have his loyalty.
The sisters touch a place deep inside the reader, forcing an acknowledgement of dissatisfaction and covetousness. It is tempting to stand back and judge them for their pettiness, but how would any other person behave in the same scenario?
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35 Gen. 29:32b.
36 Zucker and Reiss, 171.
37 Gen. 29:32b.
38 “Entry for Strong’s #8130 – שָׂנֵא,” Studylight, accessed November 2, 2019, http://studylight.org/lexicons/hebrew/8130.html.
39 Zucker and Reiss, 171.
40 Gen. 30:1b.
41 Gen. 30:2b.
42 Zucker and Reiss, 171.
43 Gen. 29:34b.
GRACE AND PEACE ALONG THE WAY,
MARIE
Image Courtesy of Hazzel Silva
A full list of references for this paper can be found here.