2,207 related texts · 56 related myths · Page 3 of 46
Jacob, after years of hard work, had finally begun to prosper. But instead of joy, his success bred envy in the hearts of Laban and his sons. Their annoyance, their vexation, becam...
The familiar story centers on Jacob working for Rachel's hand, being tricked into marrying Leah, and eventually leaving Laban to return to his homeland. But what about those little...
It wasn't just the unbearable pain of losing a child. Jacob's situation was, as these stories often are, layered with complexities, with promises and spiritual anxieties. See, Jaco...
Jacob certainly did. We find him waking up, not with a stretch and a yawn, but in sheer terror. Why? Because of a dream, of course. A dream of a ladder stretching to the heavens, a...
"Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there, and make there an altar unto Eloha, who revealed Himself to you in your flight from before Esau your brother." Targum Pseudo-Jonathan (Gene...
When Jacob returned to Bethel, the very stones where he had dreamed of the ladder decades earlier, he did not simply set up a marker and move on. He raised a pillar of stone on the...
When Joseph told his father the dream of the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars, Jacob rebuked him. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 37:10) reports the rebuke: What dream is thi...
Bereshit Rabbah turns to Leah — Laban at the Dawn of Creation. Take Laban, for example. You remember Laban. Jacob's wily uncle and father-in-law. (Genesis 29:16) simply states: "La...
It all comes to mind when we look at the story of Rachel and Leah, and those fateful dudaim, the mandrakes. The scene is set in (Genesis 30:15). Rachel, unable to conceive, is desp...
Our story begins with Rachel, one of the matriarchs of the Jewish people. She was barren, a source of immense sorrow in a time when children were seen as a woman's greatest blessin...
Bereshit Rabbah turns to Jacob's Honest Wage Agreement Over Speckled Sheep. In (Genesis 30:33), Jacob declares, "My honesty will speak on my behalf on a future day, when you will r...
Something that maybe. came back to haunt you? In the Torah, Jacob certainly has a moment like that. We find ourselves in Genesis, chapter 31. Jacob is leaving his father-in-law Lab...
When harsh decrees threaten the Jewish people, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov prescribes an unexpected remedy: dancing and clapping hands. The logic runs through a teaching about what co...
The Talmud in Sanhedrin 98b records a startling range of opinions about the suffering that will precede the Messiah. And whether it can be avoided. Rabbi Elazar's students asked hi...
Leah had four sons. Rachel had none. The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 30:1) preserves the raw edge of her suffering. Rachel was envious of her sister. The Aramaic does not hi...
The Torah says Reuben went out in the days of the wheat harvest and found dudaim, mandrakes, in the field (Genesis 30:14). The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan specifies the month: Sivan, th...
Remember Jacob and Esau? Those twins, locked in sibling rivalry from the womb? Yeah, the story gets even more complicated. Jacob, had just pulled a fast one on his father, Isaac, a...
That feeling echoes through the lives of our ancestors, too, especially in the complicated family dynamics of Jacob. The source turns to the Book of Jubilees, a fascinating, though...
Fresh from his encounter with God, after that powerful dream we talked about, he set off toward Haran. And then...bam! He's there. No long journey, no weary steps. The earth, accor...
Laban, in the Bible, certainly felt that way about his nephew, Jacob. Laban wasn't exactly known for his generosity. When he heard about Jacob's arrival, penniless and seeking refu...
Sometimes, the answers are stranger than it first appears. Let's Laban, as we know, wasn't exactly winning any "Uncle of the Year" awards. He wanted to keep Jacob around, benefitin...
The story, as told in Ginzberg's Legends of the Jews, is a doozy. Laban, remember, is not exactly winning any awards for honesty. He's got a scheme brewing, and it involves a littl...
Jacob, completely innocent, declares, "With whomever thou findest thy gods, he shall not live!" (Genesis 31:32). Ouch. As we learn in Legends of the Jews, this wasn't just a figure...
Legends of the Jews turns to Jacob's Sons Rode Celestial Steeds in a Shared Dream. The story goes that one of Jacob's sons (the text doesn't specify which one) recounts a vision fr...
In Kabbalah, the ancient Jewish mystical tradition, they have a concept that mirrors this feeling – the idea of needing supplements to achieve a complete union or connection. Think...
One such answer lies within the ancient text, Kalach Pitchei Chokhmah ("Key to the Gates of Wisdom"). It unveils a profound understanding of relationships, not just as human intera...
That’s kind of the vibe around Jacob's famous vision. The familiar story is this: Jacob, on the run from his brother Esau, is trekking from Beersheva to Haran. (Genesis 28:11) simp...
Jacob saw a ladder at Bethel, but Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer hears the end of history hidden in that night vision. "Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof," Ecclesiast...
A psalm of David, written after Doeg the Edomite betrayed him, that's where Aggadat Bereshit anchors the story of Jacob's ladder. Strange placement. But the rabbis had a method. Do...
The story goes that after his less-than-amicable departure from his father-in-law Laban, Jacob found himself at the River Yabbok (Yabbok, a river in the Transjordan, now part of Jo...
Take the story of Jacob's dream in Genesis 28, where he rests his head on a stone and sees a ladder stretching to heaven. On that ladder, angels ascend and descend. A seemingly sim...
Take the story of Jacob meeting Rachel at the well. It seems straightforward: boy meets girl, asks about her family, gets the scoop. But according to Bereshit Rabbah, ancient rabbi...
The Torah is full of moments that, The first reading, might seem straightforward, but when we delve deeper, we uncover layers of meaning and significance. Take, for instance, the s...
Bereshit Rabbah turns to Jacob in Battle of Laban. The verse in question? (Genesis 29:21): “Jacob said to Laban: Give me my wife, as my time is fulfilled, and I will consort with h...
The Torah tells us, "Rachel saw that she did not bear children for Jacob; Rachel envied her sister and she said to Jacob: Give me children, and if not, I am dead" (Genesis 30:1). B...
The ancient rabbis certainly did, and they found wisdom in the most unexpected places – even in the words of King David and the story of Jacob and Laban. to a fascinating passage f...
The scene: Jacob, after years of service to his less-than-honest uncle Laban, has finally made his escape with his wives, children, and flocks. But Laban pursues him, catching up o...
The Hebrew Bible says Jacob "wrestled a man" until dawn (Genesis 32:25). Targum Onkelos stays with the Hebrew here, it was "a man," not an angel, not a demon, not a divine being. B...
Unexpectedly, Laban confessed. There is sufficiency in my hand to do evil with thee, he said, the words of a man who has just reviewed his own forces and knows he could crush the c...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan preserves one of the strangest accounts in all of Jewish tradition (Genesis 32:25). Jacob was left alone across the Jabbok, and an angel wrestled him in the ...
Jacob lay down in one place, and the whole land came under him. Keter Shem Tov 1:8:1 takes the Talmudic image of God folding the Land of Israel beneath Jacob at Bethel and turns it...
"I will assemble Jacob, all of you; I will bring together the remnant of Israel" (Micah 2:12). The end of Aggadat Bereshit's prophetic arc arrives here: not the death of Jacob, not...
After years of infertility, the Torah says God remembered Rachel (Genesis 30:22). The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan expands the verb. The remembrance of Rachel came before the Lord, and t...
The treaty had one more clause. Laban said to Jakob, If thou shalt afflict my daughters, doing them injury, and if thou take upon my daughters, there is no man to judge us, the Wor...
When the final redemption comes, God will redeem Israel from one place only: Zion. Not from the desert, not from the waters, not from any place of exile, from the Temple Mount. "Fr...
When Jacob woke from his ladder-dream, he was shaken. The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 28:17) spells out what exactly had shaken him. How dreadful and glorious is this place....
Take lentils, for example. Humble, unassuming… yet, in Jewish tradition, they're deeply tied to mourning and sorrow. Why lentils? The tradition tells us that when Cain killed Abel,...
He jolted awake and said, "In truth, the Glory of the Shekhinah (the Divine Presence) dwells in this place, and I did not know it!" Then, shaken, "How awesome is this place!" (Gen....
