Sunday, April 15, 2012

Themes in Genesis: Trickery - How Did Leban Trick Jacob

Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife. My time is completed, and I want to lie with her.”
So Laban brought together all the people of the place and gave a feast.  But when evening came, he took his daughter Leah and gave her to Jacob, and Jacob lay with her (Genesis 29:21-23).  
 
Jacob brought his daughter to Jacob.  Jacob waited in a dark tent  (I am assuming that it was dark) for his new bride to be given to him from her dad.  The NIV is one of the few that chooses the word "gave" instead of "brought".  The Hebrew better supports "brought", which better explains how Jacob would have been tricked into sleeping with the wrong daughter.
 
Jacob was duped into marrying the wrong daughter.  On the night of his marriage, his father-in-law set him up to marry the older daughter in several ways: 
 
1.  Jacob had probably had too much to drink.  The Bible doesn't say it, but they did have a feast, which in those days that meant drinking; and Genesis gives us examples of godly people getting stone cold drunk - Noah and Lot.  Wine was a way of life, and ceremonies such as this were a time to drink more than usual.  When King David wanted Uriah to go home to his own wife, David got him drunk.  It was a method in the Bible, to get people to do things.
2.  Leban brought his daughter to Jacob into Jacob's tent.  Jacob did not walk with her into his tent. 
3.  A veil would not be good enough to cover Leah's identity.  Very few men would be tricked by the one they love covering her face.  Most men can tell the difference between their wife's body and her sister's, unless they are drunk.

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