At his mother’s request Jacob departed to avoid the wrath of his brother Esau, lest his brother kill him. His father also commanded him to go into Mesopotamia of Syria and take a wife there from the household of Bethuel, Rebecca’s brother. Having received his father’s blessing, he began the journey.
When Esau saw that it displeased his parents that he had taken wives from the daughters of Canaan, he took another wife, namely a daughter of Ishmael, son of Abraham. Jacob, proceeding into Mesopotamia, lay down to sleep at Bethel when evening came, placing a stone under his head.
In a dream he saw a ladder reaching to heaven and the Lord leaning upon its top. From there the Lord spoke to him, promising that land to his seed and that in his seed all the tribes of the earth would be blessed. He also saw angels ascending and descending by that ladder. Awakening and amazed at the vision, he said, “Truly this place is holy,” and so forth. He anointed that stone and erected it as a monument, calling that place Luz; and he vowed a vow to the Lord that he would give tithes if he returned prosperously to his home.
The ladder Jacob saw, upon the top of which God leaned, signifies the humanity of Christ, to which the divinity was united as to something preeminent. Its two sides are soul and body. Its steps are the works of Christ: His teaching, miracles, virtuous conduct, and Passion. By imitating them we ascend to God.
The angels ascend by carrying up our vows, that is, by consulting the divine will concerning the things to be done among us. They descend by bringing us assistance and gifts according as they have received them from God. The fathers understood this and still understand it.
Morally, the ladder is penance. Its sides are fear and hope. Its steps are the parts of penance: contrition, confession, satisfaction—namely prayer, fasting, almsgiving, restitution, and the like. By this ladder one ascends to heaven. God stands at the summit to help, strengthen, and encourage one toward it. The angels, who are preachers, ascend by showing its usefulness, and so forth.
Jacob afterward came to Haran, or Mesopotamia, beside a certain well. Shepherds gathered there would remove the stone that closed it and water their flocks. When Jacob inquired, they told him that Laban was well and that his daughter Rachel was coming to the well with the flock. Seeing her, Jacob kissed her with tears, declared himself to be Rebecca’s son, removed the stone from the well, and watered her flock.
Rachel hurried to announce him to her father. Laban went out to meet Jacob, brought him into his house, and, after the reasons for his journey had been related, retained him in the house to feed his flock. Jacob served him by guarding the flocks for seven years so that Laban would give him Rachel as his wife, for she was beautiful-eyed.
When the seven years were completed and Jacob asked that Rachel be given to him, Laban celebrated the wedding but brought Leah to him. When Jacob perceived this in the morning and complained, Laban answered that it was the custom of that country for elder daughters to be given in marriage first. Nevertheless, after the week he would also give Rachel to him as a wife in return for another seven years of service. This was done.
Leah was blear-eyed, and so Jacob preferred the love of Rachel to her. Yet Leah successively conceived four sons by him—Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah—while Rachel remained barren.
Rachel, seeing herself infertile and envying her sister, according to Genesis 30, gave Jacob her maidservant named Bilhah so that he might go in to her. By knowing her he had two sons, Dan and Naphtali. Leah, seeing that she had ceased to conceive further, likewise gave Jacob her maidservant Zilpah so that he might go in to her. By her he had two sons, Gad and Asher.
Reuben found mandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Leah gave them to Rachel when she asked for them, under this agreement: that Jacob should sleep with Leah the following night. Hence Leah successively bore him two other sons, Issachar and Zebulun. She then bore one female whom she called Dinah. At last Rachel conceived and bore Joseph, whom Jacob loved above all.
After Joseph’s birth Jacob sought permission from his father-in-law Laban to return to his father’s house. Laban asked him to remain with him, naming his wages. Jacob consented on this agreement: he himself would pasture only the flocks of one color, whether white or black, and whatever spotted or vari-colored offspring they bore would be his wages, while the offspring of one color would belong to Laban. This was done.
By his industry Jacob discovered a new means for his flocks of one color to conceive vari-colored and spotted offspring. He took green rods of poplar and almond, partly stripped of bark so that they were of varied colors—white and black or gray—and placed them in the watering troughs. Thus when the sheep looked at the rods of varied color in the troughs while conceiving from the rams, they bore sheep of varied color. In this way Jacob became very rich.
According to Origen, Jacob’s leaving his parents, homeland, and wealth and finding the most beautiful bride Rachel beside the waters signifies that the man who supplants vices, after abandoning worldly things, takes wisdom as his bride by devoting himself to the teachings of the Scriptures. According to Gregory in Book VI of the Moralia, Jacob’s having two wives after laboring sufficiently for them signifies that the perfect man associates with himself the twofold kind of life.
The contemplative life is signified by Rachel, who was beautiful-eyed but barren of children, because the contemplative life beholds God more subtly and clearly but does not bear fruit in one’s neighbors. Leah, who was fruitful with seven children, signifies the active life, which devotes itself to the seven works of mercy and thus bears fruit in one’s neighbors, but contemplates God less. Hence Leah was blear-eyed.
Although Jacob first sought Rachel, he nevertheless had Leah first, because no one can exercise himself well in the contemplative life unless he has first devoted himself to the active life by mortifying the passions of the vices. How Jacob is excused for having four wives is treated in Cause 32, question 4, Obiciuntur and Recurrat, and was stated above concerning Abraham.
Concerning the belief that mandrakes possess the power to make women conceive, Augustine says that it is not true. Nicholas of Lyra says that they are certain fragrant fruits.
Jacob did not sin by using that device of placing peeled rods in the troughs so that the flock would conceive varied offspring. Laban had burdened and injured him in many things and had altered their agreements, and so Jacob justly did this in compensation for them.
The Master says that it is not marvelous for offspring to be made similar to an image seen at the climax of pleasure, since this very thing is said to happen among herds of horses in Spain. Jerome and Quintilian likewise defended a matron accused because she had borne an Ethiopian child by arguing that this had occurred because of an image she saw. In the books of Hippocrates it is found that a woman was to be punished because she had borne a most beautiful child unlike either parent and their entire family, until Hippocrates advised them to ask whether by chance such an image was in the bedchamber.
Jacob as a shepherd of sheep signifies prelates and doctors, who ought diligently to watch over the flocks entrusted to them. So that the sheep—that is, their subjects—may bear offspring of varied color, namely works of diverse virtues, they ought to place rods in the waters of teaching: that is, the sayings and examples of the fathers, partly stripped of bark and partly green. This means partly according to the letter and partly, with the surface of the letter removed, according to the spiritual sense. Thus the subjects conceive when these things are proposed and afterward, by working, bear diverse works of virtue.
§ I
When Jacob had become rich in this way, he perceived that Laban and his sons were indignant against him and murmured about the increase of his substance, according to Genesis 31. He called his wives into the field and explained his intention to return to his parents, both because Laban had treated him badly and because God had commanded it in a dream.
When they consented, Jacob secretly departed with his wives, children, and all his substance while Laban was ignorant of it. When Laban heard this on the third day, he pursued them with his people. He found Jacob on Mount Gilead and complained about the flight, and especially about his idols, which Rachel had stolen without Jacob’s knowledge. Jacob answered by giving as his reason that Laban might otherwise have retained his household and property. He denied the theft and permitted Laban to search. Laban searched the tents, but did not find the idols because Rachel sat upon the saddle beneath which they were hidden. At last, after entering into a covenant with Jacob, Laban returned home and Jacob continued his journey.
Laban and his people pursuing Jacob with his wives and children so that they might seize them and bring them back signifies the persecution of the faithful by unbelievers because they have withdrawn from the rites of their fathers; the unbelievers seek to bring them back to their former ways. After many things God so terrified them that they could not prevail. Instead, they became benevolent, whether through conversion or at least through peaceful relations with Jews and pagans after idolatry had been taken away from the Gentile people.
On the journey Jacob encountered angels of God and said, “These are the camps of God.” He sent messengers to his brother Esau to announce his return, according to Genesis 32. When the messengers returned and reported that Esau was approaching him with four hundred men, Jacob was greatly afraid and prayed that God would deliver him from Esau’s hands.
He sent gifts ahead to Esau to appease his anger: flocks of sheep with rams, goats with he-goats, cows with bulls, camels, and asses, by several messengers. When he had caused all these to precede him, he remained alone. Behold, a man wrestled with him, that is, an angel in human form. When Jacob prevailed, the angel struck the sinew of his thigh, which immediately became numb so that Jacob afterward limped. The angel called his name Israel and blessed him. Jacob said, “I have seen the Lord face to face, and my soul has been saved.”
Jacob’s saying that he saw the Lord face to face is not to be understood of the face-to-face vision of the heavenly homeland. Rather, in a creature serving as subject, namely the angel, he knew God by a knowledge clearer than the ordinary knowledge that comes through faith. This wrestling also signifies the mystery of the Incarnation, in which the two natures are joined as wrestlers. At one time one seemed to prevail—that is, to be manifested more than the other—as did the human nature in the necessities of the body. At another time the divine nature was more manifest, as in the miracles. Finally the human nature prevailed in the Passion, where even God was seen to suffer.
As Jacob continued on his way, he raised his eyes and saw Esau coming with his people, according to Genesis 33. He made three companies from his household: in the first place he put the maidservants with their children; in the second Leah with her children; in the third Rachel with Joseph. Going before them, Jacob bowed prone to the earth seven times. At last the brothers embraced and kissed one another.
When Esau asked whose all that company was, Jacob answered that it was his. Jacob urged him to accept the gifts he had sent. Although Esau refused, Jacob said that he had seen him as the face of God. When Esau wished Jacob to travel with him, Jacob declined, excusing himself because of the little children and the sheep. Jacob therefore came with his household to dwell near Shechem and invoked the Lord there.
Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, went out to see the women of the region. She was loved by Shechem, son of Hamor, seized, and violated by force, according to Genesis 34. Afterward Shechem asked Jacob and his sons to give her to him as a wife. They answered deceitfully that they could not do this unless all the males of that city were circumcised, after which they could contract marriages with one another.
When the men consented and every male had been circumcised, on the third day, when the pain of the wounds was most severe, Jacob’s sons Simeon and Levi took their swords and killed all the men of that city. They also killed Shechem and his father and plundered everything in revenge for the rape. Jacob bore this with distress.
Dinah’s going out from the house to see the women of the region and being violated shows the danger that follows from people’s wandering and curiosity, as in the title on penance, Distinction 5, chapter 1. Morally, she signifies the soul that wanders outside the house of its own conscience toward created things. Because of this it is seized by the devil and held by him through delight and the excuse of sin. It is not freed unless the sons of Jacob—that is, the virile effects of the soul—wrest it from his hand by a certain violence, killing him with his household, that is, expelling sin through penance.
After this, Jacob admonished his household to cast away their idols and be cleansed.
Departing from there, Jacob came to Bethel, according to Genesis 35. The Lord cast fear upon all the inhabitants of those regions so that no one dared inflict any injury upon him. The Lord appeared to him there and confirmed the promises made to his fathers concerning the multiplication of his seed and the grant of that land. Jacob also made an altar there.
Coming from there to Ephrath, Rachel died in the birth of her second son. She called him Benoni, but his father called him Benjamin. Reuben went in to his father’s concubine Bilhah, which his father afterward learned. At last Jacob came to his father Isaac at Hebron, where he dwelt. When Isaac died at the age of 180, his sons Esau and Jacob buried him in the double cave.
At that time Prometheus, brother of Atlas, is said to have been the first to make human beings, as the Master says. This is because he made learned people out of the ignorant, and also because he is read to have made certain images that he caused to walk by a certain art. He also invented the first iron ring and enclosed a gem in it. He taught that it should be worn as an ornament on the fourth finger, which they call the medical finger, saying that this finger was worthier than the others because a vein reaches from it to the heart.
Triptolemus is also said to have come into Greece and enlarged agriculture, while Ceres invented implements for plowing and measuring grain. Then the Telchines, defeated and exiled, founded Rhodes.
Genesis 36 contains the generations of Esau that descended from him, and the leaders and kings who continued for many ages. It says that Esau departed from Jacob in Canaan because that land could not contain them on account of the multitude of both men’s flocks. He went to dwell with his household on Mount Seir. It also says that a certain descendant of his called Onan discovered hot waters in the desert—that is, baths—while pasturing his father’s asses.