JACOB’S STORY comes to a close this week. He lived for seventeen years in Egypt, long enough to see Joseph use the foreknowledge given by God to concentrate power in the hands of the pharaoh (and the same number of years Joseph lived before he was sold into slavery by his brothers).
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JACOB WAS not exactly an ideal father.
His reaction to the rape of his daughter Dinah by the prince of the city of Shechem is puzzling. Genesis chapter 34 shows that he didn’t say anything when learning of Dinah’s humiliation, or while his sons Simeon and Levi, two of Dinah’s six brothers by their mother Leah, plotted revenge against the city of Shechem, slaughtering the men after deceiving them into being circumcised.
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PORTALS AND contact with the spirit realm are at the heart of this week’s Bible study.
First, we discuss Jacob’s dream during his journey from the Negev to Haran in northern Mesopotamia. We’ve heard the term “Jacob’s ladder,” but the underlying Hebrew word reveals that what he saw was more likely a ziggurat—the ancient Mesopotamian pyramid that represented a stairway to heaven.
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OUR BIBLE study continues with Jacob’s return to Canaan, his reunion with Esau, and the slaughter of the men of Shechem following the rape of Dinah.
We also discuss the early revelation of the Godhead–the view that God comprises more than one personage, each of whom is identified as the presence of Yahweh. See Dr. Michael Heiser’s website on the Divine Council and especially his paper “Old Testament Godhead Language” (link opens PDF document).
Filed under Bible Study, Old Testament
