• Jacob’s Return to Bethel

  • 1 Then God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there; and make an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you fled from the face of Esau your brother.”
  • 2 And Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, purify yourselves, and change your garments.
  • 3 Then let us arise and go up to Bethel; and I will make an altar there to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me in the way which I have gone.”
  • 4 So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods which were in their hands, and the earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the terebinth tree which was by Shechem.
  • 5 And they journeyed, and the terror of God was upon the cities that were all around them, and they did not pursue the sons of Jacob.
  • 6 So Jacob came to Luz (that is, Bethel), which is in the land of Canaan, he and all the people who were with him.
  • 7 And he built an altar there and called the place El Bethel, because there God appeared to him when he fled from the face of his brother.
  • 8 Now Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and she was buried below Bethel under the terebinth tree. So the name of it was called Allon Bachuth.
  • 9 Then God appeared to Jacob again, when he came from Padan Aram, and blessed him.
  • 10 And God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; your name shall not be called Jacob anymore, but Israel shall be your name.” So He called his name Israel.
  • 11 Also God said to him: “I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall proceed from you, and kings shall come from your body.
  • 12 The land which I gave Abraham and Isaac I give to you; and to your descendants after you I give this land.”
  • 13 Then God went up from him in the place where He talked with him.
  • 14 So Jacob set up a pillar in the place where He talked with him, a pillar of stone; and he poured a drink offering on it, and he poured oil on it.
  • 15 And Jacob called the name of the place where God spoke with him, Bethel.

  • Death of Rachel

  • 16 Then they journeyed from Bethel. And when there was but a little distance to go to Ephrath, Rachel labored in childbirth, and she had hard labor.
  • 17 Now it came to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said to her, “Do not fear; you will have this son also.”
  • 18 And so it was, as her soul was departing (for she died), that she called his name Ben-Oni; but his father called him Benjamin.
  • 19 So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).
  • 20 And Jacob set a pillar on her grave, which is the pillar of Rachel’s grave to this day.
  • 21 Then Israel journeyed and pitched his tent beyond the tower of Eder.
  • 22 And it happened, when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine; and Israel heard about it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve:

  • Jacob’s Twelve Sons

  • 23 the sons of Leah were Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, and Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun;
  • 24 the sons of Rachel were Joseph and Benjamin;
  • 25 the sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s maidservant, were Dan and Naphtali;
  • 26 and the sons of Zilpah, Leah’s maidservant, were Gad and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Padan Aram.

  • Death of Isaac

  • 27 Then Jacob came to his father Isaac at Mamre, or Kirjath Arba (that is, Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac had dwelt.
  • 28 Now the days of Isaac were one hundred and eighty years.
  • 29 So Isaac breathed his last and died, and was gathered to his people, being old and full of days. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.