Esau's Line: Genesis 36

You know what we haven't had for a little while in through the whole Bible? A genealogy! Fortunately, we can remedy that problem today with Genesis 36 (link). I hope that you're as happy about that as I am :)

I think I've mentioned before (yep)  that these sections of Scripture can be a challenge to get through. It's tempting to skip them outright, and it's tempting to add in all sorts of ideas about who the people were. You have to hit the middle ground. Scripture does not leave us with all the details of all these lives. Any fill-in information is brought to us without the benefit of being perfectly inspired. Plus, since I don't have a lot of resources on the shelf that deal with Esau's line, it's harder for me to get that information.

What can be done with what we've got, then?

1. As seems to constantly bear repeating: one husband, one wife just works better for marriage. That's the template from Eden, when things were "very good." All manner of issues today cloud that concept, but if we believe Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 then we see intentionality in this. Esau's life and the lives of his descendants drew additional complications from his polygamy.

2. Sometimes, you have to part ways: Genesis 36:7 shows Esau moving on when he and Jacob could not share the land. This is likely about more than just material—Canaan's a big space for sheep at the time. However, Esau had traded away his birthright to the space and so he moves on.

3. Did you notice the name Reuel? Does that ring a bell for anyone? It should. Reuel shows up as a name some four centuries later in Exodus 2:18.

Let's take that thought and jump to a conclusion or two. First of all, here's an assumption that I think you can count on: cultures and families re-use names. Seriously. I've encountered a few criticisms of Scripture that point out that the authors just reuse the same names and the claim was that it showed a lack of creativity in making up the stories.

Hogwash. It just shows that those critics aren't from the South. Around here, we use and reuse names from one generation to the fourth generation. We borrow from that family and this family and the other family. Proof? My son's name is my father's middle name, my mother-in-law's maiden name, and my last name (well, all of us in this house have that in common). My name matches several of the nuts going back up the family tree as well as being given me specifically to honor non-family members.

It should be no surprise for us, then, to find Reuel show up again in the time of Moses. We're not talking about the same guy, we're talking about someone named after the same guy.

There's a connection that traces here from Esau, out into the wilderness, and down into the land of Midian. This is how Moses finds a family that worships the One True God when he flees Egypt. This is how God provides for those 40 years in the desert as a shepherd for Moses before he spends 40 years in the desert shepherding people.

Esau leaves a mixed legacy behind him. Even the Midianites as a whole are a mixed legacy behind him!

Yet along the way, the worship of the One True God was continued in parts of his family.

What are the impacts of a life? The actions echo forward into time and are hard to stop. In time, some of Esau's descendants did what was right, but others did not. Mixing his obedience with disobedience leaves him with a mixed legacy.

Therefore, let us focus our lives on being as fixed as possible in our obedience!

Reference Post: Bible Books and Bible Order

There's not much commentary here, this post is being created to sit in the background and be a reference link for certain other posts when necessary:

English books of the Bible with their somewhat traditional divisions:

Old Testament:

Pentateuch/Law/Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy

History: Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1&2 Samuel, 1&2 Kings, 1&2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther

Poetry/Wisdom: Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs (or of Solomon)

Major Prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations (can go in Poetry), Ezekiel, Daniel

Minor Prophets: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi

Note: The difference in Major Prophets and Minor Prophets is primarily one of length. It is not really one of importance.

New Testament:

Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John

History: Acts

Pauline Epistles: Romans, 1&2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1&2 Thessalonians, 1&2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon

General Epistles: Hebrews (some consider this one Pauline, I do not), James, 1&2 Peter, 1,2,3 John, Jude

Prophecy: Revelation

The Christian Old Testament bears much similarity of content with the Jewish Scriptures. However, the order used is different. At the time of writing the New Testament, the books of the Jewish Scriptures were divided in this manner (this is also the order they would have been known to the people of the New Testament and early church):

Torah (or Law): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy

Nevi'im (or Prophets): Joshua, Judges, 1&2 Samuel, 1&2 Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Book of the Twelve (consisting of: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi)

Ketuvim (or Writings): Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah (together), 1&2 Chronicles.

The New Testament codified in the order that we have. Not much else to discuss there.

Critical points:

The Book of the Twelve: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi. We separate these, but this was one big batch of prophetic writings originally.

Law and the Prophets: that's the whole of the Torah and Nevi'im sections, which is most of the Old Testament.

Order: Traditional order is semi-chronological. Genesis is first, Malachi  last. Traditional Hebrew order is Genesis-Chronicles.

Through the Whole Bible: Genesis 35

In Genesis 35 (link) we have the final results of the catastrophe that was Genesis 34 (yesterday's post). Jacob was afraid that the inhabitants of the land would seek him out and take revenge for the slaughter of the men of Hamor's city (Genesis 34:30) and that he lacked the capacity to defend the rest of the family. One wonders about his commitment to protect the family from earlier in the chapter, but that was yesterday.

Today, God speaks to Jacob and tells him to move to Bethel. Bethel being the place where Jacob had vowed to establish as his place of worship if God brought him back to the land—but apparently Jacob hadn't gotten around to getting back there yet. Point one: do not hesitate to honor your word. Had he gone straight to Bethel, just made sure to turn left, then life would have been better. He didn't.

God reinforces the command to go where he was committed to go. The move puts distance between him and some of the Hivite relatives of Shechem and Hamor which is a good thing at this time.

Before they move, Jacob gives this instruction to his household:

1. Pack up.

No, wait, that's not it. First he tells them to do this: "put away the foreign gods…purify yourselves…change your garments." (Genesis 35:2)

Let's visit these three things in order:

1. Foreign gods? Wait a minute…what are they doing with foreign gods in the first place? That's not supposed to happen. Yet, apparently, it did happen. Jacob does not highlight a specific household member for having foreign gods, but consider Genesis 31:19 when you think about who may have them.

The point, though, is that the idols have got to go. Jacob recognizes that the only hope he and his family have is unified worship of the One True God. He calls on the family to unify and dispose of the idols. I do wonder, given that some of those were Laban's idols, if they sent them back or trashed them.

We cannot hope as God's people to work together when we allow foreign gods to exercise influence over us. Even if we think it's just minor, that influence will destroy us.

2. Purify yourselves. This reflects taking a definite religious decision to focus on the right things. Purification would also have entailed a physical, symbolic rite. We don't know exactly what it was, but it was something.

These first two statements are a critical pair: it is not enough to dispose of the bad. One must also add in the good. We need to be careful of this in our lives. I'm going to stop doing this bad thing! Great! What good thing will take its place? We want to have faith but faith must have an object or it's empty.

3. Change your garments. Excuse me? New clothes?

For Jacob, the change of heart needed an exterior picture. This was the change of clothes—a shift to a different physical appearance. I do not see here that there was anything particularly objectionable about the old garments, what matters is the picture of the new life.

It was time to put aside the old and take on the new. For Jacob, he was putting aside the recent for something that was both old and new for him in the commitment to the One True God, but for the rest of the family this is really their first hard and fast commitment.

What are our outer markers of commitment?

If it's impossible to see that a follower of God is living out that commitment, then is it really much of a commitment?

Through the Whole Bible: Genesis 34

Through the Whole Bible hits another one of those unhappy chapters in Scripture today. Genesis 34 (link) presents us with the ugly tale of the rape of Dinah. That, in and of itself, is a bad thing. A quick note: there is a not a specific Hebrew word at the time for our concept of rape—however, you can see here the concept of "took her and lay with her by force" which does not suggest consensual behavior. The traditional understanding of the Hebrew words here captures the concept: Dinah, previously pure and undefiled, is forced into Shechem's bed. No lexical flips and flops here can create any shared responsibility.

When people are involved, though, one bad thing is rarely enough. The story carries on that her rapist, who is the son of prince of the city, decides he really loves her and wants her for a wife. In negotiating a bride-price, her brothers set up the entire city for slaughter and destroy Hamor. Her father, meanwhile, only raises a cry about the bad effect on public relations that destroying the city will bring.

There are several layers of lesson in this passage; some are obvious whilst others are less clear. Some are quite the stretch: I could tell you that this passage shows a Biblical reason for concealed carry permits and personal weapons training, but that's another story.

Neither should you need me to give you the obvious: rape is sinful. Later Scripture makes it a capital offense, demanding execution for the rapist in Deuteronomy 22:25-27. If you do not think that forcing or coercing someone into sexual activity is wrong, then you have problems that a blog won't solve.

You should also already see that Simeon and Levi's deception and slaughter of the city was wrong. They persuade the city leadership that if every male is circumcised, then Shechem can have Dinah and the family of Jacob will intermarry with the city and settle down. Instead, though, as the men are recovering from circumcision, Simeon and Levi show up and slaughter all the men of the city. And if you don't know how two guys could pull that off, look up 'circumcision.'

That was bad for two reasons: one, it exceeded appropriate justice for Dinah. Shechem deserved some form of justice, and perhaps his father if any cover-up had been occurring. Yet what of the other men? What of the women and children now taken as slaves? It's entirely likely that Simeon and Levi's version of "justice" led to a lifetime of coerced sexual activity for the women taken from the city.

The other reason the deception was wrong is the inappropriate use of religious practice. Circumcision was given to the Hebrews as a sign of religious devotion to the One True God. Taking the covenant action and using it as cover for an attack was wrong—just as wrong as forcing someone to be baptized or any other similar action.

What lesson should we gather here? The one I want to highlight is this: the lack of justice destroys cities, families, and lives.

At this point in the story, justice should have been handled directly by Jacob on behalf of his daughter. That was the way of the times: Hamor and Jacob should have sorted out what to do about the situation. Likely their solution would not have been perfect and it probably would not be what I expect I would want in a similar situation with my daughter.

But nothing happened. Jacob took no action at all.

The system of justice broke down. Dinah is left to deal with her assault with no hope. She will likely be considered unmarriageable by the culture (wrong, but normal then) and be subject to whispers and rumors for her whole life. Shechem looks like he'll be left free to do whatsoever he chooses again and again.

So, Simeon and Levi take the matter into their own hands and destroy an entire city for the actions of one man. They enslave the survivors and then end up forcing their whole family to flee the area for safety.

The failure of the justice system to provide justice destroyed everyone involved in this case. Simeon and Levi lose their birth order rights (that's later in Genesis) for this; the men of the city are killed; the women are enslaved; and Dinah remains the innocent one here.

You want a cautionary tale about a justice system that allows a rich person to get away with crime? That allows someone from "in the group" to do whatever he wishes?

You've got that tale here.

The first caution is this: when justice is denied, people will seek it for themselves.

The second caution is this: when people seek justice for themselves, the endgame is ugly.

If you miss the first caution, you cannot avoid the second caution. It never works to rebuke the vigilante or the caped crusader: the first caution must be heeded or the second caution is inescapable.

Where do we sit today?

Through the Whole Bible: Genesis 33

Back on task: Through the Whole Bible continues with Genesis 33 (link). Here, Jacob's story of going home finishes up. He returns to Canaan. It is time for him to face the music of his years away and the circumstances that drove his departure.

He looks up and sees, though, a bad moon a-risin' as Esau is coming his way with 400 men. It would not have been surprising to see Esau coming with a few men. Traveling alone is dangerous and treacherous, and was no less so in those days. 400 men is more than just a bodyguard group or a hunting party. That's a batch big enough to fight a pretty substantial fight.

What does Jacob do at this point? He gets a little nervous. Wouldn't you? Jacob decides to split up his group more than it was already split up. He puts the two maidservants with their children in one group, Leah and her children in a second group, and finishes the line with Rachel and Joseph. We don't know exactly why he does this: Perhaps his hope is that Rachel and Joseph will escape if the other groups are attacked. Perhaps he's just spreading his family out so that they encounter Esau piecemeal. That might keep Esau from coming back with an aggressive response, not unlike Gandalf and Beorn in The Hobbit.

What I do know is this: I've heard and read this passage as an indictment against Jacob. Here he is, prioritizing his children. How wicked, how cowardly, how unmanly are his actions here? Extremely.

Well, only if you do not read Genesis 33:3. That's the most important verse in the whole opening paragraph about the arrangement of everyone. Jacob goes in front of everyone else. The linguistic phrase of "he himself" indicates that he likely goes forward alone. There's Esau with 400 and Jacob, alone, standing between the 400 and his family.

He's right where he should be: intervening between the danger he has caused and the innocent (potential) victims of it. That's good. Now, to get there, I think starts in Genesis 32 with his encounter with God. Without that encounter, Jacob would think he is alone facing Esau. He's not.

When we face trouble, we are not alone.

That's part one of the message. Part two, though, goes back to my fourth paragraph, the one where I mention how I had personally misunderstood this passage and had heard it presented differently, where Jacob's actions are the work of a man hiding behind his children. A man who is hiding behind his "least favorite" children first, and then the rest of his children at that.

Bible reading is a funny thing: there is nothing more important that a Christian can do and there are few things that we do so badly as read the Bible. We come with a lot of previously held opinions and want to find the Bible backs them up. We come with previously heard stories and want to find them presented just the same way in Scripture.

That's a danger we must be careful of falling into. Here's the truth: we cannot study the Bible with a completely open mind. We come with certain assumptions and find them validated: an example is that I come to the Bible believing there's a God and that God wants to be known. As such, I see in the text validation that there is a God, He wants to be known, and the Bible is the primary vehicle of that knowledge.

Now, some of these assumptions are good; some are not. We need to constantly allow the text to reshape those assumptions. At some points in history people came with the assumption the world was flat and found Scripture to agree; later years we found the world to be round and feel Scripture validates that view. My assumptions about how the world began and how it ends are somewhat in flux, with the hard stance being this: God did it, God sustains it, God ends it in His good time. The text has shaped and reshaped my understanding.

So, be cautious when a text is one that "you've always read this way." Make sure you're not missing anything there or adding in something that's not there. You may not be: the Resurrection is a pretty clear fact, though you may have missed a detail. But you may be taking the wrong lesson from some things—consider, and reconsider. The same God who inspired the text will illuminate it as your read it.

Sermon wrap up February 26

Sunday Morning Audio Link here (alternate)

Sunday Evening Audio Link here (alternate)

Sunday Morning Outline:

Nehemiah 7:1-2

How to be qualified for work in the Kingdom

I. Be Faithful

     A. In doctrine

          1. Believe the right things

          2. Disbelieve the wrong things

     B. In speech

          1. Teach the truth

          2. Refuse to speak falsehoods

          3. Commit to actively speak the truth

     C. In action

          1. Do not act contrary to God's Word

          2. Act to spread the Gospel

II. Fear God

     A. Recognize His holiness

          1. Otherness of God

          2. Unapproachableness

     B. Recognize His righteousness

          1. Purity

          2. Perfection

     C. Recognize His justice

          1. Wrath

          2. Grace through Christ

Evening Sermon: Psalm 26

Through the Whole Bible: Genesis 32

Just when you think things cannot get much worse for Jacob, they do. Not unlike normal life when you think about it. Here's Jacob, having just escaped from Laban in Genesis 31, heading back to Canaan. Esau, the brother he wronged all those years ago, is there. Waiting for him.

Now, in Genesis 32 (link) we see the build up to that meeting. Jacob separates out first a gift for his brother, then sends his wives and children across the creek they have been camped beside.

And he's alone in the camp for the night. At present, Esau lives some distance away in Seir. The Biblical notation that it's the country of Edom is a little bit of an anachronism: it becomes the country of Edom in the years that Esau and his family fill, populate, and rule the area. Keep in mind that the closest this was written to the events is about 500 years afterwards. Using "country of Edom" here is no different from describing the original settlement of Manhattan as being part of New York: yes, it was New Amsterdam then, but now? New York makes sense to the current audience.

The prayer of Jacob in the middle of the chapter, starting at Genesis 32:9, is what really strikes me here. Jacob confesses his unworthiness, his dependence on God, and acknowledges God's provision, promise, and protection in his life.

That's worth holding onto in our lives.

First: Our unworthiness. If God is God, He is bigger and grander than what we understand and are. He's beyond us, better than us, and bigger than us. He does not need us, so why does He bother? Because He wants to—not because we are worthy of Him.

Second: Our dependence on God. It does not go both ways. In my home, I'm dependent on Ann for some things and she's dependent on me for others. It's a mutual dependency. (Not a co-dependency!) This is not the case for God. He is independent of us but we need Him. Very much—whatever you'd like to argue for processes, the theistic view point is that God made it all and holds it all together somehow. We need Him.

Third: God's provision. This is a subset of dependence. Can you make a garden grow? Nope. You can plant it, water it, and fertilize it but seeds germinate or don't. Photosynthesis happens…or it doesn't. God provides that. God provides, though one can debate and ponder how it all works.

Fourth: God's protection. Likewise, a subset of dependence is protection. I lock my doors, but trust God to keep me safe. That's a set of teachings from Nehemiah, but suffice it to say this: trying to protect yourself apart from God's help leads to incessant paranoia. It will never, never work.

Fifth: God's promise. This is greater than all the others. We have a promise from God. A promise that He is working in us for His glory. What else do we need? May we learn to trust His promise for all of our stability and desire.