Chronological Plan

¹Now it came about, when Isaac was old and his eyes were too dim to see, that he called his older son Esau and said to him, “My son.” And he said to him, “Here I am.”

²Then Isaac said, “Behold now, I am old and I do not know the day of my death.

³Now then, please take your gear, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me;

⁴and prepare a delicious meal for me such as I love, and bring it to me that I may eat, so that my soul may bless you before I die.”

⁵Now Rebekah was listening while Isaac spoke to his son Esau. So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game to bring home,

⁶Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Behold, I heard your father speak to your brother Esau, saying,

⁷‘Bring me some game and prepare a delicious meal for me, so that I may eat, and bless you in the presence of the LORD before my death.’

⁸So now, my son, listen to me as I command you.

⁹Go now to the flock and bring me two choice young goats from there, so that I may prepare them as a delicious meal for your father, such as he loves.

¹⁰Then you shall bring it to your father, that he may eat, so that he may bless you before his death.”

¹¹But Jacob said to his mother Rebekah, “Behold, my brother Esau is a hairy man and I am a smooth man.

¹²Perhaps my father will touch me, then I will be like a deceiver in his sight, and I will bring upon myself a curse and not a blessing.”

¹³But his mother said to him, “Your curse be on me, my son; only obey my voice, and go, get the goats for me.”

¹⁴So he went and got them, and brought them to his mother; and his mother made a delicious meal such as his father loved.

¹⁵Then Rebekah took the best garments of her elder son Esau, which were with her in the house, and put them on her younger son Jacob.

¹⁶And she put the skins of the young goats on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck.

¹⁷She also gave the delicious meal and the bread which she had made to her son Jacob.

¹⁸Then he came to his father and said, “My father.” And he said, “Here I am. Who are you, my son?”

¹⁹Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn; I have done as you told me. Come now, sit and eat of my game, so that you may bless me.”

²⁰Isaac said to his son, “How is it that you have it so quickly, my son?” And he said, “Because the LORD your God made it come to me.”

²¹Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come close, so that I may feel you, my son, whether you are really my son Esau or not.”

²²So Jacob came close to his father Isaac, and he touched him and said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”

²³And he did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like his brother Esau’s hands; so he blessed him.

²⁴And he said, “Are you really my son Esau?” And he said, “I am.”

²⁵So he said, “Bring it to me, and I will eat of my son’s game, that I may bless you.” And he brought it to him, and he ate; he also brought him wine and he drank.

²⁶Then his father Isaac said to him, “Please come close and kiss me, my son.”

²⁷So he came close and kissed him; and when he smelled the smell of his garments, he blessed him and said, “See, the smell of my son Is like the smell of a field which the LORD has blessed;

²⁸Now may God give you of the dew of heaven, And of the fatness of the earth, And an abundance of grain and new wine;

²⁹May peoples serve you, And nations bow down to you; Be master of your brothers, And may your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be those who curse you, And blessed be those who bless you.”

³⁰Now it came about, as soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had hardly gone out from the presence of his father Isaac, that his brother Esau came in from his hunting.

³¹Then he also made a delicious meal, and brought it to his father; and he said to his father, “Let my father arise and eat of his son’s game, that you may bless me.”

³²His father Isaac said to him, “Who are you?” And he said, “I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.”

³³Then Isaac trembled violently, and said, “Who then was he who hunted game and brought it to me, so that I ate from all of it before you came, and blessed him? Yes, and he shall be blessed.”

³⁴When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, “Bless me, me as well, my father!”

³⁵And he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and has taken away your blessing.”

³⁶Then Esau said, “Is he not rightly named Jacob, for he has betrayed me these two times? He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing.” And he said, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”

³⁷But Isaac replied to Esau, “Behold, I have made him your master, and I have given to him all his relatives as servants; and with grain and new wine I have sustained him. What then can I do for you, my son?”

³⁸Esau said to his father, “Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me, me as well, my father.” So Esau raised his voice and wept.

³⁹Then his father Isaac answered and said to him, “Behold, away from the fertility of the earth shall be your dwelling, And away from the dew of heaven from above.

⁴⁰And by your sword you shall live, And you shall serve your brother; But it shall come about when you become restless, That you will break his yoke from your neck.”

⁴¹So Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him; and Esau said to himself, “The days of mourning for my father are near; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”

⁴²Now when the words of her elder son Esau were reported to Rebekah, she sent word and called her younger son Jacob, and said to him, “Behold your brother Esau is consoling himself concerning you by planning to kill you.

⁴³Now then, my son, obey my voice, and arise, flee to Haran, to my brother Laban!

⁴⁴Stay with him a few days, until your brother’s fury subsides,

⁴⁵until your brother’s anger against you subsides and he forgets what you did to him. Then I will send word and get you from there. Why should I lose you both in one day?”

⁴⁶And Rebekah said to Isaac, “I am tired of living because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth like these from the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

¹So Isaac called Jacob and blessed him and commanded him, saying to him, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan.

²Arise, go to Paddan-aram, to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father; and from there take to yourself a wife from the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother.

³May God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and multiply you, so that you may become a multitude of peoples.

⁴May He also give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and to your descendants with you, so that you may possess the land where you live as a stranger, which God gave to Abraham.”

⁵Then Isaac sent Jacob away, and he went to Paddan-aram to Laban, son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

⁶Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan-aram to take to himself a wife from there, and that when he blessed him he commanded him, saying, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan,”

⁷and that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Paddan-aram.

⁸So Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan displeased his father Isaac;

⁹and Esau went to Ishmael, and married, besides the wives that he had, Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebaioth.

¹⁰Then Jacob departed from Beersheba and went toward Haran.

¹¹And he happened upon a particular place and spent the night there, because the sun had set; and he took one of the stones of the place and made it a support for his head, and lay down in that place.

¹²And he had a dream, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth with its top reaching to heaven; and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.

¹³Then behold, the LORD was standing above it and said, “I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your descendants.

¹⁴Your descendants will also be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, and to the north and to the south; and in you and in your descendants shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

¹⁵Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

¹⁶Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “The LORD is certainly in this place, and I did not know it!”

¹⁷And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!”

¹⁸So Jacob got up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had placed as a support for his head, and set it up as a memorial stone, and poured oil on its top.

¹⁹Then he named that place Bethel; but previously the name of the city had been Luz.

²⁰Jacob also made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will keep me on this journey that I take, and give me food to eat and garments to wear,

²¹and I return to my father’s house in safety, then the LORD will be my God.

²²And this stone, which I have set up as a memorial stone, will be God’s house, and of everything that You give me I will assuredly give a tenth to You.”

¹Then Jacob set out on his journey, and went to the land of the people of the east.

²He looked, and saw a well in the field, and behold, three flocks of sheep were lying there beside it, because they watered the flocks from that well. Now the stone on the mouth of the well was large.

³When all the flocks were gathered there, they would roll the stone from the mouth of the well and water the sheep. Then they would put the stone back in its place on the mouth of the well.

⁴Jacob said to them, “My brothers, where are you from?” And they said, “We are from Haran.”

⁵So he said to them, “Do you know Laban the son of Nahor?” And they said, “We know him.”

⁶And he said to them, “Is it well with him?” And they said, “It is well, and here is his daughter Rachel coming with the sheep.”

⁷Then he said, “Look, it is still high day; it is not time for the livestock to be gathered. Water the sheep, and go, pasture them.”

⁸But they said, “We cannot, until all the flocks are gathered, and they roll the stone from the mouth of the well; then we water the sheep.”

⁹While he was still speaking with them, Rachel came with her father’s sheep, for she was a shepherdess.

¹⁰When Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of his mother’s brother Laban, and the sheep of his mother’s brother Laban, Jacob went up and rolled the stone from the mouth of the well, and watered the flock of his mother’s brother Laban.

¹¹Then Jacob kissed Rachel, and raised his voice and wept.

¹²Jacob told Rachel that he was a relative of her father and that he was Rebekah’s son, and she ran and told her father.

¹³So when Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister’s son, he ran to meet him, and embraced him and kissed him, and brought him to his house. Then he told Laban all these things.

¹⁴And Laban said to him, “You certainly are my bone and my flesh.” And he stayed with him a month.

¹⁵Then Laban said to Jacob, “Because you are my relative, should you therefore serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be?”

¹⁶Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel.

¹⁷And Leah’s eyes were weak, but Rachel was beautiful in figure and appearance.

¹⁸Now Jacob loved Rachel, so he said, “I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter Rachel.”

¹⁹Laban said, “It is better that I give her to you than to give her to another man; stay with me.”

²⁰So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him like only a few days because of his love for her.

²¹Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife, for my time is completed, that I may have relations with her.”

²²So Laban gathered all the people of the place and held a feast.

²³Now in the evening he took his daughter Leah and brought her to him; and Jacob had relations with her.

²⁴Laban also gave his female slave Zilpah to his daughter Leah as a slave.

²⁵So it came about in the morning that, behold, it was Leah! And he said to Laban, “What is this that you have done to me? Was it not for Rachel that I served with you? Why then have you deceived me?”

²⁶But Laban said, “It is not the practice in our place to marry off the younger before the firstborn.

²⁷Complete the week of this one, and we will give you the other also for the service which you shall serve with me, for another seven years.”

²⁸Jacob did so and completed her week, and he gave him his daughter Rachel as his wife.

²⁹Laban also gave his female slave Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her slave.

³⁰So Jacob had relations with Rachel also, and indeed he loved Rachel more than Leah, and he served with Laban for another seven years.

³¹Now the LORD saw that Leah was unloved, and He opened her womb, but Rachel was unable to have children.

³²Leah conceived and gave birth to a son, and named him Reuben, for she said, “Because the LORD has seen my affliction; surely now my husband will love me.”

³³Then she conceived again and gave birth to a son, and said, “Because the LORD has heard that I am unloved, He has therefore given me this son also.” So she named him Simeon.

³⁴And she conceived again and gave birth to a son, and said, “Now this time my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” Therefore he was named Levi.

³⁵And she conceived again and gave birth to a son, and said, “This time I will praise the LORD.” Therefore she named him Judah. Then she stopped having children.