Chronological Plan

¹Now it came to pass, when Isaac was old and his eyes were so dim that he could not see, that he called Esau his older son and said to him, “My son.” And he answered him, “Here I am.”

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

³Now therefore, please take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me.

⁴And make me savory food, such as I love, and bring it to me that I may eat, that my soul may bless you before I die.”

⁵Now Rebekah was listening when Isaac spoke to Esau his son. And Esau went to the field to hunt game and to bring it.

⁶So Rebekah spoke to Jacob her son, saying, “Indeed I heard your father speak to Esau your brother, saying,

⁷‘Bring me game and make savory food for me, that I may eat it and bless you in the presence of the LORD before my death.’

⁸Now therefore, my son, obey my voice according to what I command you.

⁹Go now to the flock and bring me from there two choice kids of the goats, and I will make savory food from them for your father, such as he loves.

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

¹¹And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, “Look, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth-skinned man.

¹²Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall seem to be a deceiver to him; and I shall bring a curse on myself and not a blessing.”

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

¹⁴And he went and got them and brought them to his mother, and his mother made savory food, such as his father loved.

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

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

¹⁷Then she gave the savory food and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob.

¹⁸So he went 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 just as you told me; please arise, sit and eat of my game, that your soul may bless me.”

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

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

²²So Jacob went near to Isaac his father, and he felt him and said, “The voice is Jacob’s voice, 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.

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

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

²⁶Then his father Isaac said to him, “Come near now and kiss me, my son.”

²⁷And he came near and kissed him; and he smelled the smell of his clothing, and blessed him and said: “Surely, the smell of my son Is like the smell of a field Which the LORD has blessed.

²⁸Therefore may God give you Of the dew of heaven, Of the fatness of the earth, And plenty of grain and wine.

²⁹Let peoples serve you, And nations bow down to you. Be master over your brethren, And let your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you, And blessed be those who bless you!”

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

³¹He also had made savory food, and brought it to his father, and said to his father, “Let my father arise and eat of his son’s game, that your soul may bless me.”

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

³³Then Isaac trembled exceedingly, and said, “Who? Where is the one who hunted game and brought it to me? I ate all of it before you came, and I have blessed him— and indeed he shall be blessed.”

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

³⁵But he said, “Your brother came with deceit and has taken away your blessing.”

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

³⁷Then Isaac answered and said to Esau, “Indeed I have made him your master, and all his brethren I have given to him as servants; with grain and wine I have sustained him. What shall I do now for you, my son?”

³⁸And Esau said to his father, “Have you only one blessing, my father? Bless me—me also, O my father!” And Esau lifted up his voice and wept.

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

⁴⁰By your sword you shall live, And you shall serve your brother; And it shall come to pass, when you become restless, That you shall break his yoke from your neck.”

⁴¹So Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father blessed him, and Esau said in his heart, “The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”

⁴²And the words of Esau her older son were told to Rebekah. So she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and said to him, “Surely your brother Esau comforts himself concerning you by intending to kill you.

⁴³Now therefore, my son, obey my voice: arise, flee to my brother Laban in Haran.

⁴⁴And stay with him a few days, until your brother’s fury turns away,

⁴⁵until your brother’s anger turns away from you, and he forgets what you have done to him; then I will send and bring you from there. Why should I be bereaved also of you both in one day?”

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

¹Then Isaac called Jacob and blessed him, and charged him, and said to him: “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan.

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

³“May God Almighty bless you, And make you fruitful and multiply you, That you may be an assembly of peoples;

⁴And give you the blessing of Abraham, To you and your descendants with you, That you may inherit the land In which you are a stranger, Which God gave to Abraham.”

⁵So Isaac sent Jacob away, and he went to Padan Aram, to Laban the son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

⁶Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Padan Aram to take himself a wife from there, and that as he blessed him he gave him a charge, 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 Padan Aram.

⁸Also Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan did not please his father Isaac.

⁹So Esau went to Ishmael and took Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebajoth, to be his wife in addition to the wives he had.

¹⁰Now Jacob went out from Beersheba and went toward Haran.

¹¹So he came to a certain place and stayed there all night, because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of that place and put it at his head, and he lay down in that place to sleep.

¹²Then he dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.

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

¹⁴Also your descendants shall be as the dust of the earth; you shall spread abroad to the west and the east, to the north and the south; and in you and in your seed all the families of the earth shall 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 spoken to you.”

¹⁶Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the LORD is 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!”

¹⁸Then Jacob rose early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put at his head, set it up as a pillar, and poured oil on top of it.

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

²⁰Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me, and keep me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on,

²¹so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the LORD shall be my God.

²²And this stone which I have set as a pillar shall be God’s house, and of all that You give me I will surely give a tenth to You.”

¹So Jacob went on his journey and came to the land of the people of the East.

²And he looked, and saw a well in the field; and behold, there were three flocks of sheep lying by it; for out of that well they watered the flocks. A large stone was on the well’s mouth.

³Now all the flocks would be gathered there; and they would roll the stone from the well’s mouth, water the sheep, and put the stone back in its place on the well’s mouth.

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

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

⁶So he said to them, “Is he well?” And they said, “He is well. And look, his daughter Rachel is coming with the sheep.”

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

⁸But they said, “We cannot until all the flocks are gathered together, and they have rolled the stone from the well’s mouth; then we water the sheep.”

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

¹⁰And it came to pass, when Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of Laban his mother’s brother, and the sheep of Laban his mother’s brother, that Jacob went near and rolled the stone from the well’s mouth, and watered the flock of Laban his mother’s brother.

¹¹Then Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice and wept.

¹²And Jacob told Rachel that he was her father’s relative and that he was Rebekah’s son. So she ran and told her father.

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

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

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

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

¹⁷Leah’s eyes were delicate, but Rachel was beautiful of form and appearance.

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

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

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

²¹Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife, for my days are fulfilled, that I may go in to her.”

²²And Laban gathered together all the men of the place and made a feast.

²³Now it came to pass in the evening, that he took Leah his daughter and brought her to Jacob; and he went in to her.

²⁴And Laban gave his maid Zilpah to his daughter Leah as a maid.

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

²⁶And Laban said, “It must not be done so in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn.

²⁷Fulfill her week, and we will give you this one also for the service which you will serve with me still another seven years.”

²⁸Then Jacob did so and fulfilled her week. So he gave him his daughter Rachel as wife also.

²⁹And Laban gave his maid Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as a maid.

³⁰Then Jacob also went in to Rachel, and he also loved Rachel more than Leah. And he served with Laban still another seven years.

³¹When the LORD saw that Leah was unloved, He opened her womb; but Rachel was barren.

³²So Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Reuben; for she said, “The LORD has surely looked on my affliction. Now therefore, my husband will love me.”

³³Then she conceived again and bore a son, and said, “Because the LORD has heard that I am unloved, He has therefore given me this son also.” And she called his name Simeon.

³⁴She conceived again and bore a son, and said, “Now this time my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” Therefore his name was called Levi.

³⁵And she conceived again and bore a son, and said, “Now I will praise the LORD.” Therefore she called his name Judah. Then she stopped bearing.