God’s grace: powerful to achieve its goal (Gen 29:31-30:24)

A former colleague desperately wanted a family, so much so, that she divorced her husband when he categorically stated that he would not have children, ever. She married someone else, but ironically, her second husband turned out to be infertile. She ruefully reflected over her choices that she gave up an otherwise good relationship for the sake of having children only to end up in a less fulfilling marriage without children. We may strive and fight for things that we want and yet find that they elude us. Conversely, God’s grace can work through even the most unpromising circumstances and people.

Leah

While infertility continues to be a challenge in the family God has chosen, our reading highlights more problems: human squabbles, rivalry, and bitterness. How could God even contemplate being involved in the life of such people? How will such a family become the people of God? Isn’t this rather a hopeless enterprise from the word go? Yet amazingly, God continues to be involved. One cannot help feel pity for Leah who expresses her yearning for her husband’s love in the names she gives her children (Gen 29:32-34). Although she participated in the deception on Jacob and have become his wife, Jacob clearly blamed Laban as the instigator (Gen 29:25). Since Leah was not attractive according to the cultural norms of the day (Gen 29:17) and probably struggled to find a husband, she had little choice if Laban pressured her into the wedding night charade. Yet God saw her misery and made her fertile (Gen 29:31).

Rachel

Rachel, who had Jacob’s love, suffered in a different way. For one thing, it must have been galling to see her elder sister steal a march on her with the man promised to her and then experience Leah’s easy fertility while she was barren. Yet her imperious attitude in demanding a child of Jacob is rather unappealing (Gen 30:1-2) and her machinations to use her maid as a surrogate mother (as did Leah later, Gen 30:4-8; 9-12) is reminiscent of Sarah and Hagar’s story. The naming of Naphtali hints at the divine dimension of the issue (‘mighty wrestlings’ in v.8 literally means in Hebrew ‘wrestlings of God’). Like Jacob who wrestled with God and man (Gen 32:28), Rachel also wrestled with God, as well as with her sister. Yet the more she tried the less she succeeded. Gaining mandrakes (seen as an aphrodisiac and aid to fertility in the ancient world) in exchange for granting Leah a night with Jacob only led to Leah’s renewed fertility and Rachel’s ongoing barrenness (Gen 30:14-21). Yet in the end, despite Rachel’s initial arrogance and demands, God also saw her anguish in the years of barrenness and in His time (not hers) and by His grace (not her efforts), He granted her a son too (Gen 30:22-23).

Jacob and God’s grace to the family

In all this, Jacob himself was a pawn. He did not expect to marry two women and he was pulled between the sisters and pushed into bed with their maids to produce children. Even though surrogacy through a slave-wife was a respectable option in that culture, neither this arrangement, nor having several wives was ideal.[1] Nor would the problems miraculously disappear because God was involved. The choices the protagonists in the drama made would continue to create tensions. Jacob’s enduring love for Rachel but not Leah was to be transformed into favouritism for Joseph, Rachel’s biological son, and would arouse the other sons’ deadly jealousy. Nevertheless, through the ups and downs of these relationships, the greed and deceit of Laban, the jealousies and quarrels of the sisters, Jacob’s favouritism, God is nevertheless increasing the family and working His purposes promised long ago to Abraham. This passage teaches us that God involves Himself in our far-from-perfect life, and while He does not bow to our pressure and demands, He sees our anguish and gives mercy in His time and His way.

[1] The Old Testament does not explicitly forbid bigamy (two wives) or polygamy (many wives), except for the reference not to marry two sisters (Lev 18:18). However, the creation story sets the standard of one wife as the ideal and the portrayal of relationships with more than one wife are always fraught with tensions and rivalry, which underline their undesirability.

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