Who Was Rebekah In The Bible

The Book of Genesis, one of the first books of The Holy Bible, opens with a condensed family tree. This short list features many names familiar for those who have read the Bible or studied the Hebrew people, but it also includes one name that is largely unknown. Rebekah, as well as some of her other family members, is known in Jewish and Christian religious texts, but has been largely omitted from academic study. Having grown up near religious communities and with a Jewish background, I have always been interested in Rebekah’s character. However, it is only recently that I became fully invested in this mystery woman by trying to discover her true identity. Who Was Rebekah?

Rebekah was Jacob’s (the father of the twelve sons) first wife. She was taking care of his sheep for him, when he first saw her. She was wearing a veil and had approached him from a distance, at which time she asked if he would let her water his flock. He didn’t realize she was a woman until he removed her veil and offered to take her home with him.

The story of Rebekah, also referred to as Rebecca in the Bible, is part of the most famous epic in Jewish and Christian scripture: the story of Jacob’s family and descendents. This piece examines the facts behind this heroine and everything she did that we know about her…

Rebekah was the wife of Isaac, the son of Abraham and mother of Jacob and Esau. The story of Rebekah is chronicled in Genesis 24:1-67. The Bible teaches us that God is sovereignly over all things, and He uses ordinary means to accomplish His plans.

Who Was Rebekah In The Bible

The story of the wooing of Rebekah unfolds in Genesis 24, the longest chapter in the Book of Genesis. A spouse for Isaac is to be obtained from his uncle Nahor’s family; the ensuing cousin marriage, with Rebekah and Isaac both members of the same kinship group, serves to emphasize the importance of their lineage. Abraham dispatches a trusted but unnamed servant to Mesopotamia, the land of his birth and where some of his family still resides, to find a wife for his son. Rebekah secures her role as wife-elect for Isaac by befriending the servant and his ten camels in the famous well scene, which has been called a type-scene—a narrative episode with certain expected motifs that appears at the critical juncture in the life of a hero. Indeed, the account of Rebekah at the well is the premier biblical example of such a scene. It ostensibly draws attention to Isaac, but, in his absence, reveals the beauty and especially the virtues of his wife-to-be.

After the well incident, Rebekah brings the servant home, enters into the marriage arrangement, and sets off to meet her future husband. She seems to have some input into the marriage negotiations, or at least into the decision about her departure from her homeland and birth family (24:57–58). When she first sees Isaac in Gen 24:62–65, she dismounts from her camel and veils herself, a nonverbal act perhaps signaling her status as a soon-to-be betrothed woman as it does for elite women in ancient Assyria. That she dons the betrothal veil herself may also indicate her independence. Once she arrives in the promised land, she enters Isaac’s home (called “his mother Sarah’s tent,” 24:67). There she is “loved” (24:67) by her husband, the first woman in the Hebrew Bible for whom marital love is proclaimed.

After twenty years of marriage, when Rebekah fails to become pregnant, Isaac prays to God, who grants the prayer that she may conceive. Another type-scene, that of the barren wife, thus enters the Rebekah story, calling attention to the special role of the children ultimately born to her. A divine oracle is addressed to her when she is pregnant; God proclaims that “two nations” are in her womb and will contend with each other (25:23). This oracle foreshadows the tensions that will characterize the relationship between her sons, Jacob and Esau, as figures in the Genesis narrative and as eponymous ancestors of Israel and Edom.

Who Was Rebekah In The Bible

Rebekah in the Bible was the wife of Isaac and mother of Jacob and Esau. We first meet Rebekah in Genesis 24:15, where she is identified as “the daughter of Bethuel son of Milkah, who was the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor.” This would have made Rebekah a great-niece to Abraham and second cousin to Isaac.

Abraham had been looking for a wife for his son, Isaac, but he was unwilling for Isaac to marry a Canaanite—Abraham and his family were living in Canaan at the time. So Abraham sent his servant to his own kinsmen, to the city of Nahor, to find a wife for Isaac. The servant came to a well and prayed that God would give him success in this mission. Specifically, he prayed that whichever young woman provided water for him and his camels would be God’s choice to be Isaac’s wife. As the servant was praying, along came a beautiful young virgin named Rebekah, who not only gave the servant a drink but also watered his camels, providing the sign to Abraham’s servant that she was the appointed bride (Genesis 24:10–28).

Everything was settled peaceably between Abraham’s servant and Rebekah’s father—and her brother, Laban—and the servant took Rebekah back to Isaac. Isaac and Rebekah were married (Genesis 24:67), but for many years Rebekah could not have children. Isaac prayed for his wife; the Lord answered his prayer, and Rebekah became pregnant (Genesis 25:21). Rebekah became the mother of Jacob and Esau, the first twins mentioned in the Bible (Genesis 25:22–24). From these twins came two conflicted nations.

God gave Rebekah a prophecy during her pregnancy. She had noticed that the twins were struggling against one another in her womb, and she asked the Lord why they were fighting. The Lord told her that two nations were in her womb and that those nations would be at odds with one another (Genesis 25:22–23). This prophecy came true. Jacob, whose name was later changed to Israel (Genesis 32:28), became the father of the twelve tribes of Israel. Esau became the father of the Edomites, who warred against Israel for ages and were finally wiped out (Obadiah 1:1–21).

Esau was born first, and he was Isaac’s favorite son (Genesis 25:28). The younger Jacob was Rebekah’s favorite. As the firstborn, Esau was due the birthright, but Rebekah helped Jacob deceive Isaac so that the blessing would fall to the younger son instead of to the elder (Genesis 27:1–40).

When Esau discovered Jacob and Rebekah’s deceit, he planned to kill Jacob. Rebekah devised a plan to help save her favorite son, but it again involved deceiving her husband, Isaac. Rebekah made up an excuse to send Jacob to her brother, Laban, to look for a wife for himself (Genesis 27:41–46). Deceit was apparently a family trait.

Rebekah’s marriage to Isaac was the result of God’s providence, her pregnancy was an answer to prayer, and the lives of her sons fulfilled prophecy. Rebekah’s choice to lie and deceive her husband is an example of how wrongdoing in human beings does not thwart the plans of God and how God can ultimately bring about His will, through His mercy and wisdom, despite our sin (see Genesis 50:20).

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