Rachel
“Ewe, sheep”
Summary
Rachel was the younger daughter of Laban, the beloved wife of Jacob, and the mother of Joseph and Benjamin, who died in childbirth and was buried near Bethlehem.
☩Marriage to Jacob
Rachel was the younger daughter of Laban, brother of Jacob's mother Rebekah. When Jacob fled from Esau's wrath and arrived at his uncle's home in Paddan-aram, he met Rachel at the well and was immediately drawn to her beauty. He agreed to serve Laban seven years for her hand, 'and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her.' But Laban treacherously substituted Leah at the wedding, requiring Jacob to serve another seven years for Rachel. Thus began an intense rivalry between the sisters that would mark the rest of their lives.
☩Barrenness and Motherhood
While Leah bore Jacob four sons in succession, Rachel remained barren, causing her great anguish. Her desperate cry to Jacob, 'Give me children, or else I die,' evoked his sharp reply that he was not God, who had withheld children from her. She gave her handmaid Bilhah to Jacob, who bore Dan and Naphtali. At length, 'God remembered Rachel' and she conceived Joseph, saying, 'God hath taken away my reproach.' Joseph would become Jacob's favorite son, through whom the family would be preserved in Egypt.
☩Death and Legacy
When Jacob's household fled from Laban, Rachel secretly stole her father's household gods (teraphim), perhaps intending to secure inheritance rights or unable to fully abandon idolatry. She died giving birth to her second son near Bethlehem, naming him Ben-oni ('son of my sorrow'), though Jacob renamed him Benjamin ('son of the right hand'). Jacob buried her on the road to Ephrath and set a pillar upon her grave, which remained a landmark for centuries. Jeremiah portrayed Rachel weeping for her children as a symbol of the nation's grief in exile, a prophecy Matthew applied to Herod's slaughter of the innocents.
Related Verses46 mentions
References
- 1.John McClintock and James Strong, "Rachel," in Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature, vol. VIII (Harper & Brothers, 1867–1887).
- 2.James Orr (ed.), "Rachel," in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. IV (Howard-Severance Company, 1915).
- 3.Andrew Robert Fausset, "Rachel," in The Englishman's Critical and Expository Bible Cyclopædia (Hodder & Stoughton, 1878).