Who was Jacob in the Bible?

Son of Isaac and Rebekah. Though a twin, he is called 'the younger,' being born after Esau. Before the children were born it was said, "the elder shall serve the younger." The promises made by God to Abraham were thus confirmed to Jacob, as they had been to Isaac. When they grew up, Esau became a hunter, whereas Jacob was a peaceful man, dwelling in tents. Isaac loved Esau, and Rebekah loved Jacob. The typical character of these three patriarchs has been described thus: "In general, Abraham is the root of all promise, and the picture of the life of faith; Isaac is a type of the heavenly Man, who receives the church; and Jacob represents Israel as heir of the promises according to the flesh." The difference may be seen by comparing Gen. 22:17 ('stars ' and 'sand'), with Gen. 26:4 ('stars' only), and Gen. 28:14 ('dust of the earth' only).

It is a remarkable fact, to which attention was called in this magazine not long ago, that Jacob is designated a "plain" or, as the word is elsewhere translated, "perfect" man (Gen 25:27). The reference is, we believe, to the deep underlying current of life-purpose which characterized him. On the surface his life was marked by innumerable eddies and cross currents: no other of the patriarchs had so chequered a career as he. Yet the redeeming feature in his case was that from his early years he set his mind upon the Divine blessing connected with the birthright, and that blessing — though possibly he but very dimly apprehended it — centred in the Christ who was to come. Consequently he maintained the pilgrim character and went on dwelling in tents, when Esau adopted the line of things formerly favoured by Nimrod, and became a "cunning hunter."

Jacob's life up to this point in Genesis 32 was a sorrowful one. God had purposed to bless him before he was born, as you read in a previous chapter, where the Lord said to Rebekah, "Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger" (Gen. 25:23). That is to say, God purposed to bless Jacob beyond Esau. In the end of that chapter, you recollect, Esau sells his birthright for a mess of lentil pottage. Esau was a worldly man, and he sells his birthright — that which belonged to him as the first-born. He comes in faint from the chase, and finds Jacob making pottage. Esau desires it, and Jacob says, "Sell me this day thy birthright"; and Esau replies: "Behold, I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me? And Jacob said, Swear to me this day; and he sware to him: and he sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentiles; and he did eat and drink, and rose up and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright" (Gen. 25:31-34).

though we must not suppose that either of the two young men fully realized what the birthright meant. Still they knew that it carried with it a blessing from God. This Jacob greatly desired, whilst to Esau it signified practically nothing. He was willing to barter it for the transient satisfaction produced in a hungry man when he has devoured a good meal of pottage. The bargain was struck and thus Esau despised his birthright and lost it. But even on Jacob's side the deal was not a creditable one. It was a case of seeking a right thing in a wrong way. He did not get the blessing then. Later he did get it from his father, but he only got it from God when subsequently he was brought face to face with Him, as recorded in Genesis 32:29.

It was said by God before the birth of Jacob and his older brother Esau that they would be fathers of two nations of different characters, the one being stronger than the other, and the elder (Esau) would serve the younger (Jacob) (Gen.25:33), but instead of waiting patiently for God to accomplish His will in His own time, Jacob, aided by his mother Rebekah, repeated the mistake of his grandfather Abraham in trying to bring about God’s promises is his own time and in his own way. While Abraham had a son, Ishmael, of Hagar the bondswoman, Jacob deceived his father into blessing him rather than Esau. Then, leaving Esau, Jacob fled to his mother’s family at Padan-aram and, as he camped for the night at Bethel, God spoke to him in a dream (Gen.28:12-15) confirming the covenant that He had made with Abraham (Gen.15:1-6, 17:6-8, 22:15-18) and Isaac (Gen.26:2-5). The line of promise was through Jacob not Esau, but Jacob’s faith was weak and again he wanted to do things on his own terms promising, “If God be with me, and will help me, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God” (28:20-21), and he left Bethel and went to Padan-aram. There he worked for his uncle Laban and acquired Leah and Rachel as wives and had great possessions.

Other people make the mistake of justifying Jacob because God said, "Jacob have I loved" (Mal.1:2), saying God does not love a schemer. Jacob was wrong in deceiving his father. Jacob himself knew he was wrong. When he went out he went out with a bad conscience. When eventually he came back to meet Esau how did he feel? Well he knew that he had done wrong because he fell to the ground before Esau seven times and six times called him "My lord" (33:3,8,13,14(x2),15). He was afraid of his brother, this deception bothered him from that very time until he met Esau again, nevertheless Esau was one who despised the birthright, and Jacob was one who valued it. Here I think is a very important principle, the child of God values what God has to give, Jacob valued it even though he used a wrong method to get it. This is characteristic of a child of God, to take what God freely gives, this being the source of all power all joy and all blessing. In other words, we must accept, as a gift by grace, that which God bestows. This is true of every spiritual blessing on the part of the believer, he has "every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ" (Eph.1:3), we have only to take them and use them. As regards material blessings, the Lord sees fit to give them to us or to withhold them from us according to His divine wisdom in the way in which He sees it will work for our greatest good whether it be physical health or whatever it may be.

Jacob loved Joseph more than all his other sons, which caused them to hate Joseph; they also hated him for the communications given to him through dreams, and eventually sold him to the Ishmeelites. Again Jacob was dealt with deceitfully; his sons pretended that they had found Joseph's coat stained with blood, and Jacob was greatly distressed. But God was watching and overruling all for good. When Jacob and his household arrived in Egypt, he as a prince of God blessed Pharaoh king of Egypt. He lived in Egypt seventeen years, and died at the good old age of 147.

The whole family of Jacob, consisting of seventy souls, exclusive of the wives and the servants, came to Egypt. Once more God appears to Israel, but addresses him as Jacob. He gives him permission to go down to Egypt and assures him of His presence. They were directed to the land of Goshen, which was east of Memphis. And what a meeting it was, when Joseph fell around his father's neck and kissed him!

"And Joseph went in and told Pharaoh and said, My father and my brethren, and their sheep and their cattle and all that they have, are come out of the land of Canaan; and behold they are in the land of Goshen. And from among his brethren he took five men and presented them to Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said to his brethren, What is your occupation? And they said to Pharaoh, Thy servants are shepherds, both we and our fathers. And they said to Pharaoh, To sojourn in the land are we come; for there is no pasture for thy servants' flocks; for the famine is sore in the land of Canaan: now therefore we pray thee, let thy servants dwell in the land of Goshen. And Pharaoh spoke to Joseph saying, Thy father and thy brethren are come to thee: the land of Egypt is before thee; in the best of the land make thy father and thy brethren dwell; in the land of Goshen let them dwell. And if thou knowest any men of activity among them, then make them rulers over my cattle. And Joseph brought in Jacob his father and set him before Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said to Jacob, How many are the days of the years of thy life? And Jacob said to Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are a hundred- and-thirty years: few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from the presence of Pharaoh. And Joseph placed his father and his brethren, and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as Pharaoh had commanded. And Joseph nourished his father, and his brethren, and all his father's household with bread, according to their families" (vers. 1-12).

In the long list of that bright and glorious cloud of witnesses of faith in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, we find Jacob, when a-dying." There was not much testimony of faith in Jacob's life, (only that he was not profane like Esau.) His faith was manifested on his quitting the "Valley of the Shadow of Death." What a halo there was around that death-bed, where the old Patriarch "blessed the sons of Joseph, and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff." When he, a homeless youth, had fled from his father's house and the fury of Esau, he had nothing but this staff, — the bare ground for his bed, and a stone for his pillow.* It was then and there that the Lord had said to him, "Behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of."