Leah
Leah | |
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לֵאָה | |
Born | |
Died | |
Spouse | Jacob (cousin/husband) |
Children | |
Parent |
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Relatives | See list
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Leah[a] (/ˈliːə/) appears in the Hebrew Bible as one of the two wives of the Biblical patriarch Jacob. Leah was Jacob's first wife, and the older sister of his second (and favored) wife Rachel. She is the mother of Jacob's first son Reuben. She has three more sons, namely Simeon, Levi and Judah, but does not bear another son until Rachel offers her a night with Jacob in exchange for some mandrake root (דודאים, dûdâ'îm). Leah gives birth to two more sons after this, Issachar and Zebulun, and to Jacob's only daughter, Dinah.
Name
Leah means "wild cow," a common title with ancient goddesses like
Biblical narrative
Overview
Leah first appears in the
Prior to her and Rachel's mentioning, the Book of Genesis details how their first cousin and future husband, Jacob, with the help of his mother, Rebecca, willfully deceives his dying father, Isaac, into giving him his twin brother Esau's birthright. Fearful of his brother's wrath, Jacob flees his homeland for
Leah's life as Jacob's wife was distressful. So lonely was she that even the Lord took notice of it and blessed her with many children as consolation. Due to the extreme emotional distress suffered by both Leah (and Rachel) during the marriage, Yahweh later strictly clarified his opposition to uncovering the nakedness of a woman and her sister while both were still living (Genesis 30:1, Leviticus 18:18).
Despite Rachel's infertility, Jacob still favored Rachel over her. He also favored Rachel's sons, Joseph and Benjamin, over Leah's, and made no attempts to hide that from her or his other children. According to 1 Chronicles 5:1,[9] Jacob took the firstborn's birthright, which entitles a firstborn to a larger inheritance in Jewish law, from Reuben, his oldest son, to Joseph, who was his second-youngest son, and, in Genesis 33:2,[10] when he is confronted by Esau, puts Leah, along with Zilpah and Bilhah and all of their sons, in front of himself, Rachel, and Joseph, to be used as something of a buffer or a shield to protect himself in the event the confrontation turned violent.
Appearance
The
The commentary of
Marriage to Jacob
Leah becomes Jacob's wife through a deception on the part of her father, Laban. In the Biblical account, Jacob is dispatched to the hometown of Laban—the brother of his mother Rebekah—to avoid being killed by his brother Esau, and to find a wife. Out by the well, he encounters Laban's younger daughter Rachel tending her father's sheep, and decides to marry her. Laban is willing to give Rachel's hand to Jacob as long as he works seven years for her.
On the wedding night, however, Laban switches Leah for Rachel. Later Laban claims that it is uncustomary to give the younger daughter away in marriage before the older one (Genesis 29:16–30).[15] Laban offers to give Rachel to Jacob in marriage in return for another seven years of work (Genesis 29:27).[16] Jacob accepts the offer and marries Rachel after the week-long celebration of his marriage to Leah.
Motherhood
Leah was the mother of six of Jacob's sons, including his first four (
). According to the scriptures, God saw that Leah was "unloved" and opened her womb as consolation. Through her sons Levi and Judah, she is thus the matriarch of both the priestly (Levite) and royal (Judahite) tribes in Israel.Seeing that she was unable to conceive, Rachel offered her handmaid
One day, Leah's firstborn son Reuben returned from the field with
Rivalry with Rachel
On a
Each woman also continually questioned whether she was doing enough in her personal efforts toward increased spirituality, and would use the other's example to spur herself on. Rachel envied Leah's tearful prayers, by which she merited to marry the tzaddik and bear six of his twelve sons.[17][20] The Talmud (Megillah 13b) says that Rachel revealed to Leah the secret signs which she and Jacob had devised to identify the veiled bride, because they both suspected Laban would pull such a trick.[21]
Death and burial
Leah died some time before Jacob (according to Genesis 49:31).
Medieval Christian symbolism
In medieval Christian symbolism, Rachel was taken as a symbol of the contemplative (monastic) Christian life, and Leah as a symbol of the active (non-monastic) life.[24] Dante Alighieri's Purgatorio includes a dream of Rachel and Leah, which inspired illustrations by Dante Gabriel Rossetti and others:
"... in my dream, I seemed to see a woman
both young and fair; along a plain she gathered
flowers, and even as she sang, she said:
Whoever asks my name, know that I'm Leah,
and I apply my lovely hands to fashion
a garland of the flowers I have gathered."[25]
Notes
- ^ Biblical Hebrew: ועיני לאה רכות) (Genesis 29:17).[6] It is debated as to whether the adjective "tender" (רכות) should be taken to mean "delicate and soft" or "weary". Some translations say that it may have meant blue or light colored eyes. Some say that Leah spent most of her time weeping and praying to God to change her destined mate; thus the Torah describes her eyes as "soft" from weeping. See the section #Appearancefor further reading.
References
- ISBN 9780802849625
- ISBN 9780820474625
- OCLC 163207721
- JSTOR 1360043. Retrieved 2023-12-12.
- ^ Noegel, Scott B. (1997-01-01). "Sex, Sticks, and the Trickster in Gen. 30:31-43". Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society. 25 (1): 15. Retrieved 2023-11-03. however, note that references to bovines and their fertility would not have been an unkind association in the ancient near East, where the cultural attitude toward cattle is reflected by the ubiquity of boviform gods.
- ^ Genesis 29:17
- ^ Genesis 28:2
- ^ "Paddan-Aram". www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 2020-04-30.
- ^ 1 Chronicles 5:1
- ^ Genesis 33:2
- ^ Genesis 29:17
- ^ Bivin, David, "Leah's Tender Eyes," at jerusalemperspective.com Archived 2007-05-26 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Noegel, Scott B. (1997-01-01). "Sex, Sticks, and the Trickster in Gen. 30:31-43". Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society. 25 (1). Retrieved 2023-11-03.
- aish.com
- ^ Genesis 29:16–30
- ^ Genesis 29:27
- ^ a b Ginzberg, Louis (1909) The Legends of the Jews, Volume I, Chapter VI: Jacob, at sacred-texts.com
- ^ Mandrake Archived 2007-09-30 at the Wayback Machine in the American Bible Society Online Bible Dictionary, 1865, Broadway, New York, NY 10023-7505 at www.bibles.com
- ISBN 9781946822680.
- ^ a b Feinhandler, Yisrael Pesach, Beloved Companions, Vayetze - III, "Jealousy Can Be a Tool for Spiritual Growth," at shemayisrael.com
- ^ Wagensberg, Abba (2006), "Between The Lines," in Toras Aish, Volume XIV, No. 11, 2006 Rabbi A. Wagensberg & aish.com
- ^ Genesis 49:31
- ^ Richman, Chaim (1995), "Focus on Hebron," Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine 1995 Light to the Nations, Rabbi Chaim Richman - All Rights Reserved, Reprinted from The Restoration newsletter, July, 1995 (Tammuz/Av, 5755) at lttn.org Archived 2010-08-31 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Dorothy L. Sayers, Purgatory (translation of Dante's Purgatorio), notes on Canto XXVII.
- ^ Dante's Purgatorio, Canto XXVII, lines 97–102, Mandelbaum translation.