As for the help which was to come to him from Heaven,of that we notice very little.For when Jacob reached the land of Ur,he found his uncle willing to give him a home,but when he asked for the hand of his cousin Rachel,who was young and beautiful,Laban first made his nephew work for him for nothing for seven years,and then gave him his oldest daughter,Leah,whom Jacob did not like and did not want.But when he said so,his uncle told him it was the custom of the country to give the older daughter in marriage before the younger left home,and if Jacob wanted Rachel too,he must promise to work another seven years.In that case,he could have her also.
What could Jacob do?At home,Esau was waiting for him with a club.He had no place which he could call his own.Besides,he loved Rachel,and he felt that he must have her if he was to be happy.He tended his uncle's sheep faithfully for another seven years,and then felt that he had fulfilled his contract.
Even then,he was at the mercy of his mother's relatives.He had no flocks of his own and could not set up a household of his own.Once more,he made an agreement with Laban.He would work for seven more years.Then he would receive all the black lambs and the spotted and the speckled goats which happened to be found on Laban's lands.This would give him a fair start towards independence.
It was a curious bargain.Laban knew that black lambs are quite as rare as spotted and speckled goats.He therefore did not expect to lose many,and to protect himself still further,he took all the male and female goats that were spotted and striped and sent them to another pasture,where they were tended by his own sons,who saw to it that none fell into the hands of Jacob.
It was a game of wits between uncle and nephew,but in the end,the nephew proved to be the sharper of the two.
Jacob really was a very good shepherd.He understood his business and had learned a good many tricks.He knew how to change the food and the water of his flocks,so as to increase the number of certain strangely coloured goats and sheep.
Laban,on the other hand,who left most of the farm work to his sons and to his slaves,was not familiar with these new methods of husbandry.Before he knew what was happening,Jacob had gained possession of most of his herds.Then he grew very angry,but it was too late.Jacob had gone.He had taken all his black lambs with him and all his spotted and speckled goats and his two wives and his eleven children.For good measure,he had forced his way into the deserted house of Laban,and had stolen the household goods which belonged to his father-in-law.
It is true that it never came to open warfare between Laban and Jacob.It would have been a sort of civil war,anyway.But Jacob left the land of Ur for ever,and as he had nowhere else to go,he decided to take a risk and return to Canaan.Perhaps Esau would forgive him,and besides there was the inheritance in case of Isaac's death.
Once more,if we are to believe the story of Jacob,his journey through the desert was accompanied by strange dreams.Upon one occasion,so Jacob vowed,he actually wrestled with an angel of Jehovah,who broke his thigh when he threw him,and who told him that his name henceforth would be Israel,and that he would be a mighty prince in the land of his birth.
But when he came near Mamre,he did not feel so sure of himself,and when he heard that Esau was coming forward with many men and many camels,he greatly feared that the day of reckoning had come.
He did his very best to gain the good will of his brother.He offered to give him everything he had.He divided his flocks into three parts,and sent one ahead every day,as a present to Esau.But Esau was as kindly as he was rough.He did not want anything that belonged to Jacob.He had forgiven him long ago and when he met Jacob,he tenderly embraced him and bade bygones be bygones.Their father,so he told him,was still alive,although very old,and he would be glad to see his new grandchildren.
There were eleven of these when Jacob reached Hebron,but before he got back to the family,farm there were twelve.
For a long time there had been bitter hatred between Rachel and Leah.Leah,the homely wife whom Jacob did not love,had ten sons and daughters.But poor Rachel had only one,who was called Joseph.And now she died when she gave birth to her second boy,who was called Benjamin.
This was a sad home coming.Rachel was buried at Bethlehem,and then Jacob drove his flocks westward until he reached Hebron.
Isaac was still strong enough to greet his long lost son.Soon afterwards,however,he died and was buried with his father Abraham and his mother Sarah in the cave of Machpelah.
And Jacob,who now called himself Israel,inherited his father's estate,and settled down to enjoy the fruits of a career that had been based entirely upon fraud and upon theft.Such a life,however,is rarely a success.Before very long,Jacob was once more forced to leave his old home.He spent the last years of his life in the distant land of Egypt,and far away from the graves of his ancestors.
But of this,I must tell you in the next Chapter.
