February 5 - Isaac & Rebekah

February 5 - Isaac and Rebekah

I find it interesting that Isaac doesn't meet his wife until after his mother died. Isn't that every mother's dream, that her son will be true to her forever? Ok, maybe not ... maybe it was just my mother-in-law. And it was a good thing, too because when the first place that Isaac took Rebekah to was his mother's tent (Genesis 24:67). Yes, that means exactly what it says. Mama would definitely have had something to say about that! But Isaac was 40 years old when he married Rebekah (Genesis 25:20). I suspect he was tired of waiting.

Now, in Genesis 24, we find the story of Abraham's servant searching for a wife for Isaac. Abraham made him promise that he wouldn't find this wife from among the Canaanites. Abraham asked him to return to his (Abraham's) family to find a suitable wife. There was a lot of praying going on and God heard it all when he brought Rebekah to the well to care for the servant of Abraham.

I love the last verse of this chapter. "...he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother's death." How sweet is that?

Rebekah faced some of the same issues her mother-in-law had faced. She, too was barren. Isaac prayed on her behalf and she became pregnant with twins. And THEN! Isaac seems to follow in his father's footsteps. He went to Abimelech because of the famine and worried that the men of the community there might kill him because Rebekah was so beautiful. What did he do? Of course he did. He told them that she was his sister. I'm beginning to wonder if the women outside of Abraham's tribe were really that ugly or were these two so stunningly beautiful they stupefied their husbands!

When Esau was forty years old, he married a woman named Judith and another woman named Basemath. Both of this women were Hittites and Genesis 26:35 says "They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah." No wonder she was so ready to transfer the blessing of Isaac from Esau to Jacob. No woman wants nasty daughter-in-laws hanging around waiting for their inheritance! In fact, she says just that to Isaac at the end of Genesis 27. "I'm disgusted with living because of these Hittite women. If Jacob takes a wife from among the women of this land, from Hittite women like these, my life will not be worth living." (Gen. 27:46)

Jacob leaves to return to her brother, Laban. He does so to escape from Esau's fury and to take a wife. We read nothing more of Rebekah until Genesis 49:31 where we find that she and Isaac are buried with Abraham and Sarah.

Strong women change the world around their husbands sometimes. She will always be known as the mother of Jacob, who, through treachery brought him Isaac's blessing. Isaac loved her, though and had she asked, he might have given in to her request. Who knows?