Bar-Ilan University
Parashat Hashavua Study Center
Parashat Toledot 5771/ November 6, 2010
Lectures on the weekly Torah reading by the faculty of Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan,
Israel. A project of the Faculty of Jewish Studies, Paul and Helene Shulman Basic Jewish
Studies Center, and the Office of the Campus Rabbi. Published on the Internet under the
sponsorship of Bar-Ilan University's International Center for Jewish Identity. Prepared for
Internet Publication by the Computer Center Staff at Bar-Ilan University. Inquiries and
comments to: Dr. Isaac Gottlieb, Department of Bible, gottlii@mail.biu.ac.il
Rebekah and Role Reversal
Dr. Yael Shemesh
Department of Bible
Rebekah, though similar in some respects to the other matriarchs,1 has certain
exceptional characteristics. Unlike the other matriarchs, whose birth is not recounted,
the Torah tells us of her birth (Gen. 22:23), even though the Bible does not usually
mention the birth of women. The Torah even lets us be privy to various stages in her
life and informs us of her qualities as a young maiden, prior to her marriage.
Second, Rebekah is the only matriarch regarding whom we can understand why she
was chosen. The story of her engagement to Isaac (Genesis 24) describes how she
passed the character test to which Abraham’s servant put her with flying colors. She is
presented as a paragon of virtue: exceptionally kind to Abraham’s servants and ten
camels alike, diligent and swift, polite. When the servant (“Eliezer”) comes to her
home, she is also a model of hospitality (like her future father-in-law, Abraham).
Asked by her family if she would return to be Isaac’s wife, she is brave and firm in
her decision to set out on the road without delay, notwithstanding the misgivings of
her family. In her willingness to leave her country, her homeland, and her father’s
house, she walked in Abraham’s footsteps (Gen. 12:1-4), except that Abraham
separated himself from his past by the Lord’s command whereas Rebekah did so
following the command of her heart, in other words, from strong intuition that this
was the correct thing for her to do.
For example, Rebekah’s good looks are noted (Gen. 24:16), so too Sarah’s beauty (Gen. 12:11), as
well as Rachel’s (Gen. 29:17); Rebekah was barren (Gen. 25:21), as Sarah had been before her (Gen.
11:30), and as was Rachel after her (Gen. 29:31); Isaac, upon arriving at Gerar, presented Rebekah as
his sister (Gen. 26:7), as Abraham had done, first in Egypt (Gen. 12:13) and later in Gerar (Gen. 20:2);
Rebekah, through her proactive behavior, influenced the fate of her sons (Gen. 27), just as Sarah took
action regarding the status of her son Isaac (Gen. 21:10).
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The account of Isaac and Rebekah’s engagement even hints at a gender role reversal
between them, indicating that Rebekah will be the more active and dominant figure in
their life together. As Robert Alter has shown, three stories in the Bible belong to the
category of the betrothal type-scene: the betrothal of Isaac and Rebekah (Genesis 24),
the betrothal of Jacob and Rachel (Genesis 29:1-20), and the betrothal of Moses and
Zipporah (Ex. 2:15-21).2 The features that Alter finds in the betrothal type-scene are:
(1) The groom (or his representative) sets out for a foreign land.
(2) There he meets a young maiden (or maidens) by the well (a symbol of
fertility).
(3) He draws water for the young maiden.
(4) The young maiden hurries home to announce the arrival of a foreigner (the
narratives uses the verbs to hurry and to run).
(5) The foreigner is invited to dine.
(6) The actual betrothal is concluded between the guest (or the person he
represents) and the young maiden.
Not all the features need appear in each of the narratives, and clearly each narrative
will have certain points of emphasis and characteristic lines. For example, in the
Jacob-Rachel betrothal narrative we are told that Jacob had to overcome an obstacle,
namely the stone on the mouth of the well – a befitting thing for Jacob, whose entire
life was one of contending. Likewise, the Moses-Zipporah betrothal story emphasizes
that Moses rescued the young maidens (vayoshian) from the shepherds before
watering their flock – part of his characterization as one who pursues justice, and a
premonition of the role he will play bringing deliverance (moshian) to the Israelites.
Only the story of Isaac and Rebekah’s betrothal deviates significantly from the model
proposed by Alter, and this deviation concerns the roles played by bride and groom,
indicating a gender-role reversal. It is not the groom who draws water for the bride,
rather the bride, Rebekah, who draws water for the groom’s representative, having
been sent by the groom’s father; the groom is absent altogether from the story of the
fateful meeting by the well. This is symbolic of Isaac and Rebekah’s entire life
together: Isaac is the passive figure (as in the binding of Isaac, Genesis 22), and
Rebekah, in contrast, is active and forceful. These character traits of the two are
destined to come to the fore in the story of stealing the blessing (Genesis 27).3
Even before we come to this story, Rebekah brings solace to Isaac’s grieving heart
and fills the void in him left by his mother’s death. The Torah presents with
psychological acuity how Rebekah occupied the place of her mother-in-law, both
physically and emotionally, both in Sarah’s tent and in Isaac’s heart: “Isaac then
brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he took Rebekah as his wife. Isaac
loved her, and thus found comfort after his mother’s death” (Gen. 24:67).
After twenty years of infertility, Rebekah gave birth to twins. Unlike the first
matriarch, Sarah, who protected the status of her son Isaac against Ishmael, the son of
her husband's other wife Hagar, Rebekah is the mother of two sons, a rejected one and
a chosen one, Esau and Jacob, and she independently decides (differently from her
husband Isaac) which of the two sons is worthy to carry on the family line. We are
told that Isaac loved Esau for a specific reason: “because he had a taste for game”
(Gen. 25:28), i.e., because he enjoyed eating the game that Esau hunted (see Gen.
Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative, New York 1981, ch. 3, “Biblical Type-Scenes and the
Uses of Convention,” pp. 47-62.
3
Alter, pp.53-54. Also see Adin Steinsaltz (Nashim ba-Mikra, Tel Aviv 1983, p. 25), who writes that
Rebekah was the complement to Isaac’s character, he being “the passive partner, not the active one.”
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27:3-4).4 We are not told why Rebekah had a preference for Jacob, but we have the
impression that her love is free of personal bias and stems from a deep acquaintance
with the personalities of her two sons. Many commentators and Bible scholars
explain that Rebekah preferred Jacob over Esau also because she knew that Jacob had
been chosen by Divine Providence, according to the word of G-d which she received
during her difficult pregnancy: “and the older shall serve the younger” (Gen. 25:23).
The way the verse is translated here is generally the way it is interpreted. However
Radak’s commentary on this verse rightfully points out: “The particle et, which
indicates which noun is the object, does not appear here. Thus we are left in doubt as
to which will serve the other, the older serving the younger or the younger serving the
older.” In other words, G-d’s message to Rebekah is a riddle and does not say clearly
who shall serve whom, for according to biblical style, in a verse which contains a
subject, verb and object, the subject can appear last and the object first, as in Job
14:19, in which the order of the Hebrew words is: Avanim shahaku mayim (= Stone
wears away water), but the meaning is clearly “Water wears away stone.” Another
example is Isaiah 64:1, which we might render as, “Water the fire makes boil.” In
other words, just as the earlier words of prophecy – “Two nations are in your womb,
two separate peoples shall issue from your body; one people shall be mightier than the
other” (Gen. 15:23) – do not make it clear who will dominate over whom, so too, in
my opinion, the last part of the prophecy leaves things obscure. Accordingly,
Rebekah is the one who interprets G-d’s words intuitively,5 thus affecting the history
of the Jewish people by taking action to assure that the older will serve the younger
and not the other way around. The reader trusts Rebekah’s intuition, especially in
view of the unflattering portrayal of gluttonous Esau as ruled by his appetite and not
worthy of the status of first-born, which he spurns (Gen. 25:29-34), and as a source of
bitterness to his parents on account of his marrying two Hittite women (Gen. 26:3435).6
For all that Rebekah was proactive and domineering, she lived in a patriarchal society
and therefore had no official power or authority. Therefore she had to act slyly to
assure that the son whom she perceived as worthy would receive the blessing that
Isaac had destined for his favored son, Esau (Gen. 27). Does this detract in any way
from her stature? The Torah seems to present her act ambivalently: on one hand, the
Torah’s unease is revealed when Jacob is punished measure for measure, turning from
the one who dissembled into the object of dissembling, when Laban deceives him and
exchanges Rachel for Leah – also an act of deceit in which older and younger are
interchanged (Gen. 29:23-27).7 On the other hand, Esau, unlike Jacob, is portrayed as
unworthy of the blessing, and thus we can understand Rebekah’s motives.
Notwithstanding all these reservations about acts of deception, the Bible recognizes
that there are situations in which deceit may be justified, especially when the person
Targum Onkelos: “because he [Isaac] ate the game he hunted.” Likewise Ibn Ezra, Rashbam and
Radak. The printed edition of Midrash Tanhuma, Parashat Toledot 8.8, s.v. “Va-yehi ki zaken Yitzhak,”
and the commentaries by Rashi, Ralbag and others, all interpret that "the game was in Esau’s mouth" is
a metaphor for pretending to be righteous with sanctimonious speech while baiting his father with lies.
5
Steinsaltz (note 3, above, p. 25), remarks about Rebekah that she was “very clear-minded regarding
certain things. In such matters where she had this sense of clarity and full recognition she was capable
of moving aside all who stood in her way.”
6
Compare Abraham firmly opposing Isaac marrying a maiden from among the Canaanites amongst
whom he dwelled (Gen. 24:3), and Isaac instructing Jacob not to marry a Canaanite maiden, but rather
sending him off to Padan-Aram to find a wife from among the women in his family (Gen. 28:1-2).
7
That Jacob was punished measure for measure has been noted in homiletic literature; cf. Midrash
Tanhuma (Buber ed.), Parashat Va-Yetze, par. 11.
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doing the deceiving has no official power.8 Note the case of the midwives in Egypt,
about whom Scripture explains that they did not obey Pharaoh’s command (which
necessitated telling a falsehood), because of their fear of G-d, or in other words their
sense of morality (Ex. 1:17). For this they are rewarded (Ex. 1:21). Rebekah, through
her act of deception, had a decisive and formative impact on the fate of the Jewish
people.
8
For example, Susan Niditch, Underdogs and Tricksters: A Prelude to Biblical Folklore, San
Francisco 1987; Yael Shemesh, “Lies by Prophets and Other Lies in the Hebrew Bible,” JANES 29
(2002), pp. 81-95 (esp. pp. 83-85).
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