The Rest of Leah
Bobby N. Winters on the End of the Wife Jacob Did Not Choose
Cain killed his younger brother Abel out of jealousy, but at least when Abel died, the matter was settled. The rivalry between Leah and Rachel, the daughters of Laban and the wives of Jacob, continued throughout the sisters’ lives, and this, surprisingly enough, tells us something important about the nature of marriage.
Two men created the enmity between the sisters. Recall how Jacob fell in love with Rachel and agreed to work for Laban for seven years in exchange for her, “but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.”
At the end of the seven years, Jacob entered into the darkness of the marriage tent, and, after the wedding night, in the light of morning, looked to the other side of the pillow to see . . . Leah, whom Laban had placed there. Jacob then had to work another seven years for Rachel.
One-Woman Man
Even with today’s more liberal, not to say licentious, attitudes toward sex, this deceit and the resulting sexual union would present problems. In that day, it was much more serious, and, given the vision of marriage presented a few chapters earlier in the Book of Genesis, its seriousness cannot be overstated.
Eve was made from Adam’s rib. She was flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone. The symbolism is significant. God created exactly one woman for the man, and from that point onward, the man was to love that woman as if she were a part of his own body. “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” One might contemplate how the world might be different if all men took this seriously.
It has been said that this metaphor, “cleave unto his wife,” refers in an earthy way to the consummation of the sexual act. For the author of Genesis, marriage begins at sexual union, and the sexual act is sacred because it is by this means that a man and woman can create a child. Eve comments on this herself when she says, “I have gotten a man from the Lord.”
Further reading in the Torah confirms that sexual intercourse creates a special bond, so much so that marriage is required even in the case of rape. As barbaric as this seems to us, it expressed an ancient recognition of God’s design. Though Jacob had not chosen her, Leah was to be to him what Eve had been to Adam, and that was set in stone the moment they were sexually united.
Thus, when Leah was switched with her sister, the desire of Jacob’s heart was put in conflict with God’s design. As Jacob would not relent in his desire for Rachel, he was married to both women, and this set the sisters at odds with each other almost immediately.
Leah, who was a bride by her father’s trickery, was fertile and bore Jacob children immediately. She initially gives birth to four sons, and the births are announced in four consecutive verses, echoing the rapidity of the events.
Bobby N. Winters is Assistant Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and Professor of Mathematics at Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas.
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