B. Themes of GenesisEach narrative cycle has its own literary integrity. Yet there are common themes, motifs and concerns that serve to give the Ancestral Story a wholeness that is greater than the sum of its parts.1. Divine-Human Relationship. These stories take for granted the existence of an intimate relationship between the ancestors and their patron God. The deity promises, protects, and directs the lives of the ancestors. He treats them differently than the people with whom they are in contact (and conflict). Still, these other people, be they Egyptian or Philistine, Edomite or Aramean, would find benefit in being associated with the ancestral family. a. Promise. God determined and guided the ancestors' future, and he pledged that future through promises. The consistent way in which the divine promises were transferred from one generation to the next signals their programmatic character. The promises assured longevity through their offspring who would become a nation, and assured possession of the land of Canaan. In their Priestly form the promises entailed fruitfulness and multiplication. b. Covenant. The relationship between God and the ancestors was formalized by covenants. God bound himself by oath to fulfill his promises. In its Priestly form the covenant was termed everlasting. There is a succession of covenants beginning with Noah, to Abraham, and then to Moses at Mount Sinai that progressively builds and defines the relationship of God with his world. c. God of the Fathers. The patriarchs developed an intimate relationship with the deity such that Abraham could be found in conversation with God near his tent. God also came to Abraham and Jacob in visions. The deity came to be personally associated with the patriarchs and was termed "the Elohim of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." God was not immediately present to Joseph in the same way, and appears only as the force of history in Joseph's lecture to his brothers. In Israel's developing history God seems to continue receding from personal contact (see Friedman 1995). 2. Offspring. Israel understood itself as having descended from Abraham in a line of succession miraculously engineered by God. Many of the stories touch on the question of family succession: conceiving, having children, determining the line of inheritance. The frequent genealogies and the toledot structure of Genesis reinforce this overall theme. a. Firstborn. Consistently the oldest son does not end up being the favored son. Perhaps one of the lessons intended by all three cycles is that God does not follow human convention when he decides whom he will bless. He is unpredictable, and likely as not will choose the younger over the older. Yet it must also be observed that each of the firstborn sons had some flaw that may have been the reason for their disqualification. Ishmael was the son of a concubine; Esau cheaply bartered away his status; Reuben slept with Bilhah, his father's concubine. However, one could ask if their failings were inherently more heinous than some of the actions of Jacob or Judah. b. Barrenness. As a further indication of the sovereignty of God, the younger son predestined for greatness was in almost every case conceived through the help of God after an extended period of barrenness: Isaac to Sarah, Jacob and Esau to Rebekah, Joseph to Rachel, Perez to Tamar (though more through Tamar's initiative than God's help). Divinely enabled conception of the gifted son is a pattern repeated later with Samson, Hannah and Samuel, and Jesus of Nazareth in the New Testament. c. Matriarchs (see Jeansonne 1990). Women were marginalized within the patriarchal social system of the ancient Middle East. Although they may not have had institutionalized power, they were not powerless. Within the family they exercised considerable control. Israel's matriarchs--strong-willed, often employing trickery and deceit--were directly responsible for determining lines of descent and inheritance. Abraham deferred to Sarah, who expelled Hagar and her son Ishmael. Sarah and Rebekah agreed to play sister instead of spouse to save their husbands and the promise of offspring. Rebekah conspired against her husband with Jacob to steal the blessing from Isaac's favorite son Esau. Rachel and Leah were rivals to Jacob's sexual attention, and presumably also rivals to inherit the promise. Rachel stole her father's household gods and cleverly hid them from him. Tamar entrapped Judah into siring a child by her, and was judged more righteous for it. Quite possibly some of these women may have been models for the likes of Bathsheba who deftly secured the throne for her son Solomon over his rivals (see Chapter 9.1). 3. Land. Israel was vitally invested in the claim that Canaan was its heritage and homeland. The people found justification for that claim in the promise made first to Abraham, and in the fact that he actually lived in Canaan for many years. Each of the cycles contains the notice that at least an earnest of land had been purchased; Abraham bought Ehpron's field near Hebron (23) and Jacob bought a plot near Shechem (33:18-20). The family of Jacob even purchased property in Egypt (47:27). The divine land promise is the foundation for Israel's claim to the land, and justifies their conquest of Canaan under Joshua in the thirteenth century B.C.E. All three ancestral cycles are shaped around geographical itineraries, and always in respect to Canaan. Abraham left Mesopotamia and journeyed to Canaan with a sojourn in Egypt; Jacob left Canaan for Haran and returned to Canaan with huge wealth and family. Joseph was deported to Egypt but eventually brought the entire family there to survive another famine. All these peregrinations suggest Israel's hold on the land was tenuous, and separation from the land a periodic reality. Perhaps these ancestral periods of exile and return shaped the hope of the Israelites who experienced their greatest trial in the Babylonian exile. Certainly the ending of Genesis, as it leaves Jacob's family in Egypt awaiting return to the Promised Land for the burial of Joseph's bones, thrusts the reader onward to the book of Exodus in expectation, looking for return and rest. (For the narrative and theological significance of land see Brueggemann 1977 and Weinfeld 1993.)
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