Once the family settled, Leah’s daughter, Dinah, went out to make some girlfriends. Verse 2 tells us Shechem “violated” her, but the next verse says his heart was drawn to her, he loved her, and he spoke tenderly to her.
In verse 4, Shechem told his dad to get him Dinah as his wife.
Jacob and his sons found out what happened, the Bible clarifies that they had slept together, and Shechem’s father came to talk to Jacob. Hamor, Shechem’s dad, asked Jacob for their families to intermarry- for their daughters to marry each other’s sons. Shechem also asked Jacob and his sons for permission to marry Dinah, and he asked them to name any price for her.
Dinah’s brothers were upset by Shechem’s actions with their sister, so they lied and told Shechem they could all marry between their families on one condition- that Shechem and ALL of their family got circumcised.
Shechem agreed and went to go tell the men in the town and his family. They all agreed as well, and so all the men got circumcised.
25 Three days later, while all of them were still in pain, two of Jacob’s sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s brothers, took their swords and attacked the unsuspecting city, killing every male.
Jacob replied by telling them how much trouble they had brought upon the family, saying that the people in the land could easily band together and destroy his entire family.
31 But Simeon and Levi replied, “Should he have treated our sister like a prostitute?”
God told Jacob to go settle in Bethel and build an altar there, so Jacob told his people the plan and told them to get rid of their foreign gods, to purify themselves, and to change their clothes.
5 Then they set out, and the terror of God fell upon the towns all around them so that no one pursued them.
It’s amazing how God can protect His people. I definitely don’t understand his mercy and grace. Lot’s wife looked back and got turned to salt, but Dinah’s brothers killed all the men in a town. I’m just reminded that at the end of the day, we can’t lean on our own understanding.
Once in Bethel, God appeared to Jacob again to reaffirm his promises of Abraham and also to redeclare his name change to Israel.
As the family traveled on, Rachel died while giving birth to another son. With her last breath, she named him Ben-Oni meaning son of my trouble, but Jacob renamed him Benjamin meaning son of my right hand.
As a side note, Genesis 35:21 is the verse where the Bible starts referring to Jacob as Israel.
The next verse tells of Reuben, Leah’s first born, sleeping with his father’s wife, Bilhah, who was Rachel’s concubine that she gave to Jacob when she was barren. I guess this would have been his step-mother?
Jacob went home to Isaac, and at age one hundred and eighty, Isaac died.
God, I don’t understand your ways or your mercy, but I know You are good. Please have mercy on me where I have failed you and help me to follow you. Since we have been given these promises through faith in Christ, I come before you and ask also for your blessing upon my life and those reading this. Thank you.
A Walk Through The Bible 