Day 1 (Monday)
Genesis 35:1-29 (Jacob Returns to Bethel, Death of Rachel, Death of Isaac)
Last time, we saw Jacob receive a new name, Israel, the one who wrestles with God, and make peace with his brother Esau, and then finally arrive back in the Promised Land where he settled down, built a house, and purchased property.
Families with younger children should not read this, as what follows in chapter 34 is a troubling and difficult incident, and we will not read it here. Nonetheless, some households may find it instructive to read and discuss; this story closes the loop on some things we have seen before, and will see again. In this chapter, one of the men of the place (Shechem, which is near Samaria) assaults his daughter Dinah and then asks to marry her, and in response his sons Simeon and Levi first pretend to make peace, demanding that all the men there become circumcised, and then enter the city and slaughter them while they are recovering from that surgery. This is a troubling reading, and is relevant to us, because in this story we see what both Abraham and Isaac feared for their wives finally come to pass for a daughter of the household. The men of Shechem plan to use the “marriage” to absorb Jacob and his household into their society, which cannot and must not happen to the people called by the name of the Lord. This being the case, Simeon and Levi’s action is seen later as God’s judgment upon the evildoers of Canaan; at the time, however, Jacob sees it as simply a betrayal, making his household seem like a threat to the people around them. In Genesis 49:5-7, Jacob speaks about this, and says: “Simeon and Levi are brothers; weapons of violence are their swords. May I never come into their council; may I not be joined to their company—for in their anger they killed men, and at their whim they hamstrung oxen. Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce, and their wrath, for it is cruel! I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.” What this story reveals, then, is both God’s protection of His people, even through troubled and imperfect instruments, and at the same time how the sins of anger and violence nonetheless harms those who wield them.
At any rate, with this story, we will finish the story of Jacob, and see the death of his father Isaac. Note that there is one italicized line that parents may wish to omit for the sake of their younger children.
Jacob Returns to Bethel
35 God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel, and settle there. Make an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.” 2 So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, and purify yourselves, and change your clothes; 3 then come, let us go up to Bethel, that I may make an altar there to the God who answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me wherever I have gone.” 4 So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods that they had, and the rings that were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak that was near Shechem.
5 As they journeyed, a terror from God fell upon the cities all around them, so that no one pursued them. 6 Jacob came to Luz (that is, Bethel), which is in the land of Canaan, he and all the people who were with him, 7 and there he built an altar and called the place El-bethel, because it was there that God had revealed himself to him when he fled from his brother. 8 And Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and she was buried under an oak below Bethel. So it was called Allon-bacuth.
9 God appeared to Jacob again when he came from Paddan-aram, and he blessed him. 10 God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; no longer shall you be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.” So he was called Israel. 11 God said to him, “I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall spring from you. 12 The land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you, and I will give the land to your offspring after you.” 13 Then God went up from him at the place where he had spoken with him. 14 Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he had spoken with him, a pillar of stone; and he poured out a drink offering on it, and poured oil on it. 15 So Jacob called the place where God had spoken with him Bethel.
The Birth of Benjamin and the Death of Rachel
16 Then they journeyed from Bethel; and when they were still some distance from Ephrath, Rachel was in childbirth, and she had hard labor. 17 When she was in her hard labor, the midwife said to her, “Do not be afraid; for now you will have another son.” 18 As her soul was departing (for she died), she named him Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin. 19 So Rachel died, and she was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem), 20 and Jacob set up a pillar at her grave; it is the pillar of Rachel’s tomb, which is there to this day. 21 Israel journeyed on, and pitched his tent beyond the tower of Eder.
22 While Israel lived in that land, Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine; and Israel heard of it.
Now the sons of Jacob were twelve. 23 The sons of Leah: Reuben (Jacob’s firstborn), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun. 24 The sons of Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin. 25 The sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s maid: Dan and Naphtali. 26 The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s maid: Gad and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Paddan-aram.
The Death of Isaac
27 Jacob came to his father Isaac at Mamre, or Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac had resided as aliens. 28 Now the days of Isaac were one hundred eighty years. 29 And Isaac breathed his last; he died and was gathered to his people, old and full of days; and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.
Discussion questions:
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (The Leader should note that here in this passage, we see the final resting place for Laban’s gods; they are buried as Jacob’s household puts aside any other gods and dedicates themselves to the Lord alone. We see, too, the consequences of Rachel’s theft, as some commentators have noted that Jacob called a curse of death upon anyone in his household who had taken Laban’s household gods. She dies in childbirth, giving birth to Jacob’s 12th and youngest son, Benjamin. So in this reading, we see the reason that neither Reuben, nor Simeon nor Levi, were the heir of their father Israel, and also finally see the full number of the twelve tribes of Israel completed. When we resume the story next year, we will see what happens as the twelve patriarchs come to adulthood, and how the tensions and anger within the household are used by God to accomplish their deliverance, and to set the stage for the people of God to finally receive the Promised Land. Besides all this, however, we DO see here Jacob finally return to Bethel, where he had first received God's promise, and fulfill his own vow that the Lord would be his God. )
2) Where do we see Christ in this text; what is He saying or doing here?
3) Do we see ourselves and the Church in this text; what does it say about us?
4) What do you find difficult about this reading? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. )
5) Does this reading make you think that you need to change anything in your life?
Day 2 (Wednesday)
St. Gregory Palamas on Knowledge of God
With everything that we have seen in the life of Jacob the Patriarch, and all the pain and conflict that has proliferated since we saw him born several weeks ago, the most important point that we have seen remains the vision by which the Lord called him to be the vessel of the Covenant, the heir of God’s promise to Abraham, when he saw the ladder from heaven to earth at Bethel. This question, of how it can possibly be that human beings can encounter God, is a central matter for the Orthodox Christian Faith in practice. As it happens, one of the pivotal Fathers of the Church on this subject is St. Gregory Palamas, whose feast we celebrate next week, on November 14th. St. Gregory was arguing with a certain Barlaam, who claimed that God could only be understood with the educated and rational mind; in opposition to him, Gregory affirms that God can be known in truth, in His energies, but not His essence. We will read some of his words today.
St. Gregory Palamas on Hesychasm
Part 2, Section iii of The Triads – excerpts
8. […] The monks know that the essence of God transcends the fact of being inaccessible to the senses, since God is not only above all created things, but is even beyond Godhead. The excellence of him who surpasses all things is not only beyond all affirmation, but also beyond all negation; it exceeds all excellence that is attainable by the mind. This hypostatic light, seen spiritually by the saints, they know by experience to exist, as they tell us, and to exist not symbolically only, as do manifestations produced by fortuitous events: but it is an illumination immaterial and divine, a grace invisibly seen and ignorantly known. What it is, they do not pretend to know:
[…]This light is not the essence of God, for that is inaccessible and incommunicable; it is not an angel, for it bears the marks of the master. Sometimes it makes a man go out from the body or else, without separating him from the body, it elevates him to an ineffable height. At other times, it transforms the body, and communicates its own splendor to it when, miraculously, the light that deifies the body becomes accessible to the bodily eyes. Thus indeed did the great Arsenius appear when engaged in hesychastic combat; similarly Stephen, while being stoned, and Moses, when he descended from the mountain. [.. .]
11. […) But hesychasts know that the purified and illuminated mind, when clearly participating in the grace of God, also beholds other mystical and supernatural visions—for in seeing itself, it sees more than itself: it does not simply contemplate some other object, or simply its own image, but rather the glory impressed on its own image by the grace of God. This radiance reinforces the mind's power to transcend itself, and accomplish that union with those better things that is beyond understanding. By this union, the mind sees God in the Spirit in a manner transcending human powers.
[…]You claim that the mind can see God only when purified not only of the passions but of ignorance as well: yet the saints make no notion of the latter. They purify themselves of evil passions and transcend all knowledge by uninterrupted and immaterial prayer, and it is then that they begin to see God. […]
16. […] Let us not, then, turn aside incredulous before the superabundance of these blessings; but let us have faith in him who has participated in our nature and granted it in return the glory of his own nature, and let us seek how to acquire this glory and see it. How? By keeping the divine commandments. For the Lord has promised to manifest himself to the man who keeps them, a manifestation he calls his own indwelling and that of the Father, saying, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and will make our abode with him," and "I will manifest myself to him." […]
17. We have here a proof (…] that this contemplation of God is not a form of knowledge, even though Barlaam's greatest desire is that the opposite should be true. For our own part, if we refuse to call this contemplation "knowledge," it is by reason of its transcendence—just as we also say that God is not being, for we believe him to be above being. […]
33. Since the reality that transcends every intellectual power is impossible to comprehend, it is beyond all beings; such union with God is thus beyond all knowledge, even if it be called "knowledge" metaphorically, nor is it intelligible, even if it be called so. For how can what is beyond all intellect be called intelligible? In respect of its transcendence, it might better be called ignorance than knowledge. It cannot be a part or aspect of knowledge, just as the super-essential is not an aspect of the essential. Knowledge as a whole could not contain it, nor could this knowledge, when subdivided, possess it as one of its parts. […]
68. It is time to repeat those divine words: "We give thanks to you, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, because,” uniting yourself to us and making yourself manifest to us by yourself, “you have hidden these thigns from the wise and prudent,” who are prudent only by their own account and learned only in their own eyes. […]
We must transcend ourselves altogether, and give ourselves entirely to God, for it is better to belong to God, and not to ourselves. It is thus that divine things are bestowed on those who have attained to fellowship with God.
From Eastern Orthodox Christianity: The Essential Texts, edited by Bryn Geffert & Theofanis G. Stavrou. Yale University Press, 2016.
Discussion questions:
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (Leader should explain that St. Gregory is describing something of what it is like to encounter God, and how this is a knowledge that transcends understanding and intelligence. This reality of encounter with God in His energies, but not His essence, is a vital element of the Orthodox Christian spiritual life.)
2) Where do we see Christ in this text; what is He saying or doing here?
3) Do we see ourselves and the Church in this text; what does it say about us?
4) What do you find difficult about this reading? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. )
5) Does this reading make you think that you need to change anything in your life?
Day 3 (Friday)
John 5:1-18 (Jesus Heals Paralytic at Bethesda)
Last time we saw the Lord leave the city of the Samaritans and arrive in Galilee, where He healed the child of a royal official. What was notable about the healing was that He did not go to accomplish the healing in person; He simply promised the official that His child would recover, and when the official returned home, he was told that the child had become well at the same hour that the Lord had spoken with him. This was the second miracle which St. John has shown to us. This time, we will see the Lord return again to Jerusalem for one of the pilgrimage festivals.
Jesus Heals on the Sabbath
5 After this there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
2 Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. 3 In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5 One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.
Now that day was a sabbath. 10 So the Jews said to the man who had been cured, “It is the sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.” 11 But he answered them, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Take up your mat and walk.’” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take it up and walk’?” 13 Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had disappeared in the crowd that was there. 14 Later Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “See, you have been made well! Do not sin any more, so that nothing worse happens to you.”
15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. 16 Therefore the Jews started persecuting Jesus, because he was doing such things on the sabbath. 17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father is still working, and I also am working.” 18 For this reason the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because he was not only breaking the sabbath, but was also calling God his own Father, thereby making himself equal to God.
Discussion questions:
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (Leader should point out how remarkable the Lord’s statement is, that His Father is still working, and that He Himself is still working. This is the Lord’s response, the first that we see Him make in John Gospel, to the Pharisees’ concerns about His healing on the Sabbath Day. They understand the Sabbath to be a mandatory day of rest, because God rests on the Sabbath Day in the Creation account. Jesus’ response is that the Sabbath Day hasn’t actually arrived yet for Him; He is still working, and His Father is still working. In this He claims effectively to be outside of time, He makes Himself equal with God the Father, and He utterly confounds their understanding of the Law. )
2) Where do we see Christ in this text; what is He saying or doing here?
3) Do we see ourselves and the Church in this text; what does it say about us?
4) What do you find difficult about this reading? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. )
5) Does this reading make you think that you need to change anything in your life?