Genesis 36 - 37

In chapter 36 we see the names of Esau’s wives. Not that many would notice, but some of Esau’s wives are given a different names than what is recorded in Genesis 26:34 and 28:9. This might be due to the fact that people sometimes had more than one name. Take Jacob, for instance. Did Esau have two brothers, Jacob and Israel? No. How many names did Peter have? Simon Peter, Simeon, Simon, and Cephas. No, he didn’t suffer from multiple personality disorder. Then there was Mathew or Levi; Nathanial or Bartholomew and Jude or Thaddeus.

And, the fact that Esau married Canaanite wives suggests that he didn’t care much about his relationship with God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. This must have been a great disappointment for his parents.

Imagine you are in a class and the instructor asks you to read aloud the names listed in the rest of chapter 36.

Here are some of the names in the list: Oholibamah, Nebaioth, and who can forget, Bilhan and Zaavan. If you ever hear someone read a list of names and are impressed that they can pronounce them without stumbling, there is a secret to their success. Yes, my friends, there is a secret. By revealing this secret, I hope I am not putting my safety at risk.  I have in my hands a small book, less than 90 pages. I purchased it at a seminary, so its existence is probably not to be revealed to the layperson. It is called, Pronouncing Bible Names. All you have to do is look up the name and it shows you how to pronounce it. Try to pronounce Oholibamah. Let’s see the correct pronunciation: Oholibamah is pronounced, oh HAHL ih BAY muh. Want to try it again? Go ahead, no one can hear you. Very good, for an amateur.

There are a couple of names you might recognize in this list, if you actually read them.  In verse 11 is Eliphaz. Does his name sound familiar? He was one of Job’s friends, Eliphaz the Temanite. Another name to take note of is in verse 12, you find Amalek. You will read a lot about Amalek and his descendants in the Bible.

Amalek was the son of Eliphaz (himself the son of Esau, ancestor of the Edomites). The Amalekites lived a nomadic or seminomadic lifestyle along the fringes of southern Canaan's agricultural zone. As a people, the Amalekites were identified as a recurrent enemy of the Israelites. This role appears in several stories you are probably already familiar with.

Exodus 17:8–16, Amalek makes war against Israel in the wilderness. Joshua is ordered by Moses to lead Israel in battle, and Moses watches from a hillside. When Moses' hand is raised, Israel prevails, but when it is lowered, Israel falters.

Number 20:14 Moses sent messengers to the king of Edom asking for permission to pass through their country. The king of Edom, named Hadar in verse 39 refused to give them permission and sent out an army to prevent them from traveling on their highway. Isn’t that nice? And they were cousins, the Edomites and Israelites, descendants of brothers Jacob and Esau.

1 Samuel 30:1–2, the Amalekites invaded the Negev and Ziklag in the Judean/Philistine border area towards the end of the reign of King Saul, burning Ziklag and taking its citizens away into captivity. The future king David led a successful mission against the Amalekites to recover "all that the Amalekites had carried away.

I Samuel 15:1-9, Samuel identifies Amalek as the enemy of the Israelites, saying "Thus says the Lord of hosts: I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. He then commands Saul to kill the Amalekites.

1 Samuel 15:33, Samuel identifies King Agag of Amalek as an enemy and killer, saying "As your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless among women.”

2 Samuel 1:5–10, an Amalekite tells David that he found Saul leaning on his spear after the battle of Gilboa. The Amalekite claims he killed Saul, at Saul's request, and removed his crown. The intention behind the removal of the crown was for the Amalekite to present it to David, presumably to earn some kind of reward from him. David, however, condemns the Amalekite for killing the anointed king, using his own testimony as reference, and orders his men to execute him.

Guess who else was an Amalekite? Haman, the villain in the book of Esther. Haman was a descendant of Agag, the king of the Amalekites mentioned above in I Sam 15:33. He was the one who built the gallows to have Mordecai hanged and got the king to issue a proclamation to have all the Jews killed. Who ended up swinging from the gallows? Haman himself. 

Moses had some parting words concerning the Amalekites. Deut. 25:17 – Remember what Amalek did to the Israelites. Deut. 25:19 – Wipe out the descendants of Amalek. Deut. 25:19 – Not to forget Amalek's atrocities and ambush on our journey from Egypt in the desert. The tribe of Simeon finally exterminated them in the days of King Hezekiah (I Chron. 4:42-43).

So, watch out for those Amalekites. When I check the doors at night, I oftentimes tell Linda that I’m checking to see if there are any Amalekites out there. So far, we’ve been safe and secure from them.

Verse 43, “This was Esau, the father of the Edomites.” The shortest book in the Old Testament deals with descendants of Esau, the Edomites. This is the book of Obadiah, about one- and one-half pages long. It has a brief and simple message to them. God says, “I will bring you down. . . because of the violence against your brother, Jacob.”

Esau is mentioned once in the New Testament. Hebrews 12:16 says, “See that no one is sexually immoral or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son.” So, better he didn’t get the birthright after all. But you know, though he did wander away from God, God didn’t abandon him altogether. God did give him great wealth and many descendants.

The next time your family members are arguing among themselves, like Jacob and Esau and their descendants, you might say, “Let’s not be like those Amalekites. There shouldn’t be any fighting among family members.”



Chapter 37: The Story of Joseph

Let’s set the stage for this story. Jacob is an old man, about 107 years old, most of his children are pretty-well grown and then there is Joseph. Jacob felt very close to Joseph who was 17 years old. Verse 3 says, “Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons.” Perhaps his facial features, hair, personality or laugh reminded him of his late wife, Rachel. This isn’t uncommon. We might feel closer to one member of our family than we do another. The problem here is that Jacob may have made it so obvious that the other kids felt slighted. Was Jesus closer to some disciples more than to others? John was his favorite. He may have had a T shirt that read, JESUS LOVES YOU. BUT I’M HIS FAVORITE. It was with John that he sat with at the Last Supper. It was John who he entrusted the care of his mother Mary. In John 13:23 John is described as the disciple who Jesus loved. Peter and James were close to him also. It is alright if we have a closer relationship with some, more than others, but as long as you don’t slight the others, you can avoid some of the problems seen in Jacobs’ family.

Verse 3, “He made a richly ornamented robe for him. When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.”

This is what has become known as the “coat of many colors.” It literally means, a long coat with full sleeves, which is a coat of royalty (II Sam 13:18-19). Most “coats” back then were little more than ponchos, a blanket with a hole in the middle for the head, without any sleeves. The tradition of “many colors” comes from the Septuagint, which reads, “a multicolored frock.” This was more than a gift. This action by Jacob gives Joseph the right of the firstborn. Though Joseph was the eleventh child born, he was the first born of his favorite wife, Rachel. This right would normally have gone to Reuben, but he forfeited it because of his sin with Jacob’s concubines (35:22). This resulted in the siblings of Joseph feeling that Jacob “loved him more than all his brethren.” The term, loving him more, used elsewhere simply means he was chosen above the others. The giving to Joseph of the coat was symbolic of the transfer of power, rather than an expression of affection.

Now we see Joseph telling everyone about the dream that he had. Verse 5 tells us that the dream symbolized the older brothers bowing down to Joseph. Do you think he should have kept this dream to himself? In verse 4 is says that the brothers hated him because of the coat. Here it says, “they hated him all the more.” But wait, there is another dream and Joseph just can’t his mouth shut. In this dream, verse 9, shows his parents also bowing down to him, along with the brothers.

In the second dream (verse 9), we see the sun, moon and twelve stars. The sun represents Jacob, the moon, Rachel, and the twelve stars are the twelve sons of Jacob. Since the Book of Revelation must be interpreted by the background of the Old Testament, this Woman of Revelation 12 represents Israel, not the Church and not the Virgin Mary. The figure of a woman is appropriate because Israel is the Wife of Jehovah. Let’s take a look at Revelation 12:1-6:

“A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman (Israel) clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head (twelve tribes of Israel). She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth (to the Messiah). Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth (fallen angels). The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne (resurrection and ascension). The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she (Israel) might be taken care of for 1,260 days (3 ½ years, during the tribulation).”



We will talk about dream and visions in our next lesson. Until then, let’s not be like the Amalekites.