Shelley Neese's Blog

This portion covers Genesis 28:10−32:3. It is a pivotal 20-year period in the life of Jacob. He goes from being a deceptive momma’s boy fleeing the understandable wrath of his brother Esau to the father of the twelve tribes of Israel.

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Vayetzei opens with a departure that signals a seismic shift in the biblical narrative. The text begins: “Now Jacob went out from Beersheba and went toward Haran” (Gen. 28:10). Until this moment, the patriarchs Abraham and Isaac lived their lives largely within the orbit of the Promised Land. Jacob, however, is the first to undergo a true exile. He is leaving the protections of Beersheba for Haran, a place known in the ancient world for its idolatry and corruption. When he leaves, he is alone and destitute; when he returns twenty years later, he is the wealthy head of a massive clan.

The Ladder

The narrative begins with one of the most iconic images in the Bible: Jacob’s Ladder. Stopping for the night, Jacob places stones around his head and has a dream. The text says, “A ladder was set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven; and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it” (Gen. 28:12)

Jewish commentaries note a peculiarity in the verse: angels usually descend from heaven to earth. Yet here, the text says they were “ascending and descending.” Were the angels of the Holy Land going up, leaving Jacob, or coming down to accompany him? Either way, God promises Jacob in the dream: “I am with you and will keep you wherever you go” (Gen. 28:15). Upon waking, Jacob exclaims: “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it” (Gen. 28:16).

The Trickster Tricked

If the dream of the ladder provided Jacob with spiritual armor, his time in Haran was the battleground for his character. Jacob arrives in Haran and enters the house of his uncle Laban. While we often view the patriarchs as heroes of faith, we cannot gloss over the uncomfortable irony of his arrival: Jacob is a fugitive because he was a trickster. We must acknowledge that Esau, despite his carnal nature, was right to be angry. Jacob had previously exploited Esau’s hunger to buy the birthright for a bowl of soup. More damningly, Jacob participated in his mother’s elaborate deception, wearing goat skins to fool his blind father, Isaac, and explicitly lying to his face to steal the blessing meant for the firstborn.

In Haran, God holds up a mirror to Jacob in the form of Laban. The narrative of the wedding night is a little lesson of poetic justice. Jacob works for seven years for Rachel, whom he loves. Under the cover of darkness, Laban switches Rachel for her older sister, Leah. Jacob, who exploited his father’s blindness to trick him, is now blinded by the darkness of the tent. He wakes up to find he has been the victim of the exact same crime he committed: identity theft.

When he confronts Laban the next morning, the irony is devastating: “What is this you have done to me? Was it not for Rachel that I served with you? Why then have you deceived me?” (Gen. 29:25). The text echoes Isaac and Esau’s cry from the previous chapters. Laban responds, “It is not done so in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn” (Gen. 29:26). Did Laban know about Jacob’s deception, tricking his father to give him the firstborn blessing instead of Esau? Or was it clever divine justice that God had Jacob get a taste of his own medicine?

Rachel and Leah

The dynamic between Rachel and Leah is the emotional core of the narrative. Rachel is described as “beautiful of form and appearance” (Gen. 29:17). Leah, however, has “weak eyes.” She is unloved by Jacob initially. Scripture tells us: “When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, He opened her womb” (Gen. 29:31). It is Leah’s six sons who make up most of the tribes, including Levi (the Priesthood) and Judah (the Kingly line).

The names Leah gives her sons track her emotional journey from desperation to gratitude. With her first three sons, her focus is entirely on her husband, Jacob, as she treats each birth as a transaction for his affection. She names her firstborn Reuben (“See”), hoping Jacob will finally see her. The second son is named Simeon (“Hear”), because God heard she was unloved. The third son was Levi (“Joined”), bargaining that surely three sons would force Jacob to be joined to her. These names are heartbreaking cries for validation.

However, with the birth of her fourth son, a transformation occurs. She names him Judah, meaning “Praise,” declaring simply, “Now I will praise the Lord.” For the first time, she does not mention her husband or her pain. In naming Judah, Leah finds her worth not in being Jacob’s wife, but in being God’s daughter.

The Symbolism of the Well

While there are many lessons in Jacob’s journey, and whole sermons could be written about any one of the scenes in today’s Torah portion, I want to return to the section where Jacob first meets Rachel at the well. I believe this scene especially symbolizes the extension of the covenant and the expansion of God’s promise. It represents a Messianic thread that weaves its way from Abraham to Jesus.

In Genesis 29, after his long journey, Jacob arrives at the outskirts of Haran. It is his very first stop in this new land; he has not yet entered the city or found a place to stay. He encounters a well in the open fields where local shepherds are idling, waiting for more men to gather so they can collectively roll the heavy stone covering the well’s mouth.

As Jacob inquires about his uncle Laban, Laban’s daughter Rachel approaches with her sheep. Rachel becomes the very first relative Jacob lays eyes on. Energized by the sight of her, Jacob performs a feat of great strength: he single-handedly rolls the massive stone away to water her flock. Overcome with the emotion of finally finding his kin, he kisses Rachel, weeps aloud, and identifies himself as her cousin.

We first see this pattern of divine encounters at wells in Genesis 24, when Abraham’s servant goes to a well and asks for a sign from God about the wife he will pick for Isaac. He meets Rebekah, who shows kindness by offering him water and watering his camels. Rebekah was not born into the covenant like Isaac; however, the Bible makes clear that she chose of her own free will to return to Beersheba with Abraham’s servant to marry Isaac. Through Rebekah, the covenant was extended. When Jacob meets Rachel at the well, the covenant is extended again.

Later in scripture, Moses also meets his wife at a well. Zipporah was at a well with her sisters when Moses, a fugitive on the run, scared off male shepherds who were harassing them. Zipporah is a Midianite. All three of these marriages extend the covenant and the promise further outside of the strict Abrahamic household. These are women who come into the covenant and the story of God’s people through faith and commitment.

The ultimate fulfillment of the connection between wells and covenant extension arrives in John 4. The gospel records: “He came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well” (John 4:5−6). The text highlights that they were at Jacob’s Well. It was called this because when Jacob finally returned to Canaan, he bought a plot of ground for 100 pieces of silver (Gen. 33:18). Eventually, Joseph’s bones were brought from Egypt and buried on his father’s tract of land (Josh. 24:32).

As Jesus sat by the well, he asked the Samaritan woman for a drink of water. She was shocked because Jews and Samaritans had been enemies for centuries, ever since the days of Ezra and Nehemiah. The woman responded, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (John 4:9).

Although the Samaritans were the most despised of Israel’s neighbors, Jesus said to her: “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14).

Jesus was declaring his Messiahship, revealing his full identity as someone much greater than Jacob, to this woman. Abraham’s servant extended the covenant at the well by meeting Rebekah, and Jacob met his true love Rachel at the well, and Moses encountered his Midianite wife at the well. It makes sense in the pattern of the Bible for the gospel to first be taken outside of the Jewish camp at a well. When the Samaritan woman came to the full knowledge of Jesus, the door was opened for all of us.

As Jesus showed the Samaritan woman, not only are we loved by God, but we are fully known by Him—known in our kindness, our sin, and our doubts. When Jacob had his dream of angels ascending and descending the ladder, God appeared to him and gave him the same promise he had given Abraham and Isaac: all peoples on earth would be blessed through his offspring (Gen. 28:14). That happened in the coming of Jesus: his incarnation, death, and resurrection. All we must do to be grafted into God’s great promise is drink of the living water.

That’s it for this week. In the newsletter version of the episode, I am including three questions that you can study for either your personal use or a group study. They are just thought-provoking questions that I think the text asks of us as readers. Be sure to sign up for our emails at www.thejerusalemconnection.us

Join me next week as we read Vayishlach which means “And he sent.” It covers Genesis 32:4 through 36:43.

Shabbat Shalom and Am Israel Chai.

Finding God in the “Real World” (Genesis 28:10–22): In this portion, Jacob leaves the spiritual safety of his home and encounters God in a desolate, rocky place, exclaiming, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” Can you identify a “rocky ground” season in your life—where you were surprised to discover God’s presence was there all along?From Validation to Praise (Genesis 29:31–35): Leah’s naming of her children tracks her shift from desperate codependency (“Maybe now my husband will love me”) to spiritual independence (“Now I will praise the Lord”). In what areas of your life are you tempted to seek “horizontal” validation from people (spouses, bosses, social media), and what would it look like to shift that focus “vertically” to finding your worth solely in being a child of God?Extending the Covenant at the Well (Genesis 29:1–14 & John 4:1–26): We traced the biblical pattern of wells being places where the covenant is extended—from Rebekah, to Zipporah, to the Samaritan woman. Jesus broke centuries of prejudice by offering “living water” to a Samaritan, someone considered an enemy of his people. Who are the “Samaritans” in our modern context—the people we might consider “outsiders” or “unworthy”—and how can we spread the news of the Living Water to them?

The post Vayetzei (Genesis 28:10–32:3) appeared first on Shelley Neese.

For the past four years, we’ve embarked on a chapter-by-chapter exploration of prophetic texts. Now, we embark on a new spiritual journey: a one-year sprint through the foundational narratives of the first five books of the Bible, the Torah. As we follow the weekly Jewish reading calendar, we arrive at this week’s Torah portion, called Toldot, which means “descendants” or “generations,” covering Genesis 25:19–28:9.

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The reading picks up where the last portion ended: the union of Isaac and Rebekah. After twenty years of childlessness, God blessed the couple with twin boys: Jacob and Esau. However, before we delve into Jacob and Esau’s turbulent rivalry, it is essential to pause and give their father, Isaac, his due attention.

Isaac is a mysterious figure, by far the most understated of the patriarchs. The biblical narrative that surrounds Isaac is undramatic. Abraham negotiates with God and Jacob wrestles a divine being and demands a blessing. Isaac, on the other hand, hardly speaks at all. The stories where he is the central character rarely have him in extended dialogue.

Unlike the dynamic and often confrontational natures of his father Abraham and his son Jacob, Isaac is consistently portrayed as the “quiet one.” His narrative is less about proactive ventures and more about responsive obedience.

As a child, when his father brought him to Mount Moriah for his near-sacrifice, Isaac never resisted. Similarly, when Abraham sent his servant to select a wife for him, Isaac did not rebel against his father’s choice of Rebekah. Isaac loved Rebekah from the first moment that he saw her. It is precisely this quietude that reveals Isaac’s character. Isaac is a peacemaker, a truth teller, and an obedient follower of God. He is the consecrated anchor of the covenant.

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin describes Isaac as a Tamim, a pure and gentle soul. As the middle patriarch, he fortified the covenant connecting a people, land, and their God during an essential transitional generation.

Anchored to the Holy Land

Isaac stands alone among the patriarchs in never having left its sacred borders. His relationship with the Promised Land was uniquely steadfast.

Even though Abraham left everything to move to the land of promise, he was not there long before he had to escape to Egypt because of a severe famine. Jacob, too, left the promised land on two significant occasions. The first time Jacob fled to Paddan-Aram—partially to escape the wrath of Esau and partially to find a wife. That sojourn lasted twenty years because of a pesky father-in-law. Jacob’s second departure was also because of a severe famine in Canaan. Israel was more prone to famine than Egypt because Israel had to rely on unpredictable rainfall while Egypt had the Nile River and its dependable annual flooding.

Like Abraham and Jacob, a famine hit Canaan during Isaac’s lifetime as well. Isaac began to journey out towards the fertile lands of Egypt when God intervened and stopped him. Genesis says, “The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, ‘Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live’” (Genesis 26:1-2). Obedient to this divine command, Isaac went instead to Gerar which was a Philistine territory. Gerar was slightly better off in the famine but still technically within the bounds of the promised land.

While Isaac was living in the land of the Philistines, the Lord blessed Isaac. Despite the ongoing famine, Isaac farmed and his crops were bountiful. He accrued flocks, herds, and a huge household. The text says: “Then Isaac sowed in that land and in the same year reaped a hundredfold, and the Lord blessed him” (Gen. 26:12).

The rabbinic commentaries emphasize that this extraordinary prosperity was a direct consequence and reward for his obedience to God’s command to remain in the land. His attachment to the sacred soil unlocked an unprecedented outpouring of divine blessing. He didn’t seek prosperity elsewhere; he found it by remaining exactly where God commanded him to be.

The king of that area, Abimelech, eventually asked Isaac to leave. His great wealth was making the Philistines jealous. Isaac moves away from the city of Gerar and settles in the Valley of Gerar, which was like the Philistine countryside. There, he tried to reopen the wells that his father Abraham had dug years before. Redigging old wells angered the local herdsman. They saw his wells as a threat to their resources and an encroachment on their territory. Instead of fighting back, Isaac moved on from his father’s old wells and instead dug a third well. The third well didn’t cause any problems. He named that well Rehoboth which means “room,” saying, “For now the Lord has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”

Modern Israel and the Three Wells

I don’t aim to read everything in the Torah through a Zionist lens. But I can’t help but see modern Israel’s story represented allegorically in Isaac’s three wells. In the late 1800s, 30,000 Jews from Eastern Europe and Russia trickled back to the promised land. Some were fleeing persecution and others were pursuing their Zionist dreams. Most were a mixture of both.

That wave of Aliyah was like Isaac’s first two well ventures, where he tried to reopen the family wells and it stirred up conflict with the locals. Even though Isaac knew they belonged to his father, he moved on to another spot. The Philistines said the well water belonged to them. Isaac tried hard to be a quiet peacemaker. The same thing happened with the first wave of Jewish immigrants. They tried to settle in their ancestral homeland. In reality, it had become a forgotten Ottoman backwater. The Arab neighbors only woke up to the importance of Palestine once Jews felt it was the only land they could safely return.

Isaac named the first two problematic wells “Contention” and “Opposition.” That may as well be the titles of Modern Israel’s initial chapters. It has been 77 years since the birth of the modern nation-state of Israel, but they are still in that well-digging phase that only arouses contention and opposition. I long for the day of peace, when they unearth the third well, the one that assures there is finally “room” for them.

The Prophetic Vision

It was only after Isaac dug the third well that God appeared to him a second time. It was on this visitation, the only other time God spoke directly to Isaac, that he reaffirmed the Abrahamic covenant. He promised Isaac to bless him, multiply his offspring, and give him all the lands promised to his father. Soon after, even Abimelech, the Philistine king, paid a visit to Isaac. Isaac asked him, “Why have you come to me, since you were hostile to me and sent me away?”

The king explained that Isaac’s constant success had not gone unnoticed. He said:

“We saw clearly that the Lord was with you; so we said, ‘There ought to be a sworn agreement between us’—between us and you. Let us make a treaty with you that you will do us no harm, just as we did not harm you but always treated you well and sent you away peacefully. And now you are blessed by the Lord.” (Gen. 26:28-29)

It was ultimately not anything that Isaac did to finally warrant the favor of neighbors or pacify hostile forces. God intervened and opened the eyes of Isaac’s enemies. In the process, he also made his own name great among the nations. By recognizing Israel’s blessing and protection, King Abimelech also recognized the superiority of Isaac’s God.

I believe this event foreshadows what the prophets foresaw in Israel’s future. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah predict a future time when God’s supernatural restoration of Israel will compel its enemies and all nations to recognize the hand of God over the nation and therefore also the supremacy of Yahweh, the Lord of Israel.

The prophet Isaiah wrote:

In the last days the mountain of the Lord’s temple will be established as the highest of the mountains; it will be exalted above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. Many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.” The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. (Isa. 2:2-3)

In my eyes, that is when Israel enters the third well phase.

That’s it for this week. Next week we transition to Jacob’s more complicated saga.

Also, I am trying something new this week. It was a recommendation from a faithful listener. In the newsletter version of the episode I am including four questions that you can study for either your personal use or a group study. They are just thought-provoking questions that I think the text asks of us as readers. So if you want the questions each week. Be sure to sign up for our emails at www.thejerusalemconnection.us

Join me next week as we read Vayetzei (Genesis 28:10–32:3)

Shabbat Shalom and Am Israel Chai.

Bible Study Questions on Toldot (Genesis 25:19–28:9)

The Character of Isaac (Genesis 25:19-28:9): The text describes Isaac as the “quiet one” and the most understated of the patriarchs, characterized by responsive obedience rather than proactive ventures. How does this Tami (pure and gentle soul) nature of Isaac—his quiet strength and obedience—fortify the covenant in a unique way compared to the more dramatic actions of Abraham and Jacob? What might we learn from a life of “responsive obedience” in our own spiritual journeys?The Significance of Remaining in the Land (Genesis 26:1-6): Unlike Abraham and Jacob, Isaac alone never left the promised land, even during a severe famine. What was the specific divine command God gave Isaac, and what was the immediate result of his obedience (Genesis 26:12)? How does the text connect Isaac’s unprecedented prosperity directly to his steadfast attachment and obedience to God’s command to remain in the sacred soil?Conflict, Peace, and the Three Wells (Genesis 26:17-22): Isaac’s encounters with the Philistines involved contention and opposition over the wells (Esek and Sitnah). Instead of fighting, Isaac repeatedly moved on and dug a new well until he finally found “room” (Rehoboth). What does Isaac’s choice to be a peacemaker in the face of conflict teach us about resolving disputes or standing firm in the face of resource threats?Divine Intervention and Recognition (Genesis 26:26-31): The text highlights that it was not Isaac’s actions, but God’s intervention, that compelled King Abimelech and the Philistines to finally seek a treaty with him. What was Abimelech’s explicit reason for seeking peace, and what does this event reveal about God’s role in changing the hearts and minds of adversaries? How does this story foreshadow the prophetic vision cited from Isaiah 2:2-3?

 

 

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This week’s Torah portion is called Chayei Sarah, which means “the life of Sarah.” It covers Genesis 23:1–25:18. The title of this portion is ironic because it begins with the death of Sarah, at the ripe age of 127. The passing of Sarah sets the stage for two great movements in Abraham’s later life. First, he purchases a piece of land in the place God promised him and his descendants. Second, he finds a suitable bride for his son, Isaac.

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The Cave of Machpelah

After Sarah dies in Hebron, Abraham rises from his mourning to address the local residents, the Hittites. He has been living in Canaan for years at this point, but the patriarch of the Jewish people has yet to secure any land as his own. Abraham asked the Hittites, “I am a foreigner and a sojourner among you; give me a possession for a burying place among you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight” (Gen. 23:4).

The Hittites respond with what appears to be remarkable generosity. They recognize Abraham’s stature, calling him a “mighty prince” of God, and tell him to bury his dead in the “choicest of our tombs.” This insistence is central to the entire narrative. Ephron the Hittite offers him a field with cave on it as a gift, but Abraham does not accept. His refusal is strategic. A gift could be easily contested or revoked later. A purchase made publicly and sealed by a monetary transaction in the presence of witnesses is legally binding. This act establishes the first undisputed, purchased piece of the promised land. The cave is like the down payment on the entire land of Israel. It proves that the land is not just covenanted by God, it is also purchased.

Abraham pays 400 shekels of silver, an exorbitant sum for a burial plot. The text establishes the parameters of the purchase: “So the field of Ephron in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, the field and the cave that was in it, and all the trees that were in the field, which were within all the surrounding borders, were deeded to Abraham as a possession” (Gen. 23:17-18).

The importance of the Cave of Machpelah is reinforced throughout Genesis. Jacob, on his deathbed in Egypt, makes his sons swear that they will carry his bones all the way back to this cave. He recites the litany of those already interred: “Bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite… There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife, there they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah” (Genesis 49:29-31). Joseph carries out the difficult task of bringing Jacob’s remains out of Egypt to be buried with his ancestors in the covenanted land.

A Wife for Isaac

The second major event in the Torah portions is securing a wife for Isaac. Genesis says that Abraham was “old, well advanced in years,” and his son Isaac was nearing forty. He asks his servant, Eliezer, to start the wife search, but he insists she not come from the Canaanites among whom they dwell. The land of Canaan is morally corrupt, and God’s people must remain separate from its pagan practices. However, Isaac, the heir, must not leave the Promised Land for fear he might settle somewhere else and undo all of Abraham’s efforts. The continuity of the line must be rooted in the place of promise.

Eliezer journeys back to the land of Abraham’s ancestors. He understands that the selection of the next matriarch cannot be left to chance or merely human judgment. He sets a test for God to reveal the character of the woman God intends. The test is highly specific. If he asks a woman at the well for a drink, the chosen woman will, without prompting, offer to water his ten camels as well. For a young woman to draw enough water to satisfy ten thirsty camels is an act of extreme physical exertion and overwhelming generosity toward a stranger.

Rebekah appears, fulfills the test perfectly, and the text emphasizes her speed and diligence: “she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, and ran again to the well to draw water, and she drew for all his camels” (Gen. 24:20). Her character—her inner worth—is what qualifies her to be the next matriarch. It is a sign not just to Eliezer, but to the reader, that God is actively guiding this process to select a woman worthy of the covenant.

Eliezer returns and meets Rebekah’s family. When he explains to them how Rebekkah answered his exact prayer, they conclude, “The thing has come from the Lord; we cannot speak to you bad or good” (Gen. 24:50). Rebekah leaves her home, her family, and her comfort, all based on the promise of the journey and the conviction that God is leading her.

The portion concludes with the meeting of Isaac and Rebekah: “Then Isaac brought her into the tent of Sarah his mother, and he took Rebekah, and she became his wife; and he loved her. So, Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death” (Genesis 24:67). Their union fulfills the final part of Abraham’s two-part mission: securing the land through purchase and securing the seed through a divinely chosen, righteous bride.

Abraham’s Final Years: The Patriarch’s Legacy

Having secured the two great pillars of the covenant—a place for his family’s future and a righteous wife for his heir, Isaac—Abraham’s life concludes with two significant, often-overlooked events. First, the text records that Abraham takes another wife, Keturah, and has six more sons. God’s blessing of fruitfulness continues, even in Abraham’s old age. However, Abraham gives all his possessions and full inheritance to Isaac, the son of promise. As for the sons of Keturah and his other son, Ishmael, he gives them gifts and sends them away from Isaac, eastward (Gen. 25:5-6). This action is the final, practical boundary-setting act that establishes Isaac alone as the covenant heir.

Finally, “Abraham breathed his last and died in a ripe old age, an old man and satisfied” (Gen. 25:8). He is then buried by his two sons, Isaac and Ishmael, in the Cave of Machpelah, alongside Sarah. His burial in the purchased cave seals the covenant promise. He rests forever in the first, legally owned parcel of the land God swore to him and his descendants. His earthly journey ends in the place of his spiritual destiny.

1967

Jewish access to the Cave of Machpelah was severely restricted in 1267 CE when the Ottoman Sultan banned Jews from entering the site. According to Ottoman laws, Jews could only pray at the seventh step outside the structure. For centuries, Jews continued visiting the cave of the matriarchs and patriarchs but never went past the seventh step.

This changed dramatically during the Six-Day War of 1967. As the Israeli military defended itself against the surrounding Arab nations, it successfully liberated Judea and Samaria, the ancient city of Hebron. On June 8, 1967, Israeli soldiers entered Hebron and made their way to the Cave of Machpelah. Rabbi Shlomo Goren, the chief rabbi of the IDF, was among the first to enter. In an emotional moment, he blew the shofar at the site.

Israel’s regaining of the site was seen as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy and a reconnection to the very beginnings of Jewish history. The Israeli government quickly took steps to ensure the site would be accessible to worshippers of all faiths, demonstrating its commitment to religious freedom.

Despite challenges and tensions, Israel has consistently upheld its responsibility as guardian of this sacred place, ensuring that it remains open for prayer and pilgrimage. The return of Jewish access to the Cave of Machpelah stands as a powerful testament to Israel’s deep historical connection to the land and its commitment to protecting sites of religious importance for all faiths.

That’s it for this week. Join me next week as we read Toldot (Genesis 25:19–28:9)

Shabbat Shalom and Am Israel Chai.

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For the past four years, we’ve embarked on a chapter-by-chapter exploration of prophetic texts. Now, we are starting a one-year sprint through the first five books of the Bible, the Torah. We are following the weekly Jewish reading calendar—the oldest Bible reading challenge that exists. This week’s Torah portion is called Vayera, which means “And he appeared.” It is named for God’s appearance to Abraham and it covers Genesis 18:1–22:24.

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The narrative opens with the arrival of three visitors at the entrance to Abraham’s tent. The text states, “The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them and bowed down to the ground” (Gen. 18:1-3).

The identity of these three men is bathed in mystery. Jewish tradition interprets the three “men” as three distinct angels—Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael—each sent on a specific mission. Christian tradition interprets the third figure—the one identified as “Lord”—as a Christophany, a visible manifestation of the pre-incarnate Christ. The visitor apparently had a human form, as he ate and drank the meal Abraham had prepared. Yet, he also spoke with divine authority and knew Sarah’s hidden thoughts. Both Jewish and Christian traditions praise Abraham’s elaborate hospitality to these strangers. The author of Hebrews uses Abraham’s interaction in Genesis 18 as the highest standard for showing hospitality, stating, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it” (Heb. 13:2). It is during this visitation that the divine messenger delivers a crucial promise: even though the couple was advanced in years, Sarah would finally conceive a son. The announcement is naturally met with disbelief and a laugh from Sarah. The Lord acknowledges her reaction by posing the rhetorical question, “Is anything too wonderful for the Lord?” (Gen. 18:14).

Abraham’s Intercession and Divine Justice

Genesis has a pattern of alternating stories of creation with episodes of decreation. In line with that, immediately after the divine visitor promised Isaac’s birth, he also revealed the plan to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. The visitors talked among themselves, with one asking, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” (Gen. 18:17). This elevates Abraham from heir to God’s confidant. It was important to God that Abraham view this impending punishment as founded on righteousness and justice.

Notably, when God announced his intention to flood the Earth, Noah offered no appeal; he built the ark in silence. Abraham, however, is granted the right to debate with God. He steps forward as an intercessor, advocating for humanity and pleading for the innocent with the challenge, “Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?” (Gen. 18:23). The premise of his argument is that God is a God of justice who does not operate arbitrarily. This exchange signals a working partnership between God and the chosen progenitor of a nation committed to the ethical way of the Lord. Abraham’s faith gives him the confidence to pose direct questions and negotiate for the lives of the innocent. He begins his appeal at fifty righteous individuals and systematically barters down to ten, ceasing only when he likely recognized that even ten righteous people were not present. This dialogue reveals a God who is attentive and responsive to the appeals of his people. It cements Abraham’s role as the first significant intercessor recorded in the Bible.

Regarding God’s decision to verify the cities’ sins, Genesis records God declaring: “I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me; and if not, I will know” (Gen. 18:21). Commentaries agree this statement is not an admission of divine ignorance but a powerful model of righteous judicial due process for humanity. The Hebrew word for “outcry,” צְעָקָה (Tze’akah), is highly significant because it is the very same word God used when he told Moses, “I have surely seen the affliction of My people… and have heard their cry [Tze’akatam]” (Exodus 3:7). This parallel demonstrates a consistent biblical theme: God is a righteous Judge who validates and investigates the Tze’akah—the cry of the oppressed and victimize.

The swift and total destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah with “sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven” (Gen. 19:24) is understood by Jewish tradition and later biblical prophets as a decisive judgment against systemic ethical failure. The attempted violent degradation of the angelic visitors (Gen. 19:5) highlights their capacity for cruelty. According to the prophet Ezekiel, their sin was also rooted in proud arrogance, excess materialism, and a refusal to “aid the poor and needy” (Ezek. 16:49-50).

The Ultimate Test: The Akedah

The culmination of Vayera is the narrative known as the Binding of Isaac (Akedah). After a long wait and the fulfillment of the promise, God commands Abraham to take his son, his only son, the son he loves, and offer him as a burnt sacrifice. The narration is intentionally sparse. It omits any detail of Abraham’s internal struggle, unlike the previous episode concerning Sodom. Abraham rises early the next morning, prepares his donkey, and proceeds. His faith is complete; he voices no argument or complaint. As he and Isaac ascend the mountain, Isaac voices a heart-rending question: “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” (Gen. 22:7). Abraham responds, “God will see to the provision of the lamb for the offering, my son” (Gen. 22:8). This is not simply a hopeful expression; it is a declaration of committed faith—a certainty that the same God who miraculously brought life from a barren woman will also provide for this impossible demand. This moment is the high point of his journey of faith. Abraham evolves from a man who left his homeland in obedience to one who entrusts God with his most valued possession—the very continuation of the covenant.

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Jewish and Christian Interpretations of the Akedah

The story compels a consideration of difficult questions: Does God demand human sacrifice? What is the purpose of this test? Jewish tradition views the Akedah as the ultimate expression of Abraham’s absolute devotion. The focus rests not on a God seeking child sacrifice, but on a man whose love for God is so great that he is prepared to relinquish the one thing he holds most dear.

Biblical scholars take the episode in context of the whole Bible, arguing that the binding of Isaac was, in fact, a divine repudiation of human sacrifice. God’s intervention to stop the sacrifice was a pivotal ethical turning point. In the surrounding Ancient Near East, sacrificing children was a practice done to placate or curry favor with powerful gods. By commanding the sacrifice and then instantly intervening with the ram caught in the thicket, God definitively showed Abraham and all subsequent generations that he does not desire, accept, or command human blood to be spilled as a means of worship. The true ultimate act of faith is not the destruction of a life, but complete trust in God’s provision and promise. This interpretation is strongly supported because later instances of Israelites engaging in child sacrifice to the pagan deity Molech are condemned by the prophets and writers of the Bible in the harshest possible terms. God repeatedly expresses absolute abhorrence for such acts, declaring them things “which i did not command, nor did it come into my mind” (Jer. 19:5). Thus, the Akedah is understood as a transformative narrative that cleanses Judaism at its very start from this horrifying pagan custom. Scholar James Carroll champions this view in his book Jerusalem, Jerusalem. He argues that the story is meant to reveal a God who will not permit child sacrifice, establishing a revolutionary message. Devotion to the one true God requires ethical obedience and faith, not human victims.

The Christian interpretation of the Akedah roots the divine paradox in the contrast between God’s command and his ultimate provision. This interpretation employs typology to see the event as a powerful foreshadowing of Jesus Christ’s ultimate sacrifice. The paradox is that while God spared Abraham from having to surrender his beloved son, God himself would ultimately not withhold his own Son. Key elements are seen as parallels: Isaac carrying the wood up Mount Moriah prefigures Jesus carrying the cross to Calvary; and the ram provided by God as a perfect substitute for Isaac directly points to Jesus as the “Lamb of God” who is sacrificed to redeem humanity. The Akedah illustrates God’s love and justice by showing he would fulfill the sacrificial requirement not through human obedience but through his own divine provision.

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For the past four years, we’ve embarked on a chapter-by-chapter exploration of prophetic texts. Now, we are starting a one-year sprint through the first five books of the Bible, the Torah. We are following the weekly Jewish reading calendar—the oldest Bible reading challenge that exists. This week’s Torah portion is called Lech Lecha, which means “Go forth,” and it centers on God’s call on Abraham’s life. It covers Genesis 12:1–17:27.

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After the biblical flood and the failed ambition of the Tower of Babel, God changes His strategy for engaging with humanity. Instead of a universal covenant with all of creation, God narrows His focus to one person: a man named Abraham from a land called Ur of the Chaldeans. The opening words of this portion are simple, but they set a new course for all human history: “The Lord said to Abraham, ‘Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.’”

God doesn’t fully explain His plan to Abraham. He simply says, “Go forth” or “lech lecha.” Abraham, a model of faith and obedience, sets out for the land God will reveal. He leaves behind his entire world to follow a promise into a land he has never seen. Abraham was called to leave the height of civilization, the sophistication of Ur. To follow God, Abraham had to abandon the very highest human accomplishments and security, venturing into an unknown, backwater land with no guarantee of safety or prosperity.

Furthermore, the land to which Abraham was called—Canaan—was a very different landscape. It was predominantly rural, a patchwork of small city-states and tribes. The area was characterized by rugged hills, sparse settlements, and a mostly agrarian economy—hardly the urban sophistication Abraham had left behind. Canaan was a land of potential but also lacked centralized political authority or infrastructural stability. Abraham’s leap of faith was thus even more remarkable.

Jewish tradition recounts that even as a young man, Abraham recognized the folly of idol worship. According to a famous passage in the Midrash, Abraham’s father, Terah, was engaged in idol-making and idol worship. As a youth, Abraham entered his father’s shop and, seeing the idols, broke them all except for the largest—placing an axe in its hand to make it appear as though it had destroyed the others. When his father confronted him, Abraham declared that the idols were powerless and had no real existence. Instead, Abraham believed in the one true God. This act of defiance set Abraham apart from his environment. He was a pioneer of monotheism.

The Promises: A New Beginning for All Nations

In return for his obedience, God gave Abraham three magnificent promises: land, descendants, and a universal blessing. God told him, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

This promise is the start of God’s redemptive plan—the beginning of God extending Himself into the human world. Through Abraham, God would bring a people into covenant with Himself. The blessing that began with Adam and was nearly wiped out in Noah’s day now rests on one man, with the divine promise that it would extend to “all peoples on earth.” For Christians, this promise is ultimately fulfilled in Jesus, a descendant of Abraham, who brings God’s blessing to everyone.

Imperfect Faith: The Human Side of Abraham

After God commands Abraham to leave his homeland and travel to the land of Canaan, Abraham obeys and begins this journey of faith. He takes Sarai, his wife, and his nephew Lot, along with their household.

The next significant episode in Genesis reveals the complexities of Abraham’s character and highlights his flaws. During a famine, Abraham and Sarah travel into Egypt. Fearing for his life because of Sarah’s beauty and the dangerous political climate, Abraham instructs her to say she is his sister. When Pharaoh and his officials take Sarah because they see her beauty, God intervenes by afflicting Pharaoh and his household with serious plagues. This divine punishment causes Pharaoh to realize that Sarah is Abraham’s wife. He confronts Abraham about the deception.

It’s one of those strange stories in the Bible. Abraham’s fear of the Egyptians overrides his trust in God’s protection. As a result, his actions put Sarah in danger. In the end, it is Pharaoh—who shows more fear of God—who acted rightly and released Sarah.

The Covenant of the Pieces: God’s Unilateral Promise

The most significant theological moment in this portion is in Genesis 15. Abraham is still without an heir, and he questioned how God will fulfill His promise that his descendants will become a great nation. In this moment, God makes a covenant with him. He instructs Abraham to take several animals, cut them in two, and lay the halves opposite each other. This was a sacred ritual in the ancient Near East—both parties to a covenant would walk between the slaughtered animals. It symbolized that failing to uphold the agreement would result in suffering the same fate.

What is remarkable is what happens next. As Abraham falls into a deep sleep, the text says, “A smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces.” In this divine act, God alone, represented as fire and smoke, walks through the divided animals. This signifies that the covenant is unilateral—not based on Abraham’s ability to keep the promise, but entirely on God’s faithfulness.

The Foundation of Faith

The Abrahamic covenant forms the foundation of God’s plan to bring salvation to the entire world. When God called Abraham, He made promises that extended far beyond personal blessing. He committed to making Abraham the father of many nations, blessing him, and establishing an eternal relationship with his descendants.

Importantly, Scripture reveals that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was not an afterthought but was actually foretold in advance to Abraham. Paul emphasizes this in Galatians 3:8: “The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and it proclaimed the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’”

From the very beginning, God’s plan involved the Jewish people as the initial recipients and carriers of His message. The Gospel is rooted in the promise that through Abraham’s seed—ultimately fulfilled in Christ—all nations would be blessed. Israel’s purpose was never to be discarded or superseded; rather, it was to serve as the conduit through which God’s redemptive plan would be revealed to the entire world. The Gospel proceeds from the Jews, and their ongoing role remains vital in God’s covenantal purpose of blessing all humanity through Jesus Christ.

That’s it for this week. Join me next week as we read Genesis 18:1–22:24, a continuation of the relationship between Abraham and God, which is called Vayera.

Shabbat Shalom and Am Yisrael Chai.

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This week’s Torah portion is called Noach and it covers Genesis 6:9–11:32. The portion brings us into a world that has devolved into chaos and corruption, just a few generations after the fall of Adam. The opening line is jarring: “The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. And the Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled.” This is a truly painful verse, revealing a God who is grieved by the state of his creation. Amidst this despair, however, we find a single glimmer of hope: “But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord” (6:5–6)

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Noah is described as a righteous man, “perfect in his generations” (6:9). He is not perfect in a sinless sense, but rather he is wholehearted and complete in his devotion to God in a world that had completely turned away. Unlike Abraham, who would later debate with God over the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, Noah is silent. He simply trusts and obeys. He builds a massive ark and gathers the animals, preparing for a cataclysm that seems completely impossible. His faith is a quiet act of submission to a God whose plan he does not fully understand.

The Flood: A De-Creation and a New Beginning

The flood narrative is more than a story about a punishing rainstorm. From a theological perspective, it’s a de-creation. It’s an undoing of the world back to its primordial state of watery chaos, echoing the formless and empty earth of Genesis 1. God is essentially hitting the reset button on His creation.  The waters cover the earth, and all life is swept away, leaving only Noah and his family. The ark becomes a symbol of God’s redemptive power, saving a remnant to start over. The take-home message is that sin leads to cosmic chaos and death, but God, in His mercy, always provides a way for a remnant to survive.

After the flood, the Bible says God remembers Noah and the waters recede. As Noah’s family and the animals step back onto dry land, they walk into a new creation. Noah immediately builds an altar and offers a sacrifice. This act of worship marks the new beginning. God’s response is gracious. He smells the pleasing aroma and promises in His heart never again to curse the ground on account of humans, even though “the inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood” (8:21).

The Covenant of the Rainbow

To seal this promise, God gives a sign: the rainbow. He said, “I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth” (9:13). This is an important moment. It’s not a covenant with a specific nation; it’s a universal covenant with all living creatures, a unilateral promise from God never again to destroy the world. The rainbow is a symbol of God’s grace and His unwavering commitment to His creation.  For Jewish tradition, the rainbow is a reminder of God’s mercy and a sign that we, as humanity, must be vigilant in living righteously. For Christians, the rainbow is a beautiful foreshadowing of God’s ultimate commitment to all humanity, a grace that culminates in Christ, the ultimate assurance of God’s promise.

Epic of Gilgamesh

Much has been made about the similarities between the ancient myth called the Epic of Gilgamesh and the biblical story of Noah’s flood. And for good reason. In 1870, George Smith, a British Assyriologist, was studying cuneiform tablets from Nineveh when he came across a fragment describing a great flood. The more he deciphered, the more he realized he had found a story quite like the biblical account but also entirely different. Since that time, almost 100 fragments of the Epic of Gilgamesh have been found at sites across Mesopotamia.

The overall structure of both narratives is super close. They both have a divine decision to flood the earth, the selection of a righteous individual to build an ark, the gathering of animals, the flood itself, the sending out of birds to test if the waters have receded, the ark landing on a mountain, and a subsequent sacrifice. These parallels scream that there was a common Mesopotamian tradition of a great flood.

However, the differences between the two stories are also where the Bible truly shines. Nahum Sarna in his book Understanding Genesis emphasizes that the Bible’s global flood story has a strong moral imperative, something totally lacking in the Epic of Gilgamesh. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, the flood is triggered by the gods’ annoyance at the noise of humanity. It’s a capricious act, lacking any sense of justice or purpose. In contrast, the Bible presents the flood as a direct consequence of human wickedness and moral corruption. God, in his righteousness, acts to cleanse the earth of violence and injustice, offering a chance for a new beginning with Noah and his family.

After the flood, God establishes a covenant with Noah, promising never again to destroy all life with a flood. The rainbow serves as a symbol of this everlasting covenant. This element is absent in the Epic of Gilgamesh. No goodness or divine promise comes from the flood waters withdrawal.

Finally, the Bible’s monotheistic perspective transforms the narrative. Unlike the polytheistic Epic of Gilgamesh, where the gods bicker and act out of selfish motives, the God of the Bible is sovereign, just, and compassionate. The flood is not an arbitrary act but a deliberate response to human sin, ultimately paving the way for a renewed relationship between God and humanity based on the principles of divine mercy and grace.

The Failure of a New Beginning

In Chapter 11, the author of Genesis pivots from Noah’s flood to the incident of the Tower of Babel. This story describes how the descendants of Noah, speaking a single language, settled in the land of Shinar and decided to build a city with a tower that would reach the heavens. Their goal was to make a name for themselves and avoid being scattered across the earth. However, God saw their actions as a challenge to His authority and intervened by confusing their language.

The Bible’s description of the Tower of Babel is strikingly similar to the ziggurats of Mesopotamia, particularly those found in Babylon—massive, stepped pyramids that were the focal points of their cities and symbolized the link between heaven and earth. In fact, the very purpose of these ziggurats was to create a connection between the earthly and divine realms, a physical representation of humanity’s attempt to reach the heavens and commune with the gods. The biblical text also notes that they used brick for stone and bitumen for mortar, a sophisticated construction technique in ancient Mesopotamia.

According to rabbinic commentary, their sin was not just pride, but a direct rebellion against God’s command to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” This command, first given to Adam and Eve, was a divine blessing and a call to fill the world with life. Yet, the people of Shinar, in their desire for centralized power and a singular identity, actively resisted this mandate. God, in His mercy, didn’t destroy them. Instead, he confused their language and scatters them across the globe, fulfilling His original command. The lesson of Babel is that human unity, when it’s built on arrogance and rebellion against God, is a dangerous and fragile thing.

The story of Noah shows that a new world, a fresh start, isn’t enough to fix the human heart. Sin continues to be a problem, like the selfish ambitions of the nations in the plains of Shinar. This is where the story of humanity reaches a turning point. With Noah and the promise of the rainbow, God’s relationship with all of humanity is a general one. But after Babel’s failure, God changes His strategy. The stage is set for the next Torah portion, where God will no longer deal with all of humanity in general, but will choose one man, Abraham, to be the father of a people who will bless all the nations. That’s it for this week. Join me next week in reading Genesis 12:1-17:27, the portion on Abraham which is called Lech Lecha.

Shabbat Shalom and Am Yisrael Chai.

 

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For the past four years, we’ve embarked on a deep, chapter-by-chapter exploration of prophetic texts often overlooked by many readers—from the twelve minor prophets to the reformers Ezra and Nehemiah, and the major prophet Ezekiel. Now, we are embarking on a one-year sprint through the foundational texts of our faith: the first five books of the Bible, the Torah. Our first reading is called Bereishit and covers Genesis 1:1–6:8.

This series is structured around the Jewish reading cycle. According to Jewish tradition, some 2,500 years ago, Ezra the Scribe established an annual reading schedule that divides the Torah—the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—into 54 weekly portions. In Hebrew, those portions are called parashot. By following this centuries-old calendar, we will complete the entire Torah in one year. This isn’t just a reading plan; it’s an invitation to join an ancient and ongoing Bible Reading Challenge. I hope to build a bridge between the Bible conversations happening around Christian tables on Sunday lunches and the Shabbat tables of our Jewish friends and neighbors.

Like the Bible Fiber studies of the prophets, this new series will maintain a similar focus—less on personal life application and more on detailed textual exploration. Genesis is the most read book in the Bible because it’s where most people’s journey through the Bible begins and, sadly, where it often stalls out. This podcast, much like Bible Fiber has always done, will serve as your weekly encouragement to stay on track. We’ll find a way to get through the laws of Leviticus and the long sections on how to treat domestic mold. I promise that every section, no matter how obscure it may seem, holds an exciting truth and has a reason for us to celebrate the richness of Scripture.

Bereishit: The Creation Account

This week, we begin a new cycle of readings with Bereishit (Genesis 1:1–6:8), the very first Torah portion, which covers the creation account.

The first few verses of the Bible are simple: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” From chaos, God brought order, life, and light. What is particularly striking is the meticulous, step-by-step process of creation. On the first day, God separates light from darkness, establishing the very first distinction in the universe. On the second, He divides the waters, creating the expanse we call sky. Days three through six see the filling of these spaces with vegetation, celestial bodies, and all living creatures. The narrative builds to a crescendo, culminating in the creation of humanity on the sixth day.

This rhythmic, orderly account stands in stark contrast to the chaotic and violent creation myths of other ancient Near Eastern cultures. While their gods fought battles to create the world from the bodies of defeated foes, our God creates through pure speech, through a divine and peaceful command.

C.S. Lewis’s depiction of Narnia’s creation in The Magician’s Nephew is a deliberate and allegorical parallel to the biblical creation narrative. Just as God spoke creation into existence, Aslan sung Narnia into existence:

It was a Lion. Huge, shaggy, and bright it stood facing the risen sun. Its mouth was wide open in song and it was about three hundred yards away… And as he walked and sang the valley grew green with grass. It spread out from the Lion like a pool. It ran up the sides of the little hills like a wave… Soon there were other things besides grass. The slopes grew dark with heather… And when he burst into a rapid series of lighter notes she was not surprised to see primroses suddenly appearing in every direction… But now the song had once more changed. It was more like what we should call a tune, but it was also far wilder. It made you want to run and jump and climb… Showers of birds came out of the trees. Butterflies fluttered. Bees got to work on the flowers as if they hadn’t a second to lose… And now you could hardly hear the song of the Lion; there was so much cawing, cooing, crowing, braying, neighing, baying, barking, lowing, bleating, and trumpeting… Then there came a swift flash like a fire (but it burnt nobody) either from the sky or from the Lion itself, and every drop of blood tingled in the children’s bodies, and the deepest, wildest voice they had ever heard was saying: ‘Narnia, Narnia, Narnia, awake. Love. Think. Speak. Be walking trees. Be talking beasts. Be divine waters.’

Lewis painted a picture, like Genesis, of creation coming through a beautiful divine expression and effortless power. The world is not the result of a difficult, manual laboring process, but of a sovereign decree.

Created in God’s Image

The Bible says God formed Adam from the dust of the ground. This difference—being formed rather than spoken into existence—is a major point of Jewish rabbinic commentary. Why were humans formed and not just created from nothing like everything else? A common teaching is that this act of direct creation from dust highlights the intimacy and vulnerability of our relationship with God. The great rabbinic commentator, Rashi, notes that Adam was formed from the earth so that humanity would not think it was of a higher, divine origin. We are of the earth, a part of creation. Yet, we are also unique, as we are the only part of creation “made in the image of God.”

This phrase, “in the image of God” (b’tselem Elohim), is one of the most important concepts in both Jewish and Christian theology. It is the Bible’s very first description of humanity. Being made in God’s image is both a blessing and a responsibility. We are to bear His image into the world and care for His image in our treatment of others.

The First Sin and the First Choice

This idea of choice is central to the second half of the Torah portion, with the story of the Garden of Eden. The serpent tempts Eve by asking, “Did God really say…?” This is the first question in the Bible, and it immediately puts the authority of God’s word into doubt. The serpent doesn’t lie outright but he twists the truth, making the fruit appear to be the key to knowledge and godhood. The serpent’s strategy was to sow seeds of mistrust between God and His image bearers.

The sin of Adam and Eve was not merely eating a piece of fruit. It was a choice to seek knowledge and wisdom apart from God’s guidance. They chose their own way over God’s way, and in doing so, brought a fundamental brokenness into creation. Their punishment was not just expulsion from the garden, but a life of toil, pain, and distance from God. This separation, however, is not final. God makes a way for them, providing them with clothes and promising a future redemption through the seed of the woman.

Christian theology diverges from Jewish tradition in our interpretation of Adam and Eve’s sin in the garden. In Judaism, Adam’s sin is seen as a catastrophic moral error that introduced mortality, suffering, and a heightened struggle into the world, but it did not corrupt the moral nature of his descendants.

In Christian teaching, Adam’s sin represents the Fall of Man. That Original Sin caused the spiritual disease that is inherited by all humans. Because every person is born morally incapacitated, they are incapable of initiating their own salvation or perfectly obeying God’s commandments or keeping God’s standard without an act of divine Grace.

Although Christians believe humans are inherently guilty, we also know the solution is redemption and rebirth. Only the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, seen as the perfect and unblemished “image of the invisible God,” can remedy the inherited guilt and corruption and restore us to the intended relationship with God.

Apostle Paul: The New Self

The Apostle Paul gives Christians their marching orders for what it means to fulfill our original purpose in being God’s image bearers, but to do so through the sanctification of Jesus.

In his letter to the Colossians, Paul wrote:

“Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”

Bereishit sets the stage for everything that follows in the Bible. It introduces a God of order and care, a humanity created in His image with the power of choice, and the devastating consequences of that choice. It shows us that even in our moments of brokenness, God’s love and redemptive plan are still at work, as seen in the promise of a future redeemer and the preservation of a remnant of humanity. This weekly portion is more than just a historical account; it is a narrative about our identity as God’s creatures, the sacredness of our free will, and the enduring hope of redemption. It invites us into a unending dialogue about who we are and who God is.

Conclusion

Being made in the image of God is what allows us to know and be known by our Creator. As we go into our week, let’s ask ourselves: How can we bear the image of God in our world and care for others who bear that same image?

That’s it for this week. Join me next week in reading Genesis 6:9–11:32, the portion on Noah and the Flood.

Shabbat Shalom and Am Yisrael Chai.

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So far, Bible Fiber has done deep dives into the twelve minor prophets, Ezra and Nehemiah, and the major prophet Ezekiel. But I want to give a little nod to a few nonwriting and lesser-known prophets in the Bible. These are the prophets without their own books.

Non-writing Prophets

Prophets in the Bible who did not write their own books are often referred to as non-writing prophets. Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel’s prophecies were compiled into dedicated biblical books. The ministries of non-writing prophets are instead recorded within the historical narratives of other books, like Kings and Chronicles. Their primary role was to deliver God’s message to kings and the people of Israel and Judah. Their ministries were frequently characterized by bold confrontations with idol worship and corrupt rulers.

Two of the most prominent examples of non-writing prophets are Elijah and his successor, Elisha. Elijah is a major figure in the Books of Kings. He is known for his dramatic confrontation with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, where he called fire down from heaven. Another significant miracle was when he raised the son of a widow from the dead. He also miraculously provided a widow with a never-ending supply of flour and oil to sustain her and her son during a severe drought. When Elijah’s time came, God spared him from death, carrying him up to heaven in a chariot of fire.

Elisha was the successor to the prophet Elijah, inheriting a “double portion” of his spirit. His miracles often focused on helping non-Israelites who willingly called on the name of Yahweh. Through God’s power, he provided a widow with a seemingly endless supply of oil to pay her debts and raised the son of a kind and gracious Shunammite woman from the dead. Elisha famously healed the Syrian commander Naaman of leprosy by telling him to wash seven times in the Jordan River. Elisha also performed a miracle with Elijah’s cloak, parting the Jordan River as Elijah had done just moments before he was taken to heaven.

Another significant non-writing prophet is Nathan. When King David committed had an affair with Bathsheba and tried to kill her husband, Nathan rebuked David. Even though David was the strongest king to ever sit on Judah’s throne, he humbly submitted to the condemnations of Nathan, who clearly spoke from the Lord.

Gad, often referred to as “David’s seer,” was a personal prophet to King David. He is mentioned in the books of Samuel and Chronicles. It was Gad who rebuked David after the wrong-headed census. As described in 2 Samuel 24 and 1 Chronicles 21, King David, for reasons not fully explained, ordered a census of all the fighting men in Israel and Judah. This act was considered a sin, and God was displeased.

After the census was completed, David’s conscience troubled him, and he confessed his sin to the Lord. The census showed a lack of faith in God’s protection; it was merely a display of his own military strength. It was then that the prophet Gad was sent to him with a message from God. Gad presented David with three options for punishment: a choice of seven years of famine, three months of being pursued by his enemies, or three days of a plague in the land. David, recognizing that it was better to fall into the hands of God’s mercy than the hands of men, chose the plague.

As the plague raged, killing 70,000 men, the Lord’s angel of destruction was poised over Jerusalem. Gad instructed David to go to the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite to build an altar to the Lord and offer a sacrifice. This threshing floor was later used by King Solomon to build the Temple.

Ahijah was a prophet who lived in the city of Shiloh during the time of King Solomon. His most famous prophecy was delivered to Jeroboam. In a significant event recorded in 1 Kings 11:29-39, Ahijah tore his cloak into twelve pieces and gave ten pieces to Jeroboam. The Bible states that the Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from God. Solomon had been led astray by his foreign wives, building places of worship for their gods and practicing idolatry. Because of Solomon’s unfaithfulness, God decided to tear the kingdom from his hands. However, out of His covenant promise to King David, God chose not to do this during Solomon’s lifetime. Instead, he chose Jeroboam to become the ruler of ten of the twelve tribes of Israel after Solomon’s death. Ahijah’s message, symbolized by the tearing of the cloak, was a divine announcement of this impending division.

Micaiah was a prophet known for his courage in standing alone against King Ahab and his 400 false prophets. The story is found in 1 Kings 22. When King Ahab and King Jehoshaphat of Judah were deciding whether to go to war, all 400 of Ahab’s prophets gave a favorable prophecy, encouraging the king to attack. The king summoned the prophet Micaiah. Micaiah first sarcastically agreed with the other prophets, but his mocking tone was so clear that King Ahab immediately recognized it and insisted he “speak to me nothing but the truth in the name of the Lord.” When pressed, Micaiah delivered God’s true message: that Ahab would be defeated and killed in the upcoming battle. For speaking this unpopular truth, Micaiah was thrown into prison.

Uriah: A Prophetic Warning

The prophet Uriah son of Shemaiah is a figure referenced in the book of Jeremiah. Uriah delivered a powerful message of judgment against Jerusalem during a chaotic time. King Jehoiakim responded to Uriah’s negativity with intense fury. Uriah had no choice but to flee Israel for his life, running all the way to Egypt. But the king was so determined to silence him that he sent a group of men to track him down. They captured Uriah, dragged him back, and the king had him executed. It was a brutal end for a man who simply spoke God’s message.

You might wonder why we don’t have a whole book from Uriah, like we do for Jeremiah. The Bible tells us that his story, brief as it is, was so important to include because it showed just how much danger prophets faced. Unlike Jeremiah, Uriah likely didn’t have scribes to write down his prophecies, and his ministry was tragically cut short. For thousands of years, his story was just a few lines in a much larger narrative. But here’s where it gets interesting: about 2,500 years later, archaeologists started digging up artifacts that illuminated Jeremiah and Uriah’s prophecies.

The Lachish Ostraca: A Glimpse into a War-Torn World

Archaeologists digging at Lachish discovered a collection of letters from the final days of the Kingdom of Judah, before the Babylonian attack. It was written on broken pieces of pottery called Lachish Ostraca. Think of them as postcards from a war zone. They’re not official history books; they’re the hurried, sometimes desperate, correspondence between a commander named Hoshaiah at an outpost and his superior, Yaush, at the fortress of Lachish.

These letters are filled with the kind of details that bring history to life. They talk about mundane military reports, but also the very real anxieties of a nation under siege by the Babylonians. One letter, known as Ostracon 3, gives us a fascinating glimpse into the tensions of the time. In it, the commander complains about a prophet whose words are “weakening the hands” of the people and the army. We can’t know for sure if this letter is about Jeremiah, Uriah, or another prophet who saw the coming threat. Still, it’s a powerful sign that figures like them were real, active voices during this chaotic time. In Jeremiah 38:4, officials complained that his prophecies are “discouraging the soldiers who are left in this city, and the people, by speaking such things to them.”

Perhaps most remarkably, one of the letters mentions an army commander named Coniah son of Elnathan who went to Egypt. This is a potential connection to the Elnathan mentioned in the Bible, who King Jehoiakim sent to Egypt to capture Uriah. It’s not a direct confirmation, but it is interesting that an Elnathan figure was active in the very same context as Uriah’s story—and dealing with the very same foreign power, Egypt. The Lachish Ostraca don’t just validate Uriah’s existence; they pull back the curtain and show us the dangerous world in which Jeremiah and Uriah lived and died.

When we look at the story of Uriah and Jeremiah, we see a society that was fundamentally at odds with itself. On one side, you had prophets who were sounding the alarm—not just predicting a future disaster, but calling for a return to justice, righteousness, and faithfulness. They were seen as negative and unpatriotic because they spoke against the king and the nation’s prevailing policies. On the other side, you had the ruling class who chose to ignore those warnings, seeing the prophets as a political threat to be eliminated. King Jehoiakim wasn’t interested in truth; he was interested in maintaining power.

This tension between those who see a coming threat and those who deny it isn’t unique to biblical times. Every society, at one point or another, has faced this kind of division. There are always those who feel a spiritual obligation to speak difficult truths, warning against a dangerous path. And there are always others who, for various reasons—whether it’s comfort, power, or pride—dismiss those warnings. The lesson from history, from the story of Uriah and many others, is that ignoring the alarm doesn’t make the danger go away. But still our hope is in the Lord. Even the weeping prophet Jeremiah promised, “They will fight against you but will not overcome you, for I am with you to rescue you” (Jer. 1:19).

That’s it! I wanted to take a moment to shine some light on the prophets without their own books but who absolutely function in Israel’s world as megaphones for God’s word. Thank you for listening! On October 17, we are launching our brand-new series. We are doing a one-year sprint through the Torah, following the weekly reading calendar that the Jewish people have used for hundreds and hundreds of years.

Shabbat Shalom and Am Israel Chai.

The post Bible Fiber: The prophets without books appeared first on Shelley Neese.

Welcome to Bible Fiber, where we explore the textures and shades of the biblical tapestry through the Twelve Minor Prophets, two reformers, and one exile. I’m Shelley Neese, president of The Jerusalem Connection, a Christian organization dedicated to sharing the stories of Israel’s people, both ancient and modern. I’m also the author of the book Bible Fiber, a 52-week study of the Twelve Minor Prophets, available on Amazon. This week, we are reading the last section of Ezekiel 47 and all of chapter 48. It is our final episode on Ezekiel—our first major prophet and it has taken over a year to go through the dense book chapter by chapter. As much as I have enjoyed this process, these last few episodes have been like preparing for my final exam of a tough graduate school course. But we are pushing to the finish line.

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New Boundaries

The prophet’s final recorded revelation is a divine mandate on how the land of Israel will be divided among the tribes once they are restored to the land. This vision is a powerful message of hope and divine faithfulness to a people in despair. The Israelites had lost their land and their temple, and this meticulous oracle of restoration was a promise that God had not abandoned His people or forgotten His covenant promises.

The passage begins by emphasizing that the division of the land must incorporate the twelve tribes, with Joseph receiving two portions to account for the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh (47:13-14). Within the specified borders of Israel, each of the twelve tribes is to receive an equal portion.

As the text proceeds, it provides detailed descriptions of the borders: the northern boundary encompassing landmarks from the Mediterranean Sea across to Hethlon, Lebo-Hamath, and Zedad (47:15-17); the eastern boundary stretching from Hauran and Damascus along the Jordan River to the Dead Sea (47:18); the southern boundary extending from Tamar to the waters of Meribah Kadesh and along the wadi of Egypt to the Mediterranean Sea (47:19); and finally, the western boundary, which is simply described as the Mediterranean Sea itself (47:20).

The passage concludes with God affirming that this land distribution shall be the inheritance for the tribes of Israel (47:21). God will restore Israel’s national integrity and secure their future in the promised land. Each tribe has a rightful place under God’s covenant.

Tribal Portions

Ezekiel 48 goes into even more granular detail about the land allocations. Ezekiel starts with the northern tribes and moves towards the south. The northernmost portions are given to Dan first, and then followed by Asher, Naphtali, Manasseh, Ephraim, Reuben, and Judah (48:1-7). Each tribe receives a strip of land extending from the eastern to the western borders.

Central to the chapter is the allotment for the sacred district, set apart for Judah and Benjamin (48:8-14). This district includes an area for the sanctuary, territory for the priests and Levites, and land for the city and its surrounding open space. The city is known as “The Lord is There” or “Yahweh Shammah” (48:15-20, 35). This new order is not just about a geographical return but about the restoration of Israel’s national and religious identity under God’s direct sovereignty.

The passage continues by detailing the remaining tribal allocations from Benjamin to Gad, each receiving land south of the sacred district (48:23-28). The chapter concludes with a summary of the city’s gates named after the twelve tribes (48:30-34).

The grand message is that God is faithful and he longs for a future covenant land that is centered around worship. The chapter closes by reiterating the name of the city as “The Lord is There.” The name encapsulates the ultimate goal of Ezekiel’s visions—reestablishing the connection between God and His people in a harmonious, divinely ordered society.

The final distribution of the land, therefore, is not just a political act; it is the establishment of a new, holy, and life-giving environment for a restored Israel. The land itself is sanctified by the presence of the temple and the life-giving river. The future inheritance is not a return to the flawed past, but the beginning of a new, righteous era under God’s rule.

Previous Tribal Allotments

The theme of tribal allotments is not unique to Ezekiel 48. Earlier land distributions were presented to the people in Numbers 26:53-56 and Joshua 18:6-10. These earlier passages provide the historical context necessary to understand the significance of Ezekiel’s vision during the exilic and post-exilic period.Numbers outlines the divvying of land among the tribes of Israel as they prepared to enter the Promised Land. The allocation was based on the size of each tribe.

In Joshua, the actual division of land occurs as Israel settles in Canaan. The land was central to Israel’s identity and covenant relationship with Yahweh. They cast lots for the land because they fully relied on God’s guidance in determining each tribe’s inheritance.

In the wake of the Babylonian exile, Ezekiel knew that the return to the land and the re-establishment of tribal identities necessitated a careful approach to land allocation. The people faced the challenge of reclaiming their ancestral lands, which may have been lost or occupied during their absence. (We studied about this in Ezra and Nehemiah.)

The context of exile and the need for restoration permeate the chapter. The land is not only a physical possession, but a sacred inheritance tied to the covenant between God and His people.

Conclusion

Ezekiel’s vision of tribal allotments in chapter 48 is deeply rooted in the historical accounts found in Numbers and Joshua, yet it transforms and revitalizes these themes for a community returning from exile. The intent is to reaffirm their identity and relationship with God while facilitating a practical means of reestablishing a communal and covenant-oriented society.

That’s it for Ezekiel!!! Thank you for listening! We made it! I know what we are doing next in Bible Fiber and it is a whole new kind of challenge. But I am going to save that announcement for later. Right now, I want to savor in the completion of our first Major Prophet!

Shabbat Shalom and Am Israel Chai.

The post Bible Fiber: Ezekiel 47:13–48:3 appeared first on Shelley Neese.

This week, we’re reading Ezekiel 47:1-12. We are still in the last eight chapters of Ezekiel, the prophet’s concluding vision that offers a message of hope following the book’s devastating oracles of judgment. In Ezekiel 47, the prophet, along with his angelic guide, witnesses a river of living water flowing from the temple.

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They first encounter water “flowing from below the entryway of the temple toward the east” (47:1). They then move outside the temple’s perimeter toward the east gate. Although this gate had previously been sealed shut, water trickles from beneath it onto the south side (47:2).

Ezekiel and his guide follow the river as it runs away from the temple. The angel, still equipped with a measuring cord, notes their distance from the temple courts. As they venture further from the temple, the water progressively deepens. At 1,000 cubits (about 1,500 feet or 457 meters) from the entrance, the water reaches ankle depth (47:3). At 2,000 cubits, it is knee-deep. At 3,000 cubits, the water reaches waist height, prompting the prophet to wade through it (47:4). Beyond that point, the river becomes an impassable torrent. Fully immersed in his vision, Ezekiel explains, “For the water had risen; it was deep enough to swim in, a river that could not be crossed” (47:5). Only at that moment does the angelic guide speak to Ezekiel, asking, “Mortal, have you seen this?” (47:6).

Soaked from the waist down, Ezekiel and the guide sit on the riverbank. Ezekiel observes that “a great many trees” were growing along both sides of the bank (47:7). The temple river was giving life to everything it touched!

The angel explains the river’s impact even beyond their line of sight: “This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah, and when it enters the sea, the sea of stagnant waters, the water will become fresh” (47:8). The Arabah refers to the Jordan Valley, while the “sea of stagnant waters” is the Dead Sea. If you’ve ever visited the Dead Sea, you can imagine the seeming impossibility of this image. Even today, the Dead Sea remains lifeless due to its high salinity. Except for the oasis at Ein Gedi, the surrounding land is barren and dry.

When the rushing river feeds into the Dead Sea, the guide declares, “Every living creature that swarms will live, and there will be many fish once these waters reach there” (47:9). At this point, the astute Bible reader should take note: Ezekiel is describing a new creation with clear Edenic imagery. In the Genesis creation narrative, a river flows out of Eden to water the garden (Gen. 2:10). In the larger themes of the Bible, Eden is seen as the temple, and the garden represents the land of Israel as originally intended for the covenant relationship.

The language of paradise continues as the angel describes “every living creature” thriving by the river (47:9). The vegetation that grows along the banks “bears fresh fruit every month” because it is irrigated by the life-giving river (47:12). Moreover, the leaves of the trees possess healing properties.

The river’s ability to transform the barren landscape and the stagnant Dead Sea is more than just a poetic prophecy; God was showing Ezekiel in the vision that his close presence brings about complete renewal and restoration, both for the nation of Israel and, ultimately, for all creation. Just as the Holy Spirit breathed life into the dry bones in the valley, so too would God’s living water bring life, healing, and renewal to everything that drew near it.

Zechariah 14

Ezekiel was not the first prophet to envision a life-giving river flowing from Jerusalem. In Zechariah 14, the apocalyptic prophet also foretold of “living waters” that would flow out from the city. In both accounts, the river supernaturally renewed God’s land and revitalized his people. Zechariah says, “And it shall come to pass in that day that living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the eastern sea, and half of them toward the western sea; in summer and in winter shall it be” (14:8).

Despite their shared themes, Ezekiel’s and Zechariah’s rivers are complementary rather than identical visions. A primary distinction lies in the river’s source and destination. Ezekiel’s river originates specifically from the new temple. It flows eastward, bringing life to the Dead Sea. Ezekiel’s vision of the river is rooted in the prophetic hope of spiritual and physical restoration for the people of Israel after their exile. His original audience would have been inspired by God’s commitment to bring life and abundance to them, even after experiencing death and destruction.

Zechariah, however, simply states that the river flows “from Jerusalem” but describes a more expansive course. This single river miraculously divides, with half flowing to the Dead Sea (the eastern sea) and the other half flowing to the Mediterranean Sea (the western sea). While Ezekiel’s vision is focused on Israel’s salvation, Zechariah’s looks out to the universal reach of God’s blessing.

When read together, Ezekiel 47 and Zechariah 14 paint a broader picture of God’s plan for all of humanity. Ezekiel’s focus on the temple highlights that true life comes from God’s presence, while Zechariah’s vision of the river flowing in two directions demonstrates that God’s blessing will fill the land in every direction. The combination of these prophecies establishes a consistent biblical theme of paradise regained, where no obstacle stands in the way of a restored relationship between God and his people.

Jesus’s living water

In the Gospels, Jesus often referred to himself as living water. This wasn’t just a casual use of a metaphor; it was a deliberate theological statement that connected his ministry to ancient prophetic promises.

To the Samaritan woman at the well, Jesus explains, “Those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life” (John 4:14). He perceived the Samaritan woman’s deep-seated wounds and her dissatisfaction with earthly life. He promised her that through him, she would be reconciled to God and brought into his Kingdom, where her deepest spiritual longing would finally be met.

In another episode, Jesus was in Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles. Every year, during the festival, priests would go to the Pool of Siloam to draw water, then process back up the pilgrimage road to the temple. This ceremony looked back to God’s miraculous provision in the wilderness, but it also looked forward to a time of Messianic restoration, as prophesied in Ezekiel 47. While the people’s political expectations often clouded their understanding, Jesus knew that the ceremony hinted at the anticipated arrival of the Messiah. He beckoned to the crowd, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink” (John 7:38). In a direct reference to Ezekiel’s River of Life, Jesus adds, “As the Scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water’” (John 7:39). The Gospel of John immediately clarifies that Jesus “said this about the Spirit,” a crucial detail that connects the physical imagery of a river to the spiritual reality of new life with the Holy Spirit.

For Jesus, all who believed in him would become living temples. Like Ezekiel’s vision, the good news would flow forth from them to heal hearts and redeem the world. Only through his death and resurrection could he reverse the effects of the sin and death that began in Eden.

Revelation 22

John of Patmos, the New Testament writer who reinterpreted many of Ezekiel’s visions, also received a vision of a river of life. In Revelation 22, an angelic guide shows him a river, describing it as “the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city” (Rev. 22:1). John’s river shares the same characteristics as Ezekiel’s, but in addition to flowing from God’s throne, it also flows from the Lamb, Jesus Christ. In case there was any doubt that John was recalling Ezekiel’s closing vision, he describes the same irrigating effects of the river. He states, “On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations” (Rev. 22:2).

You may recognize the imagery of the monthly producing fruit trees with leaves for healing. John modifies two important aspects in his vision: he sees only a single tree, and this tree provides healing not just for Israel but for all nations. While Ezekiel’s river signifies a particular restoration for Israel—evidenced by the fact that it does not flow past the Dead Sea—John expands that restoration to encompass all nations in a covenant of universal healing.

Revelation 22’s flowing river connects the beginning of the biblical narrative with its end. Just as a river flowed from the Garden of Eden to water the land, the river from the temple will one day restore all creation. The Bible begins in Genesis with a single tree that leaves humanity under a curse and ends with one tree that brings everyone under the promise of its blessing. The tree in Eden introduced death, while the tree in Revelation overcomes death.

I really wish we could end here! In my mind, this is the concluding podcast for Ezekiel. However, the Bible did not ask for my editorial advice, and Ezekiel has one more chapter, Chapter 48. It doesn’t pack the same wallop as Chapter 47, but we will persevere. Join me next week for our final Ezekiel study!

Thank you for listening, and please continue to take part in this Bible Reading Challenge. We almost made it to the end!

For all the biblical references each week, please see the show transcript on our blog or by signing up for our emails at www.thejerusalemconnection.us/. I don’t say all the references in the podcast, but they are all in the transcript.

Send me a message—I will respond. Bible Fiber is available on YouTube or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Shabbat Shalom

The post Bible Fiber: Ezekiel 47 appeared first on Shelley Neese.