Bean Soup And Other Dirty Tricks

[Snow]

Today’s priesthood lesson was Earnest, Honest, Sincere Prayer from the President Grant manual but took a unique and tangential approach. I told the story of Jacob/Israel:

Rebekah gives birth to twins:

Esau (red)

Jacob (heel-grabber or surplanter)

Some scholars speculate the Jacob's original name was Jacob-el, or God Supplants - giving a divine connotation to Jacob's stealing of his brother’s birthright.

The story is a classic mythic tale of two brothers pitted against each other in the ancient poetic tradition. Jacob is not unlike Odysseus from Greek mythology, The narrative has:

-the hero’s wanderings,

-mystical happenings.

-extraordinary events

-eventual return home

Jacob's led the life of a trickster, a deceiver, the younger brother favored of his mother, a shepherd. Esau was the slowwitted hunter, guillible.

Jacob took Esau’s birthright when Esau entreated him for food. Esau’s philosophy was that you can’t eat a birthright and so he sold for a pot of bean soup.

Jacob tricked his father into giving to him his brother’s blessing.

Story continues... Jacob’s ladder, the first Stairway to Heaven then with more tricks and treats... Rachel and Leah, a slave and a handmaid, twelve sons, folk magic to produce speckled sheep, stealing of Laban’s household pagan god idols, hidden under the sitting and menstruating Rachel. Then as Jacob is going to reconcile with his brother Esau there is a strange occurrence....

Jacob meets a man and wrestles with him till morning. The man asks Jacob to let him go but Jacob will not until the man blesses him.

What is the connection to the topic of the lesson - Sincere Prayer?

Jacob had struggled his whole life - at birth, for his station in life, for his wives, for wealth, now at the end, he was struggling with God, not in a wrestling match, but in determined prayer. The Lord “touches his hip” and put it out of joint - not to cheat him in the wrestling match, but to remind Jacob who was God, and still Jacob would not relent. He prays on. Finally the Lord says “Let me Go” and Jacob relies “I will not except thou blesses me.” The Lord asks him his name and Jacob recognizes himself as the deceiver answering “Jacob”. He was now a spiritual man ready for a new life and a new name.

Thus he becomes “Yishra’el,” Israel.

It is worth noting that Esau gets a bum rap as the slow witted and angry dupe. Remember it was he who had been cheated by a scheming mother and deceiving brother and in the end, this hero Esau offers his brother and emotional embrace and unconditional forgiveness.

[Ray]

Were you intentionally suggesting that we can gain the blessings that rightfully belong only to Jesus by being persistent in prayer with determination to become a new creature?

Can you break down your story a little more for us common folks here on the board, or do you suggest that these correlations be received from on high?

Btw, I’m particularly interested in what you think we’ve done that can be seen as a bit of “trickery”?

[Snow]

Originally posted by Ray@Oct 15 2004, 02:02 PM

Were you intentionally suggesting that we can gain the blessings that rightfully belong only to Jesus by being persistent in prayer with determination to become a new creature?

Can you break down your story a little more for us common folks here on the board, or do you suggest that these correlations be received from on high?

Btw, I’m particularly interested in what you think we’ve done that can be seen as a bit of “trickery”?

Today I ran across one of those little things you see evangelical born-agains leave lying around - it was a $1,000,000 dollar bill on the front (to entice you to pick it up) and then on the back it said Praise Jesus, etc, etc... Take this ticket to heaven by saying the following words: "I accept Christ as my Savior, ..." etc.

Contrast that to the tale of Jacob, at least as I described it in my lesson, that here was a man who finally came to terms with himself, admitted it, put off his old self, wrestled with God, metaphorically, until God finally accepted him; ie grace is not so cheaply bought...

The deal is that as told in the Bible, the story of Jacob makes no sense as literal history. So what if Jacob cheated (lied) in order to get his father's blessing. The blessing itself is only valid if God, in his power, fullfills it. Does God reward cheating? I think not. In fact, the 12 tribes probably didn't originate with Jacob/Israel, they predated him. Later the story was told that the tribes flowed from him in order to tie together with a common heritage the divergent local tribes. For example Cyrus Gordon thinks that the tribe of Dan orginally came, not from a son of Israel, but from a Sea Peoples known as the Danuna.

Other scholars think that Jacob / Israel were two seperate people whose stories were woven together by the redactor.

So, it the story is not literal history, what gospel message can we extract from it? My take is as good as any.

[Ray]

Heh, I was hoping you might say that the “trickery” we engage in is to act as the rightful heir when we do or say something in the name of Jesus Christ... and the fact that Jesus may have allowed or continues to allow us to do and say things in His name doesn't prevent it from being "trickery", because we are still not Him.

And btw, the fact that there are some "scholars" who testify that the Biblical account of Jacob / Israel is not true does not mean that the story is not true.

… the 12 tribes probably didn't originate with Jacob/Israel, they predated him.

When one of those “scholars” feeds you this kind of information, I recommend that you check it against the scriptures. The 12 tribes of Israel were the 12 sons of Jacob and their descendents. How could there be any sons of Jacob and their descendents without there first being a Jacob, aka Israel?

The scriptures then go on to reveal how the 12 tribes of Israel later came to include both sons of Joseph and their descendents, with the descendents of Levi being intermingled among the whole house of Israel instead of being distinguished as a separate tribe.

[Snow]

Originally posted by Ray@Oct 19 2004, 09:14 AM

And btw, the fact that there are some "scholars" who testify that the Biblical account of Jacob / Israel is not true does not mean that the story is not true.

I have never heard of a scholar that testified that the Bible story is not true, so I don't know what you are talking about. I have heard the educated opinion of experts that the story is not necessarily true.

… the 12 tribes probably didn't originate with Jacob/Israel, they predated him.

When one of those “scholars” feeds you this kind of information, I recommend that you check it against the scriptures. The 12 tribes of Israel were the 12 sons of Jacob and their descendents. How could there be any sons of Jacob and their descendents without there first being a Jacob, aka Israel?

Are you pretending to be stupid or this that a real question?

The way it could happen is if the tribes predated Jacob and then later whoever wrote the account of Jacob fictionalized their attribution to Jacob.

[Ray]

Ray: The 12 tribes of Israel were the 12 sons of Jacob and their descendents. How could there be any sons of Jacob and their descendents without there first being a Jacob, aka Israel?

Snow: Are you pretending to be stupid or this that a real question?

The way it could happen is if the tribes predated Jacob and then later whoever wrote the account of Jacob fictionalized their attribution to Jacob.

Ahh, yes, I suppose there could have been someone named Mike or George with 12 sons who changed his name and the name of his descendents to Israel. Why didn’t I think of that?

Or, hey, why even say that the 12 tribes of Israel were the descendents of any one particular person? Those people might not have had any parents in common and had simply decided to live in 12 separate groups in the same area, much like the suburbs of many cities that we have today.

I guess the fact that something is written in the Bible really doesn’t prove anything at all, does it? Which is what I have been saying all along. Without the Holy Ghost to assure us of the truth that is written in the Bible, we could come up with all kinds of beliefs about anything.

[Snow]

Originally posted by Ray@Oct 20 2004, 10:01 AM

I guess the fact that something is written in the Bible really doesn’t prove anything at all, does it? Which is what I have been saying all along. Without the Holy Ghost to assure us of the truth that is written in the Bible, we could come up with all kinds of beliefs about anything.

That's right Ray. That the Bible says something proves nothing. Remember that according to the Bible, there were giants and a flood up to the tops of the mountains and a talking donkey....