Rebekah (27 page)

Isaac prayed to the L
ORD
on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. The L
ORD
answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant. The babies jostled each other within her, and she said, “Why is this happening to me?” So she went to inquire of the L
ORD
.

The L
ORD
said to her,

“Two nations are in your womb,

and two peoples from within you will be separated;

one people will be stronger than the other,

and the older will serve the younger.”

Genesis 25:21–23

The boys grew up, and Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was a quiet man, staying among the tents. Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.

Genesis 25:27–28

 22 

Rebekah sat up with a start and clutched her bulging middle. The action roused Isaac, and he rose up on one elbow, his heart beating too fast. “Is it the babe?” The question seemed ludicrous even to his untrained mind. What else could it be? “What can I do?”

She stroked her sides and whispered cooing sounds, but even through the thin sheet, he could see the babe’s kicks causing her skin to move as though a war were being fought within her.

“He is a strong one.” She winced, and his heart constricted with her agony.

“Is it painful?”

She nodded, then shook her head. “Not painful in a way that I fear he will be born too soon,” she said through a clenched jaw. “But he does not sleep. Even in the day”— she gasped—“it is as though he cannot find a comfortable position to rest.” She turned her face to him, and he could make out the tears through the dim light of the flickering oil lamp. “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Is God punishing me somehow?”

He drew her as close as the babe would allow and pulled her head against his chest. It was a question he had asked himself many times in the months since God had seen fit to bless them. Never in his years had he seen a woman so torn
by pregnancy. Keturah’s sons had caused her little distress, and Selima seemed to birth children on top of one another without a struggle.

Why, Adonai, have You given my Rebekah such grief?

“It is not your fault, beloved. I only wish I could take this from you and carry it in your place.”

She laughed, though it came out garbled by tears. “You would look mighty strange, a man carrying a child within him.” She cradled her belly and spoke softly. “There, there, my sweet child. Rest now and let your mother sleep.”

She snuggled closer against him, and within moments he heard her soft breathing. She seemed to rest better in his arms, and he gladly allowed it if only to give her peace but a moment. But his own sleep was long in coming, and he worried not for the first time what kind of son would be born to him, what kind of son could bring such turmoil.

Rebekah paced the confines of her tent, her legs barely carrying her from one side to the other. She pressed both hands against her protruding middle, stroking and speaking softly, quietly begging her unborn son—for surely it was a son—to still long enough to give her a moment’s rest. Since she had first felt the stirrings of his life, he had not ceased to shift and kick and roll until she thought she would scream for the frustration of it! Why was this happening to her?

Neither Deborah nor Selima, nor any other woman in the camp, had experienced such agony so early in her pregnancy. The pains didn’t come upon a woman until her travail, which for Rebekah was still two months away.

A little cry escaped her, and she stuck a fist to her mouth to stifle the sound. It would only frighten the camp if she screamed as she wanted to. And she feared, always feared, it would somehow harm the babe.

She sank onto the cushions, spent from her pacing, but the movement within her would not cease.

Oh, Adonai, what wrong have I done?

If only He would answer.

Unable to sit still, knowing the only way to get any relief was to walk, she rose on shaky legs and left the tent, making her way to the edge of the tree line where Isaac’s altar stood. Should she ask Isaac to offer a sacrifice on her behalf? Perhaps God would relent, allow the babe to rest, if she humbled herself in that way.

She stopped at the altar’s edge and rested a hand on the blackened stones as she had done at the altar on Mount Moriah. God had heard Isaac’s prayers for her there and granted the request for this babe. Oh, but she had never expected the result to be so hard!

She gripped the stones for support and sank slowly, awkwardly, to her knees, faintly wondering if she would be able to rise again with the burden of the babe so great. But she must humble herself, must do
something
to seek God’s favor if she was to find peace.

She braced her hands on her folded knees, unable to lean close enough to touch her forehead to the dust as she had done that day on Moriah, and prayed that the One Who Sees Me would notice her here regardless of her posture, would somehow once again show His great mercy.

Oh, Adonai, why is this happening to me?

She waited, hoping against hope for an answer. But as the shadows lengthened and she could no longer kneel in her awkward position, she rose, defeated. Perhaps God did not hear the prayers of a woman.

She brushed the dirt from her robe and bit back the urge to weep. She must strive for strength to endure until the day came for his birth. There was nothing else to be done.

She moved away from the altar, then turned back for one more look and was startled at the sight of a man not unlike
the one she had seen many years before, when Eliezer had come to take her to Isaac. The thought brought a swift pang of fear to her heart, and her knees nearly buckled beneath her.

“My Lord,” she whispered, wondering that she could speak at all.

His look held such kindness, taking her fear and causing it to still within her.

“Two nations are in your womb,” he said, his gaze never leaving hers, “and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.”

With that he vanished from her sight.

She blinked, not certain his presence had been real, and yet knowing it was. As with the first visit of the Lord many years before, she had not imagined this.

Two nations are in your womb.

No wonder she suffered so. There were two, and already they fought within her.

The older will serve the younger.

The thought troubled her. Such was not the way of things. And yet, was not Isaac the younger of his father’s first two sons? God had chosen the younger. She must tell Isaac. And she would not forget God’s word to her.

“Praise be to the God of Abraham, blessed be His name! What a red, hairy son you have!”

Deborah lifted the child, wriggling and slimy, and Rebekah opened her eyes for a brief moment to gaze on her firstborn before another contraction bore down on her. The baby’s cry split the damp night air, a joyous sound amid the ripping of Rebekah’s insides as she pushed, seated on the birthing stool.

“Look, his brother has hold of his heel.” Selima rested both hands beneath her, ready to catch the twin as Rebekah pushed. “He is almost out, Rebekah. Two more good pushes.”

Rebekah groaned and cried out and fisted both hands while she bit hard on a linen cloth. But at last her months of anguish ended in a gush of baby, blood, and water. She leaned back against another maid’s strong grip, sweat clinging to her.

After the women had cleaned her up, Rebekah moved to the softer bed of cushions and settled among them. She breathed deeply, in and out, relief flooding her that the ordeal and the many months of turmoil were finally past.

“Let me see them.”

Deborah moved closer to her left, holding a cleaned, red, and hairy infant to her face, his angry fists clenched and his lips puckering in indignation in the dim light of the birthing tent.

Rebekah laughed at the sight of him. “Surely you have been the one causing most of the fighting within me all these months, little one.” She met Deborah’s motherly gaze. “He shall be Esau, my red and hairy one.”

“And what of this child?” Selima’s sturdy arms lifted the most beautiful child she had ever seen. “Your little heel grabber.”

Joy filled her at the sight of him, and she took in the light brown skin and hair and the mewling mouth that looked for sustenance without a sound. Love for him surged in an instant, and she wondered how he had fared against his twin during their preborn battles.

“He shall be Jacob, he who grasps the heel.” She held out her arms to take him from Selima. “My son.” The words sounded as foreign as the truth that two sons of hers had now been born into the world. “You must tell Isaac that his sons are safely here.”

Isaac. The thought of him made her warm with contentment, and she felt a strange glow fill her that his prayers for her, for them, had at last been answered. How good of him to take her to the mount of his suffering, to pray for a mere woman’s request. And God had answered!

She looked up at the sound of the tent flap rustling. Isaac stood in the opening, moonlight bathing him in its ethereal light.

“What have you named them?” He took their firstborn from Deborah’s arms, laughing at the child’s boisterous, flailing arms and urgent cries. “I think he wants his mother.” But he sat in the chair beside her and held him on his knee just the same.

“His name is Esau, and his brother is Jacob. If you agree, my lord.” She lifted Jacob from her breast and handed him to Deborah, who switched boys with Isaac and handed Esau to Rebekah. Her milk had not yet come in full, but Esau suckled as though by working hard enough, he could force his own nourishment.

“He is an insistent one.” Isaac held Jacob, but his eyes were focused on Esau. “Perhaps he was the cause of your misery.” He smiled down at Jacob, who seemed completely docile and content to be held on his father’s knee.