It took a while for Esau to figure out how to get along in his family of origin. He was an impetuous man. He foolishly sold his birthright to his younger brother and lost his father’s blessing, but it wasn’t until his brother left home that Esau wised up and began to understand his family’s values.

Brother Jacob already had the blessing of the first-born, but Esau noticed that when their father Isaac sent him away it was with a second blessing, and a command not to marry a Canaanite woman. Jacob was going to find a wife from among their mother Rebekah’s relatives in Haran, also known as Paddan Aram.

Esau Tries to Solve a Problem

Esau was already married to two Hittite women, but he thought it might make things better with his family if he took another wife, this time from Abraham’s family. He went to his Uncle Ishmael and asked for the hand of his cousin Mahalath. Now Esau had three wives, but that didn’t make his marital situation better and it probably didn’t improve his relationship with his parents either.

Monogamy or Polygamy?

So far in this story of Abraham’s descendants, Isaac was the only man who practiced monogamy. He married only Rebekah and stayed with her for their lifetime. So, given what people were doing, what was God’s stance on monogamy versus polygamy?

God never condoned polygamy in the Bible. His plan at the beginning of time was that one man would marry one woman and stay married to her as long as they both lived. Genesis 2:24 says,

“That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.”

But people didn’t stick with God’s ideal plan for marriage. Men took multiple wives and concubines and their polygamy usually led to problems.

Jacob’s Choice

Jacob is an example of a man with multiple wives. He worked for seven years to get Rachel as his wife, but was tricked into marrying Leah first. When he discovered the deception, his father-in-law gave him Rachel, too, in exchange for seven more years of work. Each wife brought a maidservant with her that eventually became Jacob’s concubine. He had children by all of them.

Leah really loved Jacob and she gave him more children than the other three wives combined, six sons and a daughter. She was a devoted wife and mother and we can tell by the names she gave her children, she tended to have an optimistic outlook.

What if Jacob had accepted Leah as his only wife and left for home after he married her? He would have made it back to the Promised Land much sooner, probably with a contented wife and plenty of children. Instead he delayed his return home and ran into a lot of trouble by marrying several wives.

Multiple Wives, Multiplied Troubles

Because Jacob was so set on having Rachel, he got Leah, Zilpah and Bilhah, too. And as it turned out, Rachel, the one he preferred, was a petulant wife who made his first wife Leah miserable and blamed Jacob for things he couldn’t control.

“When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, ‘Give me children, or I’ll die!’ Jacob became angry with her and said, ‘Am I in the place of God, who has kept you from having children?’ ” Genesis 30:1-2

Rachel’s solution to her infertility was to add one more woman to the marriage and have children through her maid Bilhah. When Bilhah gave birth to a son, Rachel claimed him as her own and said, ”I have had a great struggle with my sister and I have won.” (Genesis 30:7) I wonder whether it was the children Rachel wanted or the victory over her sister.

Who’s In Charge?

Leah was well aware of Jacob’s fascination with Rachel and she accused Rachel of stealing her husband. When Rachel wanted to get a hold of some mandrakes Leah’s son Reuben had collected, Leah snapped at her.

“ . . . ‘Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes, too?’ “ Genesis 30:15

But they struck a deal and Leah hired Jacob for the night by giving Rachel the mandrakes.

“So when Jacob came in from the fields that evening, Leah went out to meet him. ‘You must sleep with me,’ she said. ‘I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.’ So he slept with her that night.” Genesis 30:16

Jacob never knew what he was coming home to at the end of the day. He ended up with twelve sons by four wives, but he may have felt that he was not really the head of his own household.

What Might Have Been . . .

We’ll never know how the story would have turned out if Jacob had followed his parent’s instructions, married one wife and come home. Maybe he and Leah would have had twelve sons together and lived peaceably the rest of their lives. A man could grow to appreciate and love a good wife like Leah, but what Jacob had was a house full of women competing with each other for his favor.

God Gets His Way in the End

It’s interesting that when the story of Jacob, Leah and Rachel comes to a close, it’s Leah who is buried beside Jacob in the family tomb at Mamre. They join Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah in the Tomb of the Patriarchs, as the father and mother of the twelve tribes of Israel.

God was able to work with people even when they made mistakes and he worked with the twelve sons Jacob had with his four wives. It wasn’t because Jacob’s family was perfect that God blessed and used them; it was because they worshipped him as their God and followed after him.

Jacob certainly grew through this experience. He left his childish ways behind and no long hung around the tents cooking and conniving. He worked hard in the fields and proved himself a man worthy of his hire, as we will see tomorrow. The Bible certainly doesn’t idealize these people and their stories. When people please God we read about it and when they fail we read about that, too.

The Bible tells the story, just the way it was.