Genesis 35:9-19

9 Forsooth God appeared again to Jacob, after that he turned again from Mesopotamia of Syria, and came into Bethel, and blessed him, (And God appeared again to Jacob, after that he had returned from Paddan-aram, and he blessed him,)

10 and (he) said, Thou shalt no more be called Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name. And (so) God called him Israel,

11 and said to him, I am God Almighty (and he said to him, I am Almighty God); increase thou, and be thou multiplied, (yea,) folks and peoples of nations shall be of thee, (and) kings shall go out of thy loins;

12 and I shall give to thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land which I gave to Abraham and Isaac.

13 And (then) God departed from him.

14 Forsooth Jacob raised (up) a title, or a memorial, of stones, in the place wherein God spake to him, and he sacrificed thereon flowing sacrifices, and shedded out oil, (And Jacob raised up a stone pillar, in the place where God spoke to him, and he offered a sacrifice of wine on it, and poured oil on it,)

15 and he called the name of that place Bethel.

16 Soothly Jacob went out from thence, and he came in the beginning of summer to the land that leadeth to Ephratah; in which land when Rachel travailed in child bearing, (And Jacob went out from there, and at the beginning of summer he came to the way that leadeth to Ephrath; in which land when Rachel struggled, or laboured, to survive while giving birth,)

17 she began to be in peril for the hardness of (the) childbearing; and the midwife said to her, Do not thou dread, for thou shalt have also this son (and the midwife said to her, Do not thou fear, for thou shalt also have this son/for this is another son for you).

18 Forsooth while the soul passed from her for sorrow, and death nighed then, she called the name of her son Benoni, that is, the son of my sorrow; forsooth his father called him Benjamin, that is, the son of the right side. (But as her soul passed away from her, and death neared, she named her son Benoni, that is, The son of my sorrow; but his father called him Benjamin, that is, The son of my right hand.)

19 Therefore Rachel died, and was buried in the way that leadeth to Ephratah, that is Bethlehem. (And so Rachel died, and was buried on the way that leadeth to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem.)

Genesis 35:9-19 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS 35

This chapter gives an account of Jacob's going to Bethel, and building an altar there by the order and direction of God, Ge 35:1-7, where Deborah, Rebekah's nurse, died and was buried, Ge 35:8, and where God appeared to Jacob, confirmed the new name of Israel he had given him, and renewed to him the promises of the multiplication of his seed, and of their inheriting the land of Canaan, Ge 35:9-13; all which is gratefully acknowledged by Jacob, who erected a pillar in the place, and called it Bethel, in memory of God's gracious appearance to him there, Ge 35:14,15; from hence he journeyed towards his father's house, and on the way Rachel his wife fell in travail, and bore him a son, and died, and was buried near Ephrath, Ge 35:16-21; near this place Reuben committed incest with Bilhah, Ge 35:22, and the names of the twelve sons of Jacob are given, Ge 35:23-26; and the chapter is closed with an account of Jacob's arrival at his father's house, of the death of Isaac, and of his burial at the direction of his two sons, Ge 35:27-29.