Jacob, Joseph & Egypt

'Esav hated his brother because of the blessing his father had given him. 'Esav said to himself, "The time for mourning my father will soon come, and then I will kill my brother Ya'akov."

But the words of 'Esav her older son were told to Rivkah. She sent for Ya'akov her younger son and said to him, "Here, your brother 'Esav is comforting himself over you by planning to kill you.

Therefore, my son, listen to me: get up and escape to Lavan my brother in Haran.

Stay with him a little while, until your brother's anger subsides.

Your brother's anger will turn away from you, and he will forget what you did to him. Then I'll send and bring you back from there. Why should I lose both of you on the same day?"

Rivkah said to Yitz'chak, "I'm sick to death of Hitti women! If Ya'akov marries one of the Hitti women, like those who live here, my life won't be worth living."

So Yitz'chak called Ya'akov, and, after blessing him, charged him: "You are not to choose a wife from the Hitti women.

Go now to the home of B'tu'el your mother's father, and choose a wife there from the daughters of Lavan your mother's brother.

May El Shaddai bless you, make you fruitful and increase your descendants, until they become a whole assembly of peoples.

And may he give you the blessing which he gave Avraham, you and your descendants with you, so that you will possess the land you will travel through, the land God gave to Avraham."

So Yitz'chak sent Ya'akov away; and he went to Paddan-Aram, to Lavan, son of B'tu'el the Arami, the brother of Rivkah Ya'akov's and 'Esav's mother.

Now 'Esav saw that Yitz'chak had blessed Ya'akov and sent him away to Paddan-Aram to choose a wife from there, and that as he blessed him he charged him, "You are not to choose a Kena'ani woman as your wife,"

and that Ya'akov had listened to his father and mother and gone to Paddan-Aram.

'Esav also saw that the Kena'ani women did not please Yitz'chak his father.

So 'Esav went to Yishma'el and took, in addition to the wives he already had, Machalat the daughter of Yishma'el Avraham's son, the sister of N'vayot, to be his wife.

Ya'akov went out from Be'er-Sheva and traveled toward Haran.

He came to a certain place and stayed the night there, because the sun had set. He took a stone from the place, put it under his head and lay down there to sleep.

He dreamt that there before him was a ladder resting on the ground with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of ADONAI were going up and down on it.

Then suddenly ADONAI was standing there next to him; and he said, "I am ADONAI, the God of Avraham your [grand]father and the God of Yitz'chak. The land on which you are lying I will give to you and to your descendants.

Your descendants will be as numerous as the grains of dust on the earth. You will expand to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. By you and your descendants all the families of the earth will be blessed.

Look, I am with you. I will guard you wherever you go, and I will bring you back into this land, because I won't leave you until I have done what I have promised you."

Ya'akov awoke from his sleep and said, "Truly, ADONAI is in this place - and I didn't know it!"

Then he became afraid and said, "This place is fearsome! This has to be the house of God! This is the gate of heaven!"

Ya'akov got up early in the morning, took the stone he had put under his head, set it up as a standing-stone, poured olive oil on its top

and named the place Beit-El [house of God]; but the town had originally been called Luz.