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EARTH'S TREASURE HE AP S Paul R. Bauman, A.B., Th.B., D.D.
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"Now Rachel had taken the tera- phim, and put them in the camel's saddle, and sat upon them. And La ban lelt about all the tent, but iound them not" (Gen. 31:34 R.V.). TN THE black, goat-hair tent pitched on the barren Mesopotamian plain, the one piece of furniture, apart from a few pots and a blanket, is gener ally a . camel’s saddle. Sometimes studded with silver and covered With blankets of many colors, it serves as a couch on which the secluded wife reclines to pass her days away; at night it is her pillow, but both day and night the hollow beneath the sad dle is the hiding place for the objects she would conceal. The camel’s sad dle of the modern Arab tent is like the saddle of four thousand years ago, beneath which Rachel concealed the household gods of her father.”1 What were those teraphim of which the Bible speaks? Why was Laban so tremendously concerned about them? Archaeology a n d Oriental custom have joined hands to answer these questions and give a wealth of mean ing to this very interesting story. The teraphim were undoubtedly images— small statuettes of clay similar to those which have been found in great numbers among the ruins of the Bab ylonian and Canaanite cities belong ing to Rachel’s age. Though varying greatly in form, they were generally about five inches high. The posses sion of these little household images reveals something of the influence idolatry had upon the household of Jacob—so much so that, before he could “ go up to Bethel . . . and make there an altar unto God,” Jacob was obliged to say to his entire household and to all that were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you” (see Gen. 35:2,3 R.V.). One may ask, “Why was Laban so tremendously concerned over the theft of several little clay idols which eas ily could have been replaced in his home?” Recent discoveries reveal the fact that Rachel was no less crafty than her father, Laban, or her hus band, Jacob. “Haran (Laban’s home) was an old Hurrian center. A Hurrian text from Arratha shows that the pos session of the household gods by a son-in-law made him legitimate heir— to the estate of the wife’s father.”1Ap parently Rachel expected much more than magic from her teraphim; they were a guarantee of inheritance! A study of the text of the more recent ly vere.d Nuzu Tablets has given •’ Hrted confirmation to this.1
Rachel’s apology for failing to stand in the presence of her father is inter esting in the light of Oriental custom. Such an apology was very necessary according to. etiquette still existing in the East, which demands the greatest external respect on the part of children toward their parents. Even a king’s eldest son always stands in his fa ther’s presence, and is regarded as the first of his servants. Daughters occupy an even humbler place. Hence, an apology on Rachel’s part was ex pected and required. Some have wondered why Laban was apparently not even suspicious when Rachel pled “the manner of women” (v. 35) as her excuse for fail ing to rise in his presence. Here De- litzsch makes the following observa tion: “The cunning of Rachel was well planned, for even if Laban had not re garded it as impure and wrong to touch the seat of a woman in this state (see Lev. 15:22), how could he have thought it possible that one in this state would sit upon his god?”* Keil rightly calls attention to the fact that the view upon which the law (Lev. 15) was based, is much older than the statutes, and exists among other people.' Before we too harshly condemn Ra chel for the possession of a few house hold gods, we should consider seri ously our own hearts and recall the final admonition recorded for our benefit in the First Epistle of John: “Little children, keep yourselves from idols” (5:21). Let us remember that an idol is anything which takes the place of God in our lives. 'We, like Jacob, can never “ go up to Bethel . . . and make there an altar unto God” until we, too, have heeded the admo nition to “ put away the foreign gods that are among you, and purify your selves.” The gods which are foreign to the born-again Christian must be buried once and for all like the little images of Jacob’s household. Only then can we know power with God and victory over the things that would defeat us (See Genesis 35:1-5.). 1. Banks, The Bible and the Spade, New York, 1913, page 55. 2. Knopf, The, Old T e s t a m e n t Speaks, New York, 1933, page 68. 3. The Biblical Archaeologist, Feb., 1940, page 6. 4. Bange, Critical and Homiletical Commentary, New York, 1869, page 543. 5. Ibid.
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