Literary Devices – Bereshit 35/0

Literary Devices – Bereshit 35

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Envelope Structure

Tanakh Lab¹ demonstrates that one of the chapters most similar to Bereshit 35, which describes Yaakov's return to Israel, is Bereshit 28, which narrates Yaakov’s journey from his father’s house.  There are a number of parallels in plot and language (see here), including: Hashem’s blessings, the establishment of stone monuments (מצבות), the location and naming of Beit El, and the name El Sha-ddai, with which Yitzchak blesses Yaakov in Bereshit 28 and Hashem identifies Himself in Bereshit 35.  The two chapters thus serve as bookends for Yaakov's journey and give a sense of closure and harmony to Yaakov’s narrative, as in coming chapters the Torah will focus on the story of his sons.

Relational Epithets

Yaakov

Throughout the chapter Yaakov is referred to as either Yaakov or Yisrael, without reference to other relationships, except in the very last verse of the chapter. There, when they bury Yitzchak, Esav and Yaakov are referred to collectively as “בָּנָיו” (his children), indicating a family bond that existed in the context of mourning their father, despite their fraught relationship. It is also noteworthy that, in this verse, Esav is listed before Yaakov, notwithstanding Yaakov’s acquisition of the birthright

Parallelism

Hashem’s blessing in verses 10-12 to Yaakov is stated in poetic, parallelistic form:²

• שִׁמְךָ יַעֲקֹב  / לֹא יִקָּרֵא שִׁמְךָ עוֹד יַעֲקֹב / כִּי אִם יִשְׂרָאֵל יִהְיֶה שְׁמֶךָ / וַיִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמוֹ יִשְׂרָאֵל.
• פְּרֵה וּרְבֵה/  גּוֹי וּקְהַל גּוֹיִם יִהְיֶה מִמֶּךָּ / וּמְלָכִים מֵחֲלָצֶיךָ יֵצֵאוּ.
• וְאֶת הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר נָתַתִּי לְאַבְרָהָם וּלְיִצְחָק לְךָ אֶתְּנֶנָּה / וּלְזַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ אֶתֵּן אֶת הָאָרֶץ

Chiastic Structure

The list of the children of Yaakov’s wives and concubines is listed in the form of a chiastic structure (Bereshit 35:23-26), with Leah and her maidservant appearing first and last, and Rachel and her maidservant appearing in the middle [Leah - Rachel - Rachel's maidservant - Leah's maidservant]. This represents the centrality of Yaakov’s marriage to Rachel.

¹ To see which chapters are most linguistically similar to Bereshit 35, click on the Torah icon in the Tanakh Lab.

² For more information about the nature of Biblical parallelism, see Dr. Mayer I. Gruber’s article, The Meaning of Biblical Parallelism: A Biblical Perspective and Dr. Adele Berlin’s Grammatical Aspects of Biblical Parallelism. Other resources (not available online) are Dr. Robert Alter’s The Art of Biblical Poetry pp. 3-61, Dr. Adele Berlin’s The Dynamics of Biblical Parallelism, and Dr. James Kugel’s The Idea of Biblical Poetry: Parallelism and Its History.