1: God spoke to Jacob: "Go back to Bethel. Stay there and build an altar to the God who revealed himself to you when you were running for your life from your brother Esau."
2: Jacob told his family and all those who lived with him, "Throw out all the alien gods which you have, take a good bath and put on clean clothes,
3: we're going to Bethel. I'm going to build an altar there to the God who answered me when I was in trouble and has stuck with me everywhere I've gone since."
4: They turned over to Jacob all the alien gods they'd been holding on to, along with their lucky-charm earrings. Jacob buried them under the oak tree in Shechem.
5: Then they set out. A paralyzing fear descended on all the surrounding villages so that they were unable to pursue the sons of Jacob.
6: Jacob and his company arrived at Luz, that is, Bethel, in the land of Canaan.
7: He built an altar there and named it El-Bethel (God-of-Bethel) because that's where God revealed himself to him when he was running from his brother.
8: And that's when Rebekah's nurse, Deborah, died. She was buried just below Bethel under the oak tree. It was named Allon-Bacuth (Weeping-Oak).
9: God revealed himself once again to Jacob, after he had come back from Paddan Aram and blessed him:
10: "Your name is Jacob (Heel); but that's your name no longer. From now on your name is Israel (God-Wrestler)."
11: God continued, I am The Strong God. Have children! Flourish! A nation--a whole company of nations!- will come from you. Kings will come from your loins;
12: the land I gave Abraham and Isaac I now give to you, and pass it on to your descendants.
13: And then God was gone, ascended from the place where he had spoken with him.
14: Jacob set up a stone pillar on the spot where God had spoken with him. He poured a drink offering on it and anointed it with oil.
15: Jacob dedicated the place where God had spoken with him, Bethel (God's-House). [JC]
16: They left Bethel. They were still quite a ways from Ephrath when Rachel went into labor--hard, hard labor.
17: When her labor pains were at their worst, the midwife said to her, "Don't be afraid--you have another boy."
18: With her last breath, for she was now dying, she named him Ben-oni (Son-of-My-Pain), but his father named him Ben-jamin (Son-of-Good-Fortune).
19: Rachel died and was buried on the road to Ephrath, that is, Bethlehem.
20: Jacob set up a pillar to mark her grave. It is still there today, "Rachel's Grave Stone." [JC]
21: Israel kept on his way and set up camp at Migdal Eder.
22: While Israel was living in that region, Reuben went and slept with his father's concubine, Bilhah. And Israel heard of what he did. [JC] There were twelve sons of Jacob.
23: The sons by Leah: Reuben, Jacob's firstborn Simeon Levi Judah Issachar Zebulun.
24: The sons by Rachel: Joseph Benjamin.
25: The sons by Bilhah, Rachel's maid: Dan Naphtali.
26: The sons by Zilpah, Leah's maid: Gad Asher. These were Jacob's sons, born to him in Paddan Aram. [JC]
27: Finally, Jacob made it back home to his father Isaac at Mamre in Kiriath Arba, present-day Hebron, where Abraham and Isaac had lived.
28: Isaac was now 180 years old.
29: Isaac breathed his last and died--an old man full of years. He was buried with his family by his sons Esau and Jacob. [JC]