--- season 2 (holy bible )
The Torah focuses on three moments in the changing relationship between God and people. The first eleven chapters of Genesis provide accounts of the creation (or ordering) of the world, and the history of God's early relationship with humanity. The remaining thirty-nine chapters of Genesis provide an account of God's covenant with the Hebrew patriachs, Abraham,Isaac and
Jacob (also called Israel), and Jacob's children (the "
Children of Israel"), especially Joseph. It tells of how God commanded Abraham to leave his family and home in the city of Ur , eventually to settle in the land of Canaan , and how the Children of Israel later moved to Egypt. The remaining four books of the Torah tell the story of Moses who lived hundreds of years after the patriarchs. His story coincides with the story of the liberation of the Children of Israel from slavery in
Ancient Egypt,
to the renewal of their covenant with God at mount sinai , and their wanderings in the desert until a new generation would be ready to enter the land of Canaan. The Torah ends with the death of Moses. The Torah contains the commandments, of God, revealed at Mount Sinai (although there is some debate amongst Jewish scholars, if this was written down completely in one moment, or if it was spread out during the 40 years in the wandering in the desert). These commandments provide the basis for Halakha (Jewish religious law). Tradition states that the number of these is equal to 613 mitzvot or 613 commandments. There is some dispute as to how to divide these up (mainly between the Ramban
and rambam the Torah is divided into fifty-four portions which are read in turn in Jewish liturgy, from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Deuteronomy, each Sabbath . The cycle ends and recommences at the end of Sukkot , which is called simchat torah .
Jacob , also known as
Israel (
Hebrew:
יִשְׂרָאֵל,
Standard Yisraʾel,
Tiberian Yiśrāʾēl;
Arabic:
اسرائيل,
Isrāʾīl;
Septuagint Greek: Ἰσραήλ; "struggler with God"), was the third
Biblical patriarch and ancestor of the twelve
tribes of Israel, named after his twelve sons.
The Bible says he was the son of
Isaac and
Rebecca, the grandson of
Abraham and
Sarah and of
Bethuel, and the twin brother of
Esau. He had twelve sons and one daughter by his
two wives,
Leah and
Rachel, and their maidservants,
Bilhah and
Zilpah. The children were
Reuben,
Simeon,
Levi,
Judah,
Dan,
Naphtali,
Gad,
Asher,
Issachar,
Zebulun, daughter
Dinah,
Joseph, and
(--Benjamin--).
[1] Before the birth of Benjamin, Jacob is renamed "Israel" by an angelic being, the name after which the modern nation of
Israel is named.
As a result of a severe famine in
Canaan, Jacob resettled his whole family in
Egypt, in the
Land of Goshen, at the time when his son Joseph was viceroy. Jacob died there 17 years later, and Joseph carried Jacob's remains to the land of Canaan, where he gave them stately burial in the same
Cave of Machpelah as were buried Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebecca and Jacob's wife Leah (
Genesis 49:29-50:14).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esau
