Genesis 35:1-15
Then
God said to Jacob, "Go to Bethel and live there. Make an
altar there. I am
the God who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau."
So Jacob said to his family and those
who were with him, "Get rid of the foreign gods which you have, wash yourselves
until you are ritually clean, and change your clothes. Then
let''s go to Bethel. I will make an altar there to God, who answered me when I
was troubled and who has been with me wherever I''ve gone." So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods that they
had in their possession as well as the earrings that they had on. Jacob buried
these things under the oak
tree near Shechem. As
they moved on, God made the
people of the cities that were all around them
terrified so that no one pursued them.
Jacob
and all the people who were with him came to Luz (that is, Bethel) in the land
of Canaan. He built an altar there and
called that
place El Bethel
. That''s where God had
revealed himself to Jacob when he was fleeing from his brother. Rebecca''s nurse Deborah died and was buried under
the oak tree outside Bethel. So Jacob called it the Tree of Crying. Then God appeared once more to Jacob after he
came back from Paddan Aram, and he blessed him. God
said to him, "Your name is Jacob. You will no longer be called Jacob, but
your name will be Israel." So he named him Israel. God also said to him, "I am God Almighty.
Be fertile, and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will
come from you, and kings will come from you. I
will give you the land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac. I will also give this
land to your descendants." Then
God went up from him at the place where he had spoken with him. So Jacob set up a memorial, a stone marker, to
mark the place where God had spoken with him. He poured a wine offering and
olive oil on it. Jacob named the place
where God had spoken with him Bethel .
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