INSPIRATIONAL
Rachel’s Story?
P Badejo
.
The mandrakes tasted like sand in
her mouth. Rachel sighed, closed her
eyes and Jacob’s face filled her mind.
"How did it get to this, Jacob?
Fighting over mandrakes with Leah?
As if I can’t go to the fields and get
mandrakes myself? Fighting over you
... my beloved husband ..."
She sighed again - "...you have so
many faces, Jacob - you are Leah’s
husband, the father of Leah’s
children, the father of Leah’s
handmaid’s children, the father of
my handmaid’s children - but the
face I sorely long for - the father of
my children - has eluded me...“
She opened her eyes and took
another mouthful. She knew Jacob
loved her, she had no doubts about
that. The love was there from the
first time they met each other and
did not diminish even when her
father tricked Jacob into marrying
Leah, her older sister, ahead of her.
It was a harsh reality that Leah had to
live with from the day she got
married to Jacob. Her pain was
evident in the names she gave her
sons when they started arriving Reuben: "The Lord has seen my
misery and now my husband will love
me“; Simeon: "The Lord has seen I
am not loved and has given me this
so“; Levi: "Now at last my husband
will be attached to me because I
have borne him three sons."
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JASMINE'S PLACE
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