Genesis 18:24

18:24 What if there are fifty godly people in the city? Will you really wipe it out and not spare 1  the place for the sake of the fifty godly people who are in it?

Genesis 28:18

28:18 Early 2  in the morning Jacob 3  took the stone he had placed near his head 4  and set it up as a sacred stone. 5  Then he poured oil on top of it.

Genesis 35:22

35:22 While Israel was living in that land, Reuben had sexual relations with 6  Bilhah, his father’s concubine, and Israel heard about it.

Jacob had twelve sons:

1 tn Heb “lift up,” perhaps in the sense of “bear with” (cf. NRSV “forgive”).

2 tn Heb “and he got up early…and he took.”

3 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Jacob) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

4 tn See the note on this phrase in v. 11.

5 tn Heb “standing stone.”

sn Sacred stone. Such a stone could be used as a boundary marker, a burial stone, or as a shrine. Here the stone is intended to be a reminder of the stairway that was “erected” and on which the Lord “stood.” (In Hebrew the word translated “sacred stone” is derived from the verb translated “erected” in v. 12 and “stood” in v. 13. Since the top of the stairway reached the heavens where the Lord stood, Jacob poured oil on the top of the stone. See C. F. Graesser, “Standing Stones in Ancient Palestine,” BA 35 (1972): 34-63; and E. Stockton, “Sacred Pillars in the Bible,” ABR 20 (1972): 16-32.

6 tn Heb “and Reuben went and lay with.” The expression “lay with” is a euphemism for having sexual intercourse.

sn Reuben’s act of having sexual relations with Bilhah probably had other purposes than merely satisfying his sexual desire. By having sex with Bilhah, Reuben (Leah’s oldest son) would have prevented Bilhah from succeeding Rachel as the favorite wife, and by sleeping with his father’s concubine he would also be attempting to take over leadership of the clan – something Absalom foolishly attempted later on in Israel’s history (2 Sam 16:21-22).