Boys · Hebrew · Old Testament · classic · Patriarchal
Jacob
/JAY-kub/
יַעֲקֹב
"Supplanter; heel-grasper; may God protect"
Genesis 25:26
RolePatriarch; father of the twelve tribes
Etymology
From 'aqev' (עָקֵב, heel) — he grasped his twin Esau's heel at birth. The name also connects to 'aqav' (to follow, to supplant, to deceive). After wrestling with God, he was renamed Israel ('one who struggles with God').
Who they were
Jacob's story is the Bible's longest and most psychologically complex family saga. He emerged from the womb grasping his twin brother's heel — a gesture that foreshadowed a lifetime of reaching for what wasn't his. He bought Esau's birthright for a bowl of stew. He deceived his blind father to steal Esau's blessing. He fled to his uncle Laban, worked seven years for Rachel, was deceived on his wedding night and given Leah instead, worked seven more years, and was himself cheated repeatedly — the deceiver deceived. Yet Jacob also had genuine encounters with God. At Bethel, fleeing from Esau, he dreamed of a ladder reaching heaven with angels ascending and descending. At Peniel, on the night before he was to meet Esau again after twenty years, he wrestled all night with a mysterious figure who dislocated his hip and renamed him Israel — 'you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.' He limped for the rest of his life. That limp is the mark of the whole story: Jacob was broken and blessed in the same encounter. His favouritism toward Rachel and her son Joseph would tear his family apart — yet through that broken family came the twelve tribes, and through Judah's line came David and Jesus. Jacob died in Egypt, an old man who had seen more sorrow and more grace than most. His blessing of his twelve sons in Genesis 49 is one of the Bible's great prophetic poems.
Family
- Father
- Isaac
- Mother
- Rebekah
Character qualities
- Relentless grasping
- Capacity for deception
- Genuine spiritual hunger
- Transformation through struggle
- Endurance through loss
Key verse
Genesis 32:28
Where they appear
Themes
Variants & related forms
Jake · Jacques · Jacobo · Yaakov · James · Iago
Read their story
Jacob's story begins in Genesis.
The full passage is at Genesis 25:26. Any modern translation will do — the NLT and NIV are the most readable; the ESV and NKJV stay close to the wording the church has used for centuries.
Find a Bible to read it in →