Rachel Steals the Idols

(2) ותגגב רחל את התרפים AND RACHEL STOLE THE TERAPHIM — her intention was to wean her father from idol-worship (Genesis Rabbah 74:5).

(2) She intended to remove her father from idol-worship. [Rashi knows this] because it is written, “That belonged to her father,” an apparent superfluous phrase. It should simply say, “His idols.” Perforce, she intended to remove her father from idolatry.

(2) והתרפים, they are instruments made of copper used to tell time. It was also to consult them to divine future events, although the information forthcoming often proved false. Zecharyah 10,2 already remarks on the unreliability of Teraphim in this regard. The reason the word is in the plural mode, seeing that we speak about a single object, is because it consisted of multiple layers of tablets. According to Ibn Ezra each tablet had the face of a human being and was presumed to get inspiration from celestial regions. Rachel’s objective in stealing the Teraphim was to deny Lavan knowledge about the route Yaakov had taken when he left. Yaakov had no idea that Rachel had stolen the Teraphim as we have been told explicitly in verse 32. Had he known about it he would have prevented Rachel from carrying out such a theft. He would not even have allowed her to remove anything from her father’s house unless he had given his approval, much less the Teraphim.

(1) ותגנוב רחל את התרפים, “Rachel stole the teraphim; what precisely are “teraphim”? According to Pirke de rabbi Eliezer chapter 36, they were deities that people like Lavan worshipped. How did they originate? A firstborn male human being was slaughtered; they cut off his head, salted it (to preserve it from decomposing) using both salt and oil. They inscribed on the forehead of that slain person the name of a deity such as a demon, hung it up under the tongue of the slain person on the wall, lit candles in its honour, prostrated themselves before it, and it would start speaking to the worshipper. (presumably answering questions addressed to it, like to an oracle.) These teraphim are referred to as doing this in the Book of Zecharyah 10,2: כי התרפים דברו און, “for the teraphim spoke delusions.” Rachel stole them so that they could not speak to their father and tell him that Yaakov had fled and where he was going. Not only this; she may have used the opportunity to destroy all idols in her father’s home.

(1) ותגנב רחל את התרפים, “Rachel stole the teraphim.” According to Rashi, she intended to wean her father from idolatry by removing the idol from him. Nachmanides admits that it is possible that Lavan had been using the teraphim in his worship of idolatry. It is however by no means certain that teraphim served only as idols. We certainly would not expect to come across idols in King David’s residence, and yet we are told in Samuel I 19,13 that Michal, David’s wife placed such teraphim in David’s bed, feigning that it was he who was sleeping in that bed. Surely, David did not keep idolatrous figures in his home. It is most likely that the teraphim were objects which enabled people to know the time of day, and in that connection they were also used to help them to predict future events. The root of the word is from רפה, “weak” as in רפי ידים, “weak-handed,” or נרפים אתם, “you are weak” (in the sense of lazy, not pulling one’s weight.) The reason people call these objects תרפים is to hint that the reliability of these objects in predicting future events is not very strong, although in the majority of instances the predictions prove more or less accurate. Only people who do not pray to the Lord, the Creator, would be foolish enough to put their trust in them. Some people argue that astrologers possess the power to summon up certain images at a time which they can accurately predict. Ibn Ezra writes that teraphim are objects made of copper which are designed to help us determine portions of an hour, such as minutes. Some people claim that some astrologers possess the skill to raise some life-like shapes at a predetermined hour, and that apparition appears to speak intelligently. Personally, I believe that teraphim are replicas of human beings, constructed in a manner designed to endow them with some divine powers. Some commentators believe that Rachel stole the teraphim in order to wean her father from practicing idolatry. If that were so indeed, why did she keep these teraphim with her instead of at least burying them? It is far more likely that Rachel, being aware that her father was an astrologer, was afraid that by a combination of astrology and the teraphim he would succeed in tracking the movements of Yaakov and his family and he would overtake them in short order. Another view is that she took the teraphim so that these would not reveal to him where Yaakov was at that time. [according to that view she did not really ”steal” them but denied him their use at a critical point in time. Ed.]

(1) ותגנב רחל את התרפים אשר לאביה; she stole them in order that he would reconsider his actions, saying to himself that any deity which allows itself to be stolen surely cannot be much good to anyone. The same argument had been used by Yoash who told his father that if his deity, the baal, was really capable of avenging himself, he should do so himself instead of letting his human worshipper become his defender. (Judges 6,31) Similar arguments are reflected in Ezekiel 28,9 where the prophet predicts the downfall of the King of Tzor (Tyre) who had declared himself a god. He ridicules this “god” as saying to his murderer: “I am a god!” (quoted by Rabbeinu Bachya).

(1) ותגנב רחל את התרפים “Rachel stole the Teraphim.” Nachmanides speculates that these Teraphim were some kinds of hour-glasses or similar instruments with which to measure time. These vessels were employed to glean knowledge about future events. The word itself is derived from נרפים, (Compare Exodus 5,17, where Pharaoh accused the Israelites of pretending to be too weak to work hard) they called these vessels תרפים to hint that the power of foretelling events associated with these instruments was rather on the weak side. Predictions based on these instruments, while proving accurate in the majority of cases, were frequently wide off the mark. Zechariah 10,2 refers to these instruments when he says that they disappointed those who relied on their predictions. The question which concerns us is why Rachel bothered to steal them if they were so unreliable? Apparently Rachel stole the Teraphim so that they could not reveal Yaakov’s whereabouts to her father seeing that Yaakov and family had fled from Padan Aram. The Teraphim were Lavan’s deities; he put a great deal of faith in their ability to reveal to him what he wanted to know.

(2) Lavan was an expert magician. He himself had said נחשתי, “I have consulted oracles,” and these oracles had told him that his new-found wealth was due to Yaakov. The whole country Charan was well known for its preoccupation with oracles, snake-charmers, and all these methods to divine future events. This is already referred to in Isaiah 2,6 כי מלאו מקדם מעוננים כפלשתים, “for they are full of magic practices from the East and of soothsaying like the Philistines.” Also Bileam ben Be-Or was of the same ilk as he came from the same region; this is why when the Torah quotes his opening statements we find him saying: (Numbers 23,6) “From Aram has Balak brought me, Moav’s king from the hills of the East.”

(3) Concerning the significance of the Teraphim, Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra writes: “I am fairly convinced that these Teraphim resembled a human shape in order to enable them to receive celestial powers’ input. However, I cannot explain this in further detail (as the Torah has forbidden this). We can conjecture that Ibn Ezra was correct when we consider that Michal, David’s wife and daughter of King Saul had placed Teraphim in David’s bed to mislead the King’s police into thinking that David himself occupied that bed (compare Samuel I 19,16). [Michal had claimed that her husband was sick and could not present himself at court.] This leaves us with the question of how to explain Hoseah 3,4 ואין אפוד ותרפים, “that the Israelites would go for a long time without either Ephod or Teraphim.” The meaning there seems to be that they would practice no religion, neither the Jewish religion symbolised by the Ephod which contained the means for the High Priest to receive communication from G’d, nor Teraphim which was a means to receive such communication from spiritually negative forces in the celestial spheres.

(4) Rabbeinu Chananel writes as follows concerning the subject of the Teraphim: Rachel stole the Teraphim in order to force her father to become a penitent seeing he would realise that a god which allows itself to be stolen surely could not be something of substance. How could a god who cannot take care of himself take care of others? We find the same argument spelled out in detail in Judges 6,31 where Yoash ridicules the people who want to avenge their idol and execute Jerubaal (Gideon) who had smashed its altar, saying to them: “let the Baal fight his own enemies if he is as powerful as you believe him to be!” Ezekiel 28,9 phrases it thus: “Will you then say before your murderer: ”I am a god?’ But you are a man and no god in the hand of your desecrators.” [The subject of discussion was Chiram King of Tyre, a friend of David and Solomon who developed illusions of grandeur].

(5) A Midrashic approach: When Lavan accused Yaakov of having stolen the Teraphim למה גנבת אלהי, “why did you steal my gods (31,31)?” The reason he thought that they had been stolen was in order that they should not reveal to Lavan that Yaakov had fled. The Midrash asks: “were the Teraphim then able to speak?” Do we not have a specific verse in Psalms 115,7 לא יהגו בגרונם, “they cannot make a sound with their throats?” The answer given is that indeed the Teraphim could speak as we know on the authority of Zechariah 10,2 “for the Teraphim spoke delusion.” How do the Teraphim “speak?” One places in front of them a firstborn person, slaughters him and salts him adding a variety of spices. One then proceeds to write the name of a deity on a headband made of gold; one places this headband under the tongue of this dead person using the appropriate idolatrous incantations and places the carcass in the wall; one lights candles in front of this stuffed human being and prostrates oneself in front of him. This is the meaning of what is written in Zechariah: “for the Teraphim speak delusions.” Rachel’s whole purpose in stealing such Teraphim was to wean her father from the practice of idolatry. After all, G’d had promised to remove idolatry from the face of the earth as is written (Isaiah 2,18) והאלילים כליל יחלוף, “and as for idols, they shall vanish completely.”

(1) ותגנוב רחל את התרפים, “Rachel stole the teraphim;” in order that Lavan would not be able to divine the route they had taken by consulting them as oracles. We have read about their uses in Hoseah 3,4 as well as in Zachariah 10,2.