An Inverted Type-Scene? Setting Parameters around a Jacob Cycle Sister-Wife Story

ABSTRACT The sister-wife episodes in Genesis (Gen 12:10-20; 20:1-18; 26:1-13) are well documented in biblical scholarship. Occasionally, an equivalent story in the Jacob cycle (Gen 25-35) is proffered. This essay investigates the tenability of such a proposal. The primary contribution is setting parameters around the proposed germane fourth story, through integrative exegetical methodologies, to properly assess the smattering of resonant motifs common between Gen 29-31 and the standard type-scene. By bracketing the texts anterior and posterior to the sister-wife stories, a common preface and postface emerge: a wife-at-the-well type-scene and the form-critical element of covenant-making, respectively. With this exegetical framing in place, the numerous motifs in the Jacob cycle-typically crafted via inversion- shared with the other sister-wife stories is cogent enough to conclude that there is a viable case of an inverted sister-wife type-scene in Gen 29-31. Furthermore, a hypothetical rationale for its literary inversion is elaborated. Keywords: Jacob, Sister-wife, Type-scene, Inversion, Laban, Methodology.