Genesis 29:30: “So Jacob went into Rachel and he loved Rachel more than Leah and served Laban for another seven years.”
Love is a very ambiguous word in English. When we say “Luv ya” we could be talking about a parental love, a friendship love, a love between siblings, a love within a Christian fellowship, a romantic love, a sexual love as in making love or even the affection we have for an object such as a car or a certain song. We throw out that word love all the time and never explain just what type of love we are dealing with, we expect the context in which we use the word to explain it.
There are a number of words used in classical Hebrew which at one time or another either in the Bible or in extra Biblical literature has been rendered as love. The most common word for love is ahavah which is sort of the one size fits all love. It has been applied to romantic love, parental love, sibling love etc. Then we get to words which apply to a specific type of love. There is dovid which is one that is beloved. You have racham which is a merciful love, a love that is returned. We have chabad which is to cherish, yadad which is a friendship love, ‘egab which is a sexual love, machamal which is a love out of pity, qashar which is a love that forms a bonding with two people and me’ah which is a love a mother feels for her unborn child while still in the womb. I love the word bildad which is a love that you haven’t quite figured out. It is what a future son-in-law would respond to his future father-in-law when asked if he loves his daughter. It is a “well, uh, I mean, I, well you know, I sort of…” Then there is a word not rendered in Scripture as love but I have found it rendered as love in extra Biblical literature and that is the word hiybath which is related to the word hovah and literally means an obligation. Sometimes we love someone simply because we are obligated to love that person. So Hebrew seems to have a word to fit every occasion for love.
The word used in Genesis 29:30 for Jacob loving Rachel more than Leah is that all purpose word ahavah which in its root means I will give. Jacob ahavah Rachel but he hovah Leah. He loved Leah only out of obligation. The test for ahavah is simple, “Do you want to do more for him/her than you want her/him to do for you?” In its Gematria ahavah is 13, Aleph = 1, Hei = 5, Beth = 2, Hei = 5 which equals 13. When a man and woman ahavah each other you have two ahavahs which is 13 + 13 and equals 26. The name of God YHWH also has a numerical value of 26. True love between a man and woman joins them with God. Jacob loving Rachel and Rachel loving Jacob joined themselves with God.
Now we know that God ahavahs use but we must return ahavah to add our 13 to make 26. Love is not complete until it is returned. God demonstrates ahavah in that He wants to do more for us than He wants us to do for Him. The issue then comes down to whether we want to do more for him than we want him to do for us. Far too often we return his ahavah with hiybah, obligation. Bible translators will not even render hiybah as love and rightly so, loving out of obligation is not love at all. Hiybah can only result is an incomplete love.
Do we give tithes out of ahavah or hiybah? Do we attend church out of ahvah or hiybah? Do we study the Word of God out of ahavah or hiybah? We say we love God but is it ahavah or hiybah? Do we love God as Jacob loved Rachel or as Jacob loved Leah. Jacob did his duty with Leah. He laid with her, he gave her children, he provided for her, took care of her, but he never felt ahavah for her only hiybah. He did his duty for Leah, he hiybah Leah but that love or obligation did not bring him to God. In fact it only broke Leah’s heart. He loved (ahavah) Rachel and thus he was far more endeared to the children of Rachel (Joseph and Benjamin) and indeed gave Joseph his coat signifying that he was giving him the position of the eldest. This made his brothers bitter and jealous because they saw how Jacob broke their mother’s heart and flaunted it, threw into their mother’s face by giving Joseph the position that really belonged to Judah. Yet in a spiritual sense it was proper for Joseph to be given that positon for he was the eldest of the woman who was Jacobs 13 to his 13 and joined him to God (26).
You hear in the media all the time people saying they divorced because that person did not satisfy them, did not meet their needs, they were being held back by that person, they were not able to be all that God intended for them to be. Or they found someone who could meet their needs better than their present mate or do it better than their mate. Such baloney is applauded in our culture and even encouraged. Love in our culture is not love it is hiybah not ahavah. Yet, in the relationship between a man and woman God has given you His greatest opportunity to join yourselves with Him in a complete worship experience. Every day, every orthodox Jew recites the prayer, Thou shalt love (ahavah) the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul and might. Love is a discipline, you must be reminded of it every day, and you must work at it, choose it, and strive for it for its end result is a treasure beyond all measure.
Jacob had two wives, David and Solomon had many wives. Are we not to have only one mate, what gives? In God’s eyes, Jacob, David and Solomon only had one mate. Each had only one wife they really ahavah. The others they merely hiybah. There was only one woman that they would sleep with on the Sabbath, only one woman would thy enter into that complete worship of God, only one woman would God recognize as the true marriage and don’t kid yourself, they had to work at it this ahavah it just did not happen or come.
Do you really ahavah your mate or just hiybah. You may have gone through an earthly wedding ceremony, you may have a signed an earthly contract that obligates (hiybah) you to your mate, but in that wedding ceremony you promised to God before a priest or preacher that you would ahavah. You would work at it, struggle with it until you found it. One day you would wake up and find that you don’t ahavah your mate, desire to do more for him/her than you want him/her to do for you. That is when you roll up your sleeves and start reciting every day, “I will love her with all my heart, soul and might, just as you would do with God. There is an old Jewish saying to young couples whose marriages were arranged. Many never even met until their wedding day. Often in such marriages they did not ahavah each other but only hiybah. Yet their parents would tell them, “You will learn to ahavah each other.” Just as we learn to ahavah God. If you have a mate, and you don’t feel you ahavah your mate, then learn to ahavah. God has blessed you with a tremendous opportunity to learn ahavah. In that learning you also realize you must also learn to ahavah God, even when He doesn’t seem to be loving to you, doesn’t answer your prayers, allows you to go through rough times. Just as in marriage it can either drive you apart or closer together where you learn ahavah. If you apply the same disciplines to loving God as you do to your mate you will enter a complete worship of Him. You have a great opportunity to truly love God if you only turn you hovah into ahavah. So don’t blow it.
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