Jacob

==Historicity==
{{See also|Old Testament#Historicity}}
Although archaeologist and biblical scholar [[William F. Albright]] maintained (c. 1961) that the narratives of Abraham and Jacob could be dated to about the 19th century BCE;,<ref name="bimson">Bimson, John J. (1980). [https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/epn_3_bimson.html "Archaeological Data and the Dating of the Patriarchs," ''Essays on the Patriarchal Narratives'', pp. 59–92, (A.R. Millard & D.J. Wiseman, eds., Leicester: IVP. Hbk.] {{ISBN|0851117430}}</ref> John J. Bimson wrote in 1980: "Since then ... there has been a strong reaction against the use of archaeological evidence in support of the biblical traditions, and Albright's comment could not be repeated with any truth today."<ref name="bimson" /> [[Nahum M. Sarna]] (1978) noted that an inability to date the narratives of the patriarchs does not necessarily invalidate their historicity,<ref name="bimson" /> a view supported by Bimson, who admitted that "Our knowledge of the centuries around 2000 BCE is very small, and our ignorance very great."<ref name="bimson" />

[[Gerhard von Rad]], in his ''Old Testament Theology'' (1962) postulated that the patriarchal narratives describe actual events subsequently interpreted by the community through its own experience.<ref>von Rad, Gerhard. ''Old Testament Theology'', vol. 1, pp. 106–08, New York: Harper, 1962</ref>
Other scholars, such as [[Thomas L. Thompson]], view the narratives as late literary compositions (6th and 5th centuries BCE) that have ideological and theological purposes but are unreliable for historical reconstruction of the pre-settlement period of the Israelites.<ref>Megan Bishop Moore, Brad E. Kelle, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Qjkz_8EMoaUC Biblical History and Israel's Past: The Changing Study of the Bible and History], Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2011, pp. 57–74.</ref><ref>Rainer Albertz, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Xx9YzJq2B9wC Israel in exile: the history and literature of the sixth century B.C.E.], Society of Biblical Literature, 2003, p. 246</ref> In ''[[The Historicity of the Patriarchal Narratives]]'' (1974), Thompson suggested that the narratives arose in a response to some emergent situation, expressed as an imaginative picture of the past to embody hope.<ref name="goldingay">[[John Goldingay|Goldingray, John]] (1980). [https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/epn_1_goldingay.html "The Patriarchs in Scripture and History", ''Essays on the Patriarchal Narratives'', pp. 11–42, (A.R. Millard & D.J. Wiseman, eds., Leicester: IVP. Hbk.] {{ISBN|0851117430}}</ref>

In ''[[The Ascent of Man]]'' (1973), [[Jacob Bronowski]] pointed out similarities between Jacob and Bakhtyar, who lends his name to Iran's [[Bakhtiari people]]. Both were herdsmen who had two wives, and are regarded as the ancestral patriarch of their nomadic people.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bronowski|first=Jacob|url=http://archive.org/details/ascentofman0000bron_y1z2|title=The Ascent of Man|publisher=BBC Books|year=1990|isbn=978-0-563-20900-3|location=London|pages=60–61|orig-year=1973}}</ref>

Archaeologist [[William G. Dever]] wrote in 2001: "After a century of exhaustive investigation, all respectable archaeologists have given up hope of recovering any context that would make Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob 'historical figures.'"<ref>{{Cite book|last=Dever|first=William G.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6-VxwC5rQtwC&pg=PA98|title=What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It?: What Archeology Can Tell Us About the Reality of Ancient Israel|publisher=[[Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing]]|year=2001|isbn=978-0-8028-2126-3|location=Grand Rapids, MI|pages=98|language=en}}</ref>
Excavations in the [[Timna Valley]] produced what may be the earliest camel bones found in Israel or even outside the [[Arabian Peninsula]], dating to around 930 BCE. This is seen by some as evidence that the stories of Abraham, Jacob, and Joseph (said to have taken place a thousand years earlier) were written no earlier than the 10th century BCE.<ref name="camels">{{cite news|last=Hasson|first=Nir|date=Jan 17, 2014|title=Hump stump solved: Camels arrived in region much later than biblicalreference|newspaper=Haaretz|url=http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/week-s-end/.premium-1.569091|access-date=30 January 2014}}</ref>

[[Israel Finkelstein]] proposed the Jacob-Esau narratives could have originated from 8th century BCE [[Kingdom of Israel (Samaria)|Kingdom of Israel]] because the conflict with Edom fits well not only in a Judahite context but also in 8th century BCE Israelite context.<ref name=":106">{{cite journal |title=Comments on the Historical Background of the Jacob Narrative in Genesis |journal=Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft |url=https://www.academia.edu/22081309 |last1=Finkelstein |first1=Israel |issue=3 |volume=126 |pages=317–338 |last2=Römer |first2=Thomas |doi=10.1515/zaw-2014-0020 |year=2014 |s2cid=170305826 |issn=1613-0103}}</ref> Other scholars have suggested that the story could fit also in a 2nd millennium BCE context.<ref>{{cite book |title='Now These Records are Ancient': Studies in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical History, Language and Culture in Honor of K. Lawson Younger, Jr. |last1=Hoffmeier |first1=James K. |publisher=Zaphon |year=2022 |isbn=978-3-96327-190-8 |pages=201–211 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VneJzwEACAAJ |last2=Janzen |first2=Mark |editor-last=Averbeck |editor-first=R. E. |chapter=Towards a Diplomatic, Contextual Reading of the Encounter Between Jacob and Esau in Genesis 33 |editor-last2=Hoffmeier |editor-first2=J. K. |editor-last3=Howard |editor-first3=J. C. |editor-last4=Zwickel |editor-first4=W.}}</ref> Finkelstein suggests there is an archaeological evidence that 8th century Israel interacted with Edom: the graffiti of [[Kuntillet Ajrud]] that mention both a "YHWH of Samaria" (center of Israel) and a "YHWH of Teman" (center of Edom).<ref name=":106" /> He proposed the Jacob-Laban narrative might stem from the 8th century BCE as Haran was then the western capital of the Assyrian empire.<ref name=":106" /> He also proposed that the earliest layer of Jacob cycle or the oldest Jacob tradition, which is the story of him and his uncle Laban establishing the border between them, might be a pre-monarchic tradition and could be originated from [[Gilead]].<ref name=":106" />