Kenneth Heck

The impression that Jacob may have taken more than one daughter to Egypt is due to translation technicalities. The Hebrew word used for "sons and daughters" is 'ben' which, from Strong's Concordance, (1121, 1a) basically represents one's immediate physical male or female offspring. It could also have been translated as 'children,' a word frequently used to denote the total issue or offspring of some individual in the Bible.

Jacob took only one daughter, Dinah, to Egypt.

February 23 2015 • 2 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Ezekiel Kimosop

I cannot rule out the possibility that Jacob may have had more than one daughter though this is difficult to prove from the Bible. 

The Bible writers often focused on key people or characters and left out details of non important persons. 

For instance, little is known about Jesus' brothers by his legal father and mother but thankfully, the Bible reveals their names. No mention is made of His sisters (see Matthew 12:46; Mark 3:31 and Luke 8:19).. This is because Jesus was the focus of the Holy Spirit who inspired the writing of Scripture. Roman Catholics say that Jesus had no biological brothers, saying Mary could not have conceived any children after Jesus. They argue that the word "brothers" was a generic Jewish reference to close male relatives such as cousins. This notion is however not supported by Scripture. 

We are not even told about what happened to Mary after Acts 2, though we can guess that she may have moved in with apostle John as instructed by Jesus on the cross. Again John never mentioned her in all his letters. 

So my conclusion is yes, there could have been more than one daughter born to Jacob but since Scripture does not reveal it, we should perhaps hold it as a remote possiblity under the circumstances.

March 03 2017 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

John Appelt

Jacob’s family is quite straightforward. Genesis 35:23-26 lists twelve sons of Jacob according to their mothers. Genesis 30:21 mentions the daughter, Dinah, born to Leah after bearing six sons. 

The family of Jacob going into Egypt, is specifically identified, Genesis 46:8-25, which total 66 children and grandchildren, Genesis 46:26. Adding Joseph and his two sons and Jacob himself, the total is 70. 

When Stephen gave the figure of 75 in Acts 7:14, he was counting differently. He counted the members of the family Joseph called down to come to Egypt. This included 9 wives. The wives of Judah and Simeon (presumably) had died, Genesis 38:12 and 46:10. Joseph and his sons were already in Egypt. 

So, the count is definite with no other sons and daughters born to Jacob. Yet Genesis 46:15 says thirty-three ‘sons and daughters’ were born to Leah. It is not that there were other daughters, but it indicated sons and daughters in a general sense. It would be like asking a couple how many ‘children’ they have and finding out they have just one child. 

The family included grandchildren which are stated to be his ‘sons and daughters,’ Genesis 46:7, which was correct in the Hebrew sense. Actually, only one other female is mentioned, making this a male-dominated family which is genetically possible. She was Serah, the daughter of Asher, Genesis 46:17. 

There is an interesting thing concerning Serah. There was until the end of the 19th century, a grave in the Jewish cemetery in Pir Bakran, Iran, about 20 miles southwest of Isfahan, that was marked ‘Serah, the daughter of Asher the son of our Patriarch Jacob.’ It was a well-known pilgrimage site for the Jews living in Persia. It is unknown how she ended up there, but she must have been important to have such a burial site. 

The only scriptural references to her are Genesis 46:17, Numbers 26:46, and I Chronicles 7:30. In his commentary, John Gill wrote, “She seems to have been a person of some note, being so particularly remarked…” There is no other mention of her in the Bible. 

Jewish writings are full of various accounts about Serah most of which are obvious fabrications. One somewhat credible tradition is that she was the one the brothers of Joseph enlisted to tell their aged father Jacob that Joseph was still alive and had summoned them to move to Egypt. They thought he would be too shocked to take the news. Supposedly she sat near to where he was standing in prayer and played the lyre and gently sang, “Joseph my uncle did not die, he lives and rules all the land of Egypt.” The sons then came in with the news. 

There is no way to authenticate this account, but it was a normal practice for the immediate family to gather to comfort one who was grieving, thus ‘sons and daughters,’ in the general sense, Genesis 37:35. 

Jacob had only two ‘daughters,’ Dinah and Serah his granddaughter, but no more.

January 05 2022 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report