of a departure from the true God.  The first steps towards idolatry were taken.  There was the resort to a sensible representation,—­some image probably used as a symbol of the true God at first, but certainly ensnaring the heart, and ending in idolatry.  Thus the gods of Laban, which Rachel stole, were leading him and his family rapidly to idol-worship, and to forgetfulness of the true God.  Still he had not sunk into gross idolatry.  Laban still pledged himself, and invoked the name of the God of Abraham and of Nahor, and of their fathers, when he entered into covenant with Jacob.  He had not yet altogether abjured the worship of Jehovah:  he had begun to mingle a false worship with it, and thus prepared the way for the full apostasy of his descendants.

That the chosen people might be kept from the taint of idolatry, Jacob left Laban; yet Rachel had stolen her father’s images—­and there is then great significance in that act by which Jacob renewed his covenant with God, when called upon to build the altar at Bethel.

“And Jacob said unto his household, and to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you and be clean, and change your garments:  and let us arise and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went.  And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and all their ear-rings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem.”

Probably the ear-rings were used as heathen charms or amulets.  While idolatry, as a leprosy, was thus beginning to infect the household, he saw the need of their purification; and there seems no accidental connection between this searching out and putting away of idolatry in the household of Jacob and the following death of Rachel:  “With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let him not live.”

The cherished wife of Jacob, deeply tainted with the superstitions by which her family were corrupting the religion of Jehovah, may have been thus removed to prevent further contagion.  While the apostle may refer to this example in his promise:  “Nevertheless she shall be saved in child-bearing, if she continue in the faith.”  And this sin may have excluded Rachel from the sepulchre of Abraham.  The plague-spot disappears from this time, and the purification of the household was availing.  For many generations, whatever their other sins, the children of Jacob were kept from idolatry.

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MIRIAM.

The influence of women upon the destiny and character of man, as exemplified in the life of Moses.

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