Jacob went and lived to the south of the Tower of Eder Ephrathah. He went to his father Isaac — he and his wife Leah — on the first of the tenth month.

When Reuben saw Bilhah, Rachel’s maid — his father’s concubine — bathing in water in a private place, he loved her.

At night he hid. He entered Bilhah’s house at night and found her lying alone in her bed and sleeping in her tent.

After he had lain with her, she awakened and saw that Reuben was lying with her in the bed. She uncovered the edge of her (clothing), took hold of him, shouted out, and realized that it was Reuben.

She was ashamed because of him. Once she had released her grip on him, he ran away.

She grieved terribly about this matter and told no one at all.

When Jacob came and looked for her, she said to him: ‘I am not pure for you because I am too contaminated for you, since Reuben defiled me and lay with me at night. I was sleeping and did not realize (it) until he uncovered the edge of my (garment) and lay with me’.

Jacob was very angry at Reuben because he had lain with Bilhah, since he had uncovered the covering of his father.

Jacob did not approach her again because Reuben had defiled her.

For this reason it is written and ordained on the heavenly tablets that a man is not to lie with his father’s wife and that he is not to uncover the covering of his father because it is impure. They are certainly to die together — the man who lies with his father’s wife and the woman, too — because they have done something impure on the earth.

There is to be nothing impure before our God within the nation that he has chosen as his own possession.

Again it is written a second time: ‘Let the one who lies with his father’s wife be cursed because he has uncovered his father’s shame’. All of the Lord’s holy ones said: ‘So be it, so be it’.

Now you, Moses, order the Israelites to observe this command because it is a capital offence and it is an impure thing. To eternity there is no expiation to atone for the man who has done this; but he is to be put to death, to be killed, and to be stoned and uprooted from among the people of our God.

For any man who commits it in Israel will not be allowed to live a single day on the earth because he is despicable and impure.

They are not to say: ‘Reuben was allowed to live and (have) forgiveness after he had lain with the concubine-wife of his father while she had a husband and her husband — his father Jacob — was alive’.

For the statute, the punishment, and the law had not been completely revealed to all but (only) in your time as a law of its particular time and as an eternal law for the history of eternity.

There is no time when this law will be at an end, nor is there any forgiveness for it; rather both of them are to be uprooted among the people. On the day on which they have done this they are to kill them.

Now you, Moses, write for Israel so that they keep it and do not act hke this and do not stray into a capital offence; because the Lord our God, who shows no partiahty and accepts no bribes, is the judge.

Tell them these words of the testament so that they may listen, guard themselves, be careful about them, and not be destroyed or uprooted from the earth. For all who commit it on the earth before the Lord are impure, something detestable, a blemish, and something contaminated.

No sin is greater than the sexual impurity which they commit on the earth because Israel is a holy people for the Lord its God. It is the nation which he possesses; it is a priestly nation; it is a priestly kingdom; it is what he owns. No such impurity will be seen among the holy people.

During the third year of the sixth week [2145] Jacob and all his sons went and took up residence at the house of Abraham near his father Isaac and his mother Rebecca.

These are the names of Jacob’s sons: Reuben, his first-born, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun were Leah’s sons. Rachel’s sons were Joseph and Benjamin. Bilhah’s sons were Dan and Naphtali. And Zilpah’s sons were Gad and Asher. Leah’s daughter Dinah was Jacob’s only daughter.

After they had come, they bowed to Isaac and Rebecca. When they saw them, they blessed Jacob and all his children. Isaac was extremely happy that he had seen the children of his younger son Jacob, and he blessed them.