Today’s first reading is the account of “Jacob’s Ladder” told in Genesis 28. It is important to know that Jacob has just cheated his older brother Esau out of his rightful inheritance and paternal blessing. Now Jacob is traveling to Haran – a distance of 700 miles from his home – putting some distance between himself and the wrath of his older brother.

Jacob departed from Beer-sheba and proceeded toward Haran. When he came upon a certain shrine, as the sun had already set, he stopped there for the night. Taking one of the stones at the shrine, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep at that spot. Then he had a dream: a stairway rested on the ground, with its top reaching to the heavens; and God’s messengers were going up and down on it.

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