“Abstract Woman” by Carl Newman. Photo from the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Scripture introduces Bilhah when she is given to Rachel at her wedding to Jacob. When Rachel has difficulty conceiving, she presents Bilhah to Jacob, telling her husband, “Here is my maid Bilhah; go in to her, that she may bear upon my knees and that I too may have children through her” (Genesis 30:3). Bilhah births two sons, whom Rachel names Dan and Naphtali.
Though Bilhah is foremother to two of the 12 tribes of Israel, and at times she’s described as a “wife” to Jacob, Bilhah is still treated as lesser within Jacob’s household. When Jacob fears he’ll be attacked by his brother Esau, he arranges his household in order of preference, with Bilhah, her counterpart Zilpah, and their children at the front, clearly the most expendable members of Jacob’s large family. However, Esau does not attack Jacob, and Bilhah and her children go unharmed.
But still, even after the Esau encounter, Bilhah is not safe; violence is done to her by a member of her own household. Jacob's firstborn son, Reuben, rapes Bilhah. Some translations obscure Reuben’s actions by saying he “slept with” Bilhah, but the Hebrew gives no indication of consent (Wilda C. Gafney, Womanist Midrash, 105). Moreover, Reuben is not immediately punished for what he’s done. It’s not until Genesis 49 that Jacob revokes Reuben’s rights as the firstborn.
In the stories of the matriarchs and patriarchs, we see the complexity of the people who will become the nation of Israel. Both the enslaver and the slave are the people’s common ancestors. And Bilhah’s story demands we recognize the reality of abuse: “Bilhah represents the woman who has had more than one abusive relationship…And Bilhah represents the woman who survives her abuse” (“Torat Bilhah: The Torah of a Disposable Woman” by Wilda C. Gafney).
A full ⅓ of the tribes of Israel come from the enslaved women Bilhah and Zilpah.
Besides being listed among the patriarchs and matriarchs, Bilhah is also memorialized in 1 Chronicles 4:29, where she is the namesake of a town.
In Jewish and Christian liturgies, God is often invoked as “the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” To more accurately reflect the story as it's presented in Scripture, try adding the women in your personal and communal prayers: “the God of Abraham and Sarah, Rebekah and Isaac, Jacob and Rachel, Leah, Bilhah, and Zilpah.”