And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.
He dreamed. It was natural that in the unwonted circumstances he should dream. Bodily exhaustion, mental excitement, the consciousness of his exposure to the banditti of the adjoining regions, and his need of the protection of Heaven, would direct the course of his dream into a certain channel. But his dream was an extraordinary-a supernatural one.
A ladder. Some writers are of opinion that it was not a literal ladder that is meant, as it is impossible to conceive any imagery stranger and more unnatural than that of a ladder whose base was on earth, while its top reached heaven, without having anything on which to rest its upper extremity. They suppose that the little heap of stones, on which his head reclined for a pillow, being the miniature model of the object that appeared to his imagination, the ladder was a gigantic mountain-pile, whose sides, indented in the rock, gave it the appearance of a scaling ladder. There can be no doubt that this use of the original term was common among the early Hebrews; as Josephus, describing the town of Ptolemais (Acre), says it was bounded by a mountain, which, from its projecting sides, was called 'the ladder;' and the stairs that led down to the city are, in the Septuagint, termed a ladder (Nehemiah 3:15), though they were only a flight of steps cut in the side of the rock. But whether the image presented to the mental eye of Jacob were a common ladder, or such a mountain-pile as has been described, the design of this vision was to afford comfort, encouragement, and confidence to the lonely fugitive, both in his present circumstances and as to his future prospects.
His thoughts during the day must have been painful; he would be his own self-accuser, that he had brought exile and privation upon himself; and above all, that though he had obtained the forgiveness of his father, he had much reason to fear lest God might have forsaken him. Solitude affords time for reflection; and it was now that God began to bring Jacob under a course of religious instruction and training. To dispel his fears and allay the inward tumult of his mind, nothing was better fitted than the vision of the gigantic ladder which reached from himself to heaven, and on which the angels were continually ascending and descending from God Himself on their benevolent errands.
Of course, it was the visible heaven he thought was within ladder reach, not the heavens which science has opened up. This visionary ladder has been very generally regarded as a type of Christ, in support of which an appeal is made to John 1:51. The words of the evangelist х tous (G3588) angelous (G32) tou (G5120) Theou (G2316) anabainontas (G305) kai (G2532) katabainontas (G2597) epi (G1909) ton (G3588) huion (G5207) tou (G5120) anthroopou (G444)], UPON the Son of man, do not convey the same meaning as the Septuagint translation of Genesis 28:12 х epi (G1909) autee (G846)], upon it; i:e., the ladder. But, taking the preposition х epi (G1909), like the Hebrew `al (H5921)], in the sense of, with ministering to, the passage of the evangelist may have a reference to this in the history of Jacob; and the ladder may be typical of a happier age in the future, when the heaven shall be open over the earth, and by means of the Son of man, our great Representative, ministering angels shall continually pass from heaven to earth, and from earth to heaven, on errands of beneficence and mercy to redeemed men. But doubtless the vision was intended primarily to intimate the divine care of Jacob and his interests as an individual (Josh. 1:51
).