Isaac’s Last Instructions

1 And in the sixth year of this week [2162] Isaac called his two sons Esau and Jacob, and they came to him, and he said to them: 'My sons, I am going the way of my ancestors, to the eternal house where my ancestors are. 2 So bury me near Abraham my father, in the double cave in the field of Ephron the Hittite, where Abraham purchased a tomb to bury in; in the tomb which I dug for myself, bury me there. 3 And this I command you, my sons, that you practice righteousness and uprightness on the earth, so that the Lord may bring upon you all that the Lord said that he would do to Abraham and to his descendants. 4 And love one another as brothers, my sons, as a man who loves his own soul, and let each look for ways to benefit his brother, and act together on the earth; and let them love each other as their own souls.⁠a 5 And concerning the question of idols, I command and instruct you to reject them and hate them, and do not love them, for they are full of deception for those that worship them and for those that bow down to them. 6 Remember, my sons, the Lord God of Abraham your father, and how I too worshipped Him and served Him in righteousness and in joy, so that He might multiply you and increase your descendants as the stars of heaven in number, and establish you on the earth as the plant of righteousness which will not be rooted out to all the generations forever. 7 And now I shall make you swear a great oath⁠b — for there is no oath which is greater than it by the name glorious and honored and great and splendid and wonderful and mighty, which created the heavens and the earth and all things together — that you will fear Him and worship Him.⁠c 8 And that each will love his brother with affection and righteousness, and that neither will desire evil against his brother from now on forever all the days of your life so that you may prosper in all your deeds and not be destroyed. 9 And if either of you devises evil against his brother, know that from now on everyone that devises evil against his fellow shall fall into his hand, and shall be rooted out of the land of the living, and his descendants shall be destroyed from under heaven. 10 But on the day of turmoil and cursing and indignation and anger, with flaming devouring fire as He burned Sodom, He will likewise burn his land and his city and all that is his, and he shall be blotted out of the book of the discipline of the human beings, and not be recorded in the book of life, but in that which is appointed to destruction, and he shall depart into an eternal curse; so that their condemnation may be always renewed in hate and in cursing and in anger and in torment and in indignation and in plagues and in disease forever. 11 I say and testify to you, my sons, according to the judgment which shall come upon the man who wishes to injure his brother. 12 And he divided all his possessions between the two on that day and he gave the larger portion to him that was the firstborn, and the tower and all that was about it, and all that Abraham possessed at the Well of the Oath. 13 And he said: 'This larger portion I will give to the firstborn.' 14 And Esau said, 'I have sold to Jacob and given my birthright to Jacob; to him let it be given, and I have not a single word to say regarding it, for it is his.' 15 And Isaac said, May a blessing rest upon you, my sons, and upon your descendants today, for you have given me rest, and my heart is not pained concerning the birthright, for fear that you might do evil on account of it. 16 May the Most High God bless the man that acts righteously, him and his descendants forever.' 17 And he finished instructing them and blessing them, and they ate and drank together before him, and he rejoiced because there was one mind between them, and they went out from him and rested that day and slept. 18 And Isaac slept on his bed that day rejoicing; and he slept the eternal sleep, and died one hundred and eighty years old. He completed twenty-five weeks and five years; and his two sons Esau and Jacob buried him. 19 And Esau went to the land of Edom, to the mountains of Seir, and lived there. 20 And Jacob lived in the mountains of Hebron, in the land of Canaan, in the tower in the land of his father Abraham, and he worshipped the Lord with all his heart and according to the visible commands according as He had divided the days of his generations.

The Death of Leah

21 And Leah his wife died in the fourth year of the second week of the forty-fifth jubilee, [2167] and he buried her in the double cave near Rebekah his mother to the left of the grave of Sarah, his father's mother 22 and all her sons and his sons came to mourn over Leah his wife with him and to comfort him regarding her, for he was lamenting her for he loved her deeply after Rachel her sister died; 23 for she was perfect and upright in all her ways and honored Jacob, and all the days that she lived with him he did not hear from her mouth a harsh word, for she was gentle and peaceable and upright and honorable. 24 And he remembered all her deeds which she had done during her life and he lamented her deeply; for he loved her with all his heart and with all his soul.