Myth #67:

Benjamin was born in Canaan.

The Myth: And they journeyed from Bethel; and there was but a little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labour. And it came to pass, when she was in hard labour, that the midwife said unto her, Fear not; thou shalt have this son also. And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died) that she called his name Ben-oni: but his father called him Benjamin. (Gen. 35:16–18)

The Reality: Benjamin’s original name of Benoni indicates a connection to the Egyptian city of Heliopolis, known as On in the Bible.

Earlier, we discussed the location of Rachel’s tomb (see Myth #60), noting alternative traditions about where she died. Implicit in both claims was the idea that she gave birth to Benjamin in Canaan.

Benjamin was the twelfth child of Jacob but the second child of Rachel. He was Joseph’s only full brother. After Joseph’s brothers secretly delivered him into slavery, Benjamin became Jacob’s favorite.

The naming of Benjamin presents an interesting question of tribal origins. His father called him Benjamin but his mother called him Ben-oni, which means “Son of On,” and On was the biblical name for the Egyptian city of Heliopolis. That city, one of the main cult centers in Egypt, had an important connection to Joseph, Benjamin’s only full brother. When Joseph became Prime Minister of Egypt, he married Asenath, daughter of the chief priest of Heliopolis. (Her name means something like “She belongs to the goddess Neith.”) She was the mother of his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. The Joseph branch of Rachel, which formed the central core of Israel and which shared borders with Benjamin, had its roots in the city of Heliopolis.

If the main branch of Rachel had Heliopolitan associations, it would not be unexpected for the minor branch to also have an Heliopolitan connection. That Rachel called her younger child “Son of Heliopolis” indicates that Benjamin’s roots sprouted in Egypt soil.

The biblical stories of Rachel’s and Leah’s descendants indicate a strong rivalry between the two factions. The Song of Deborah shows that with the exception of Reuben the main Leah branch (Simeon, Levi, and Judah) had not come into existence until long after Israel settled into Canaan. The Rachel branch exhibits several connections to Egypt.

These bits of evidence suggest that the original Exodus group must have been primarily a Rachel faction and that the Leah grouping didn’t fully emerge as a political entity until long after the Exodus. Later scribes created the mythological Jacob family as an attempt to give the various factions a common history.