Jacob's Staircase
Jacob had a dream in which a staircase reached from earth to heaven and divine beings were going up and down carrying messages.
When he woke, he exclaimed, "This is none other than the house of God."Within the Hebrew tradition, of course, there was only one god, but the idea of divine messengers is accepted without question in the Bible. The concept of angels, as we understand them today, results from the fusing of these biblical messengers with Persian ideas of divine beings. They were given wings no earlier than the fourth century A.D.
Doubt in the Stars?
"Count these if you can!" Abram hears a voice say, "for that will be the number of your descendants". And yet in his old age he has none. Though this incident ends with the statement that "Abram had faith in Yahweh", the artist has detected a note of doubt. The stars which Abram's eyes look upon, his mind imagines in the form of a question mark.
We see here the same twelve stars that appeared as a question mark in the second panel. But now the question mark is beginning to disperse, symbolizing that the number of Jacob's children will remove any doubt about the promise of many descendants.
The Sun and the Moon
The sun and the moon may point to the future, when Jacob's son Joseph will himself have a dream [Genesis 37:9] with heavenly bodies in it. Because of his dreams, his brothers sell him into Egypt, where God fulfills the promise.
The Fire
Abraham brought the fire for the offering, fully believing that he would use it. Isaac asks, "The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" He trusts his father and does not realize that he is to be the lamb.