Leah in the context of "Naphtali"

The patriarchs (Hebrew: אבות‎ ʾAvot, "fathers") of the Bible, when narrowly defined, are Abraham, his son Isaac, and Isaac's son Jacob, also named Israel, the ancestor (according to the Abrahamic tradition) of the Israelites. These three figures are referred to collectively as "the patriarchs", and the period in which they lived is known as the patriarchal age.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam hold that the patriarchs, along with their primary wives, known as the matriarchs (Sarah, Rebekah and Leah), are entombed at the Cave of the Patriarchs, a site held holy by the three religions. Rachel, Jacob's other wife, is said to be buried separately at what is known as Rachel's Tomb, near Bethlehem, at the site where she is believed to have died in childbirth.

Jacob, later known as Israel, is a Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions. He first appears in the Torah, where he is described in the Book of Genesis as a son of Isaac and Rebecca. Accordingly, alongside his older fraternal twin brother Esau, Jacob's paternal grandparents are Abraham and Sarah and his maternal grandfather is Bethuel, whose wife is not mentioned. He is said to have bought Esau's birthright and, with his mother's help, deceived his aging father to bless him instead of Esau. Then, following a severe drought in his homeland Canaan, Jacob and his descendants migrated to neighbouring Egypt through the efforts of his son Joseph, who had become a confidant of the pharaoh. After dying in Egypt at the age of 147, he is supposed to have been buried in the Cave of Machpelah in Hebron.

Per the Hebrew Bible, Jacob's progeny were beget by four women: his wives (and maternal cousins) Leah and Rachel; and his concubines Bilhah and Zilpah. His sons were, in order of their birth: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin. He also had a daughter named Dinah, born to his first wife Leah. The descendants of Jacob's sons were collectively known as the Israelites, with each son being the forefather of one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, of whom all but the Tribe of Levi were allotted territory in the Land of Israel. The Genesis narrative also states that Jacob displayed favoritism among his wives and children, preferring Rachel and her sons Joseph and Benjamin to the rest—culminating in Joseph's older brothers selling him into slavery out of resentment.

Judah (Hebrew: יְהוּדָה‎, Modern: Yəhūda, Tiberian: Yŭhūḏā) was, according to the Book of Genesis, the fourth of the six sons of Jacob and Leah and the founder of the Tribe of Judah of the Israelites. By extension, he is indirectly the eponym of the Kingdom of Judah, the land of Judea, and the word Jew.

According to the narrative in Genesis, Judah alongside Tamar is a patrilineal ancestor of the Davidic line. The Tribe of Judah features prominently in Deuteronomistic history, which most scholars agree was reduced to written form, although subject to exilic and post-exilic alterations and emendations, during the reign of the Judahist reformer Josiah from 641 to 609 BCE.

Reuben or Reuven (Hebrew: רְאוּבֵן, Standard Rəʾūven, Tiberian Rŭʾūḇēn) was the first of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob's oldest son), according to the Book of Genesis. He was the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Reuben.

Simeon (Hebrew: שִׁמְעוֹן, Modern: Šīmʾōn, Tiberian: Šīmʾōn) was the second of the six sons of Jacob and Leah, and the founder of the Israelite tribe of Simeon, according to the Book of Genesis of the Hebrew Bible. Biblical scholars regard the tribe as part of the original Israelite confederation. Simeon is absent in some sections of the Bible that list the other tribes, and some scholars think that it was not initially regarded as a distinct tribe. Some Biblical scholars believe that Simeon was not considered a distinct tribe due to the Zimri scandal. The Blessing of Moses before his death had omitted the Tribe of Simeon because Jacob had castigated him, Genesis 49:5-7, and because of the affair of Baal-peor.

Levi (/ˈliːvaɪ/ LEE-vy; Hebrew: לֵוִי, Modern: Levī, Tiberian: Lēwī) was, according to the Book of Genesis, the third of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob's third son), and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Levi (the Levites, including the Kohanim) and the great-grandfather of Aaron, Moses and Miriam. Certain religious and political functions were reserved for the Levites.

Most scholars view the Torah as projecting the origins of the Levites into the past to explain their role as landless cultic functionaries.

Issachar (Hebrew: יִשָּׂשכָר, romanized: Yiśśāḵār, lit. '"There is reward"') was, according to the Book of Genesis, the fifth of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob's ninth son), and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Issachar. However, some Biblical scholars view this as an eponymous metaphor providing an aetiology of the connectedness of the tribe to others in the Israelite confederation.

Zebulun (Hebrew: זְבֻלוּן/זְבוּלֻן/זְבוּלוּן, Modern: Zəvūlūn, Tiberian: Zăḇūlūn; also Zebulon, Zabulon, or Zaboules in Antiquities of the Jews by Josephus) was, according to the Books of Genesis and Numbers, the last of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob's tenth son), and the founder of the Israelite tribe of Zebulun. Some biblical scholars believe this to be an eponymous metaphor providing an etiology of the connectedness of the tribe to others in the Israelite confederation. With Leah as a matriarch, biblical scholars believe the tribe to have been regarded by the text's authors as a part of the original Israelite confederation.

The Tomb of Zebulun is located in Sidon, Lebanon. In the past, towards the end of Iyyar, Jews from the most distant parts of the land of Israel would make a pilgrimage to this tomb.