Genesis 29:31–35:18

³¹When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren.^{* 32}Leah conceived and bore a son, and she named him Reuben,^t for she said, “Because the Lord has looked on my affliction, surely now my husband will love me.”^{* 33}She conceived again and bore a son and said, “Because the Lord has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son also,” and she named him Simeon.^{u 34}Again she conceived and bore a son and said, “Now this time my husband will be joined to me, because I have borne him three sons”; therefore he was named Levi.^{v* 35}She conceived again and bore a son and said, “This time I will praise the Lord,” therefore she named him Judah;^w then she ceased bearing.^*

³⁰When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister, and she said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I shall die!”^{* 2}Jacob became very angry with Rachel and said, “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?”^{* 3}Then she said, “Here is my maid Bilhah; go in to her, that she may bear upon my knees and that I too may have children through her.”^{* 4}So she gave him her maid Bilhah as a wife, and Jacob went in to her.^{* 5}And Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son. ⁶Then Rachel said, “God has judged me and has also heard my voice and given me a son”; therefore she named him Dan.^{x* 7}Rachel’s maid Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. ⁸Then Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings I have wrestled with my sister and have prevailed,” so she named him Naphtali.^y*

⁹When Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she took her maid Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.^{* 10}Then Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a son. ¹¹And Leah said, “Good fortune!” So she named him Gad.^{z 12}Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. ¹³And Leah said, “Happy am I! For the women will call me happy,” so she named him Asher.^a*

¹⁴In the days of wheat harvest Reuben went and found mandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”^{* 15}But she said to her, “Is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son’s mandrakes also?” Rachel said, “Then he may lie with you tonight for your son’s mandrakes.”^{* 16}When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he lay with her that night. ¹⁷And God heeded Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. ¹⁸Leah said, “God has given me my hire because I gave my maid to my husband,” so she named him Issachar.^{b 19}And Leah conceived again, and she bore Jacob a sixth son. ²⁰Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good gift; now my husband will honor me, because I have borne him six sons,” so she named him Zebulun.^{c* 21}Afterwards she bore a daughter and named her Dinah.

²²Then God remembered Rachel, and God heeded her and opened her womb.^{* 23}She conceived and bore a son and said, “God has taken away my reproach,”^{* 24}and she named him Joseph,^d saying, “May the Lord add to me another son!”^*

Jacob Prospers at Laban’s Expense

²⁵When Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own home and country.^{* 26}Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, and let me go, for you know very well the service I have given you.” ²⁷But Laban said to him, “If you will allow me to say so, I have learned by divination that the Lord has blessed me because of you;^{* 28}name your wages, and I will give it.”^{* 29}Jacob said to him, “You yourself know how I have served you and how your livestock have fared with me.^{* 30}For you had little before I came, and it has increased abundantly, and the Lord has blessed you wherever I turned. But now when shall I provide for my own household also?”^{* 31}He said, “What shall I give you?” Jacob said, “You shall not give me anything; if you will do this for me, I will again feed your flock and keep it: ³²let me pass through all your flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep and every black lamb and the spotted and speckled among the goats, and such shall be my wages.^{* 33}So my honesty will answer for me later, when you come to look into my wages with you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs, if found with me, shall be counted stolen.”^{* 34}Laban said, “Good! Let it be as you have said.” ³⁵But that day Laban removed the male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white on it, and every lamb that was black and put them in charge of his sons, ³⁶and he set a distance of three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, while Jacob was pasturing the rest of Laban’s flock.

³⁷Then Jacob took fresh rods of poplar and almond and plane and peeled white streaks in them, exposing the white of the rods.^{* 38}He set the rods that he had peeled in front of the flocks in the troughs, that is, the watering places, where the flocks came to drink. And since they bred when they came to drink, ³⁹the flocks bred in front of the rods, and so the flocks produced young that were striped, speckled, and spotted. ⁴⁰Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and the completely black animals in the flock of Laban, and he put his own droves apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock. ⁴¹Whenever the stronger of the flock were breeding, Jacob laid the rods in the troughs before the eyes of the flock, that they might breed among the rods, ⁴²but for the feebler of the flock he did not lay them there, so the feebler were Laban’s and the stronger Jacob’s. ⁴³Thus the man grew exceedingly rich and had large flocks and male and female slaves and camels and donkeys.^*

Jacob Flees with Family and Flocks

³¹Now Jacob heard that the sons of Laban were saying, “Jacob has taken all that was our father’s; he has gained all this wealth from what belonged to our father.” ²And Jacob saw that Laban did not regard him as favorably as he did before. ³Then the Lord said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your ancestors and to your kindred, and I will be with you.”^{* 4}So Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah into the field where his flock was ⁵and said to them, “I see that your father does not regard me as favorably as he did before. But the God of my father has been with me.^{* 6}You know that I have served your father with all my strength, ⁷yet your father has cheated me and changed my wages ten times, but God did not permit him to harm me.^{* 8}If he said, ‘The speckled shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore speckled, and if he said, ‘The striped shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore striped.^{* 9}Thus God has taken away the livestock of your father and given them to me.

¹⁰“During the mating of the flock I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats that leaped upon the flock were striped, speckled, and mottled. ¹¹Then the angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob,’ and I said, ‘Here I am!’^{* 12}And he said, ‘Look up and see that all the goats that leap on the flock are striped, speckled, and mottled, for I have seen all that Laban is doing to you. ¹³I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and return to the land of your birth.’ ”^{* 14}Then Rachel and Leah answered him, “Is there any portion or inheritance left to us in our father’s house?^{* 15}Are we not regarded by him as foreigners? For he has sold us, and he has been using up the money given for us. ¹⁶All the property that God has taken away from our father belongs to us and to our children; now then, do whatever God has said to you.”

¹⁷So Jacob arose and set his children and his wives on camels, ¹⁸and he drove away all his livestock, all the property that he had gained, the livestock in his possession that he had acquired in Paddan-aram, to go to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan.

¹⁹Now Laban had gone to shear his sheep, and Rachel stole her father’s household gods.^{* 20}And Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean, in that he did not tell him that he intended to flee. ²¹So he fled with all that he had; starting out he crossed the Euphrates^e and set his face toward the hill country of Gilead.^*

Laban Overtakes Jacob

²²On the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled. ²³So he took his kinsfolk with him and pursued him for seven days until he caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead.^{* 24}But God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream by night and said to him, “Take heed that you say not a word to Jacob, either good or bad.”^*

²⁵Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country, and Laban with his kinsfolk camped in the hill country of Gilead. ²⁶Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done? You have deceived me and carried away my daughters like captives of the sword.^{* 27}Why did you flee secretly and deceive me and not tell me? I would have sent you away with mirth and songs, with tambourine and lyre.^{* 28}And why did you not permit me to kiss my sons and my daughters farewell? What you have done is foolish. ²⁹It is in my power to do you harm, but the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, ‘Take heed that you speak to Jacob neither good nor bad.’^{* 30}Even though you had to go because you longed greatly for your father’s house, why did you steal my gods?”^{* 31}Jacob answered Laban, “Because I was afraid, for I thought that you would take your daughters from me by force. ³²But anyone with whom you find your gods shall not live. In the presence of our kinsfolk, point out what I have that is yours, and take it.” Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen the gods.^f*

³³So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the tent of the two maids, but he did not find them. And he went out of Leah’s tent and entered Rachel’s. ³⁴Now…