Day 10: Genesis 30-32

Jacob’s Growing Family, His Departure from Laban, & Wrestling with God

Genesis 30

1 When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister. She said to Jacob, “Give me children, or else I will die.”

2 Jacob’s anger burned against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in God’s place, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?”

3 She said, “Behold, my servant Bilhah. Go in to her, that she may bear on my knees, and I may also obtain children by her.”

4 She gave him Bilhah her servant as wife, and Jacob went in to her. 5 Bilhah conceived, and bore Jacob a son. 6 Rachel said, “God has judged me, and has also heard my voice, and has given me a son.” Therefore she named him Dan.

7 Bilhah, Rachel’s servant, conceived again, and bore Jacob a second son. 8 Rachel said, “I have wrestled with my sister with mighty wrestlings, and have prevailed.” She named him Naphtali.

9 When Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, she took Zilpah, her servant, and gave her to Jacob as a wife. 10 Zilpah, Leah’s servant, bore Jacob a son. 11 Leah said, “How fortunate!” She named him Gad.

12 Zilpah, Leah’s servant, bore Jacob a second son. 13 Leah said, “Happy am I, for the daughters will call me happy.” She named him Asher.

14 Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, 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 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, “Therefore he will lie with you tonight for your son’s mandrakes.”

16 Jacob came from the field in the evening, and Leah went out to meet him, and said, “You must come in to me, for surely I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.”

He lay with her that night.

17 God listened to Leah, and she conceived, and bore Jacob a fifth son. 18 Leah said, “God has given me my hire, because I gave my servant to my husband.” She named him Issachar.

19 Leah conceived again, and bore a sixth son to Jacob. 20 Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good dowry. Now my husband will dwell with me, because I have borne him six sons.” She named him Zebulun.

21 After that, she bore a daughter, and named her Dinah.

22 God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her, and opened her womb. 23 She conceived, bore a son, and said, “God has taken away my reproach.” 24 She named him Joseph, saying, “May Yahweh add another son to me.”

25 After Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own place, and to my country. 26 Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, and let me go; for you know my service with which I have served you.”

27 Laban said to him, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, stay, for I have learned by experience that Yahweh has blessed me for your sake.”

28 He said, “Appoint me your wages, and I will give it.”

29 Jacob said to him, “You know how I have served you, and how your livestock have fared with me. 30 For it was little which you had before I came, and it has increased to a multitude. Yahweh has blessed you wherever I turned. Now, when will I provide for my own house also?”

31 He said, “What shall I give you?”

Jacob said, “You shall not give me anything. If you will do this thing for me, I will again feed your flock and keep it. 32 I will pass through all your flock today, removing from there every speckled and spotted sheep, and every black one among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the goats. This will be my hire. 33 So my righteousness will testify for me hereafter, when you come concerning my hire that is before you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and black among the sheep, that is stolen if it is with me.”

34 Laban said, “Behold, let it be according to your word.”

35 That day he removed the male goats that were streaked and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white in it, and all the black ones among the sheep, and gave them into the hand of his sons. 36 He set three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob fed the rest of Laban’s flocks.

37 Jacob took to himself rods of fresh poplar, almond, and plane tree, and peeled white streaks in them, exposing the white which was in the rods. 38 He set the rods which he had peeled in front of the flocks in the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink. They conceived when they came to drink.

39 The flocks conceived before the rods, and the flocks brought forth streaked, speckled, and spotted. 40 Jacob separated the lambs, and set the faces of the flocks toward the streaked and all the black in Laban’s flock. He put his own droves apart, and didn’t put them into Laban’s flock.

41 Whenever the stronger of the flock conceived, Jacob laid the rods before the eyes of the flock in the watering troughs, that they might conceive among the rods; 42 but when the flock were feeble, he didn’t put them in. So the feebler were Laban’s, and the stronger Jacob’s. 43 The man increased exceedingly, and had large flocks, female servants and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

Genesis 31

1 He heard the words of Laban’s sons, saying, “Jacob has taken away all that was our father’s, and from that which was our father’s he has obtained all this wealth.” 2 Jacob saw the expression on Laban’s face, and saw that he was not toward him as before.

3 Yahweh said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your fathers, and to your relatives, and I will be with you.”

4 Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah to the field to his flock, 5 and said to them, “I see your father’s expression, that it is not toward me as before; but the God of my father has been with me. 6 You know that I have served your father with all of my strength. 7 Your father has deceived me, and changed my wages ten times, but God didn’t allow him to hurt me. 8 If he said, ‘The speckled will be your wages,’ then all the flock conceived speckled. If he said, ‘The streaked will be your wages,’ then all the flock conceived streaked. 9 Thus God has taken away your father’s livestock, and given them to me.

10 “It happened at the time that the flock conceived that I lifted up my eyes, and saw in a dream, and behold, the male goats which leaped on the flock were streaked, speckled, and grizzled. 11 The angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob,’ and I said, ‘Here I am.’

12 “He said, ‘Now lift up your eyes, and see, all the male goats which leap on the flock are streaked, speckled, and grizzled, for I have seen all that Laban does to you. 13 I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar, where you vowed a vow to me. Now arise, get out from this land, and return to the land of your birth.’”

14 Rachel and Leah answered him, “Is there yet any portion or inheritance for us in our father’s house? 15 Aren’t we accounted by him as foreigners? For he has sold us, and has also quite devoured our money. 16 For all the riches which God has taken away from our father are ours and our children’s. Now then, whatever God has said to you, do.”

17 Then Jacob rose up, and set his sons and his wives on the camels, 18 and he took away all his livestock, and all his possessions which he had gathered, including the livestock which he had obtained in Paddan Aram, to go to Isaac his father in the land of Canaan.

19 Now Laban had gone to shear his sheep. Rachel stole the teraphim that were her father’s. 20 Jacob deceived Laban the Syrian, in that he didn’t tell him that he was fleeing. 21 So he fled with all that he had. He rose up, passed over the River, and set his face toward the mountain of Gilead.

22 Laban was told on the third day that Jacob had fled. 23 He took his relatives with him, and pursued him seven days’ journey. He overtook him in the mountain of Gilead.

24 God came to Laban, the Syrian, in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Be careful that you don’t speak to Jacob either good or bad.”

25 Laban caught up with Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the mountain, and Laban with his relatives encamped in the mountain of Gilead. 26 Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done, that you have deceived me, and carried away my daughters like captives of the sword? 27 Why did you flee secretly, and deceive me, and didn’t tell me, that I might have sent you away with mirth and with songs, with tambourine and with harp, 28 and didn’t allow me to kiss my sons and my daughters? Now you have done foolishly. 29 It is in the power of my hand to hurt you, but the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, ‘Be careful that you don’t speak to Jacob either good or bad.’

30 “Now, you have gone away, because you greatly longed for your father’s house, but why have you stolen my gods?”

31 Jacob answered Laban, “Because I was afraid, for I said, ‘Lest you should take your daughters from me by force.’ 32 Anyone you find your gods with shall not live. Before our relatives, identify what is yours with me, and take it.” For Jacob didn’t know that Rachel had stolen them.

33 Laban went into Jacob’s tent, and into Leah’s tent, and into the tent of the two female servants; but he didn’t find them. He went out of Leah’s tent, and entered into Rachel’s tent. 34 Now Rachel had taken the teraphim, and put them in the camel’s saddle, and sat on them. Laban felt about all the tent, but didn’t find them.

35 She said to her father, “Don’t let my lord be angry that I can’t rise up before you; for the way of women is on me.” He searched, but didn’t find the teraphim.

36 Jacob was angry, and argued with Laban. Jacob answered Laban, “What is my trespass? What is my sin, that you have hotly pursued me? 37 Now that you have felt about all my stuff, what have you found of all your household stuff? Set it here before my relatives and your relatives, that they may judge between us two.

38 “These twenty years I have been with you. Your ewes and your female goats haven’t cast their young, and I haven’t eaten the rams of your flocks. 39 That which was torn of animals I didn’t bring to you. I bore its loss. Of my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night. 40 This was my situation: in the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night; and my sleep fled from my eyes. 41 These twenty years I have been in your house. I served you fourteen years for your two daughters, and six years for your flock, and you changed my wages ten times. 42 Unless the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac had been with me, surely now you would have sent me away empty. God has seen my affliction and the labor of my hands, and rebuked you last night.”

43 Laban answered Jacob, “The daughters are my daughters, the children are my children, the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine. What can I do today to these my daughters, or to their children whom they have borne? 44 Now come, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it be for a witness between me and you.”

45 Jacob took a stone, and set it up for a pillar. 46 Jacob said to his relatives, “Gather stones.” They took stones, and made a heap. They ate there by the heap.

47 Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed. 48 Laban said, “This heap is witness between me and you today.” Therefore its name was called Galeed 49 and Mizpah, for he said, “Yahweh watch between me and you, when we are absent from one another. 50 If you afflict my daughters, or if you take wives besides my daughters, no man is with us. See, God is witness between me and you.”

51 Laban said to Jacob, “Behold this heap, and behold the pillar, which I have set between me and you. 52 May this heap be a witness, and the pillar be a witness, that I will not pass over this heap to you, and that you will not pass over this heap and this pillar to me, for harm. 53 The God of Abraham, the God of Nahor, and the God of their father, judge between us.”

Jacob swore by the fear of his father, Isaac. 54 Jacob offered a sacrifice in the mountain, and called his relatives to eat bread. They ate bread, and stayed all night in the mountain.

55 Early in the morning, Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and blessed them. Laban departed, and returned to his place.

Genesis 32

1 Jacob went on his way, and God’s angels met him. 2 When he saw them, Jacob said, “This is God’s army.” He called the name of that place Mahanaim.

3 Jacob sent messengers in front of him to Esau, his brother, to the land of Seir, the field of Edom. 4 He commanded them, saying, “This is what you shall tell my lord, Esau: ‘This is what your servant Jacob says: “I have lived as a foreigner with Laban, and stayed until now. 5 I have cattle, donkeys, flocks, male servants, and female servants. I have sent to tell my lord, that I may find favor in your sight.”’”

6 The messengers returned to Jacob, saying, “We came to your brother Esau. Moreover, he comes to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.”

7 Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks, and the herds, and the camels, into two companies. 8 He said, “If Esau comes to the one company, and strikes it, then the company which is left will escape.”

9 Jacob said, “God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, Yahweh, who said to me, ‘Return to your country, and to your relatives, and I will do you good,’ 10 I am not worthy of the least of all the loving kindnesses, and of all the truth, which you have shown to your servant; for with just my staff I passed over this Jordan; and now I have become two companies. 11 Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear that he will come and strike me, and the mothers with the children. 12 You said, ‘I will surely do you good, and make your seed as the sand of the sea, which can’t be counted because there are so many.’”

13 He stayed there that night, and took from that which he had with him a present for Esau, his brother: 14 two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, 15 thirty milk camels and their colts, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten foals.

16 He delivered them into the hands of his servants, every herd by itself, and said to his servants, “Pass over before me, and put a space between herd and herd.” 17 He commanded the foremost, saying, “When Esau, my brother, meets you, and asks you, saying, ‘Whose are you? Where are you going? Whose are these before you?’ 18 then you shall say, ‘They are your servant Jacob’s. It is a present sent to my lord, Esau. Behold, he also is behind us.’”

19 He commanded also the second, and the third, and all that followed the herds, saying, “This is how you shall speak to Esau, when you find him. 20 You shall say, ‘Moreover, behold, your servant Jacob is behind us.’” For he said, “I will appease him with the present that goes before me, and afterward I will see his face. Perhaps he will accept me.”

21 So the present passed over before him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.

22 He rose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two servants, and his eleven children, and crossed over the ford of the Jabbok. 23 He took them, and sent them over the stream, and sent over what he had.

24 Jacob was left alone, and wrestled with a man there until the breaking of the day. 25 When he saw that he didn’t prevail against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh, and the hollow of Jacob’s thigh was strained as he wrestled.

26 He said, “Let me go, for the day breaks.”

Jacob said, “I won’t let you go unless you bless me.”

27 He said to him, “What is your name?”

He said, “Jacob.”

28 He said, “Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have fought with God and with men, and have prevailed.”

29 Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.”

He said, “Why is it that you ask what my name is?” Then he blessed him there.

30 Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for he said, “I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.”

31 The sun rose on him as he passed over Peniel, and he limped because of his thigh. 32 Therefore the children of Israel don’t eat the tendon of the thigh vein which is on the hollow of the thigh, to this day, because he touched the hollow of Jacob’s thigh in the tendon of the thigh vein.

Scripture: World English Bible (WEB), public domain.