Genesis 30

Notes on the verses

Chap. XXX. Ver. 1—21. Jacob’s other children enumerated. —There appears to us something very extraordinary, and in some respects unseemly in the desire so universally expressed by good women of old, to have children. In Leah, indeed, it is not to be wondered at, as she was anxious to engage the affections of her husband, who had married her under a mistake; but Rachel possessed his warmest love, and was not slighted because she had no offspring. On the contrary, well knowing that “children are an heritage from the Lord,” ((Psalms 27:3).) Jacob is angry with her for repining, and reproves her sharply: “Am I in God’s stead?” saith he, “who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?” But ‘the blessing of Abraham”

was a numerous posterity; and, in particular, one illustrious person, (Christ,) “in whom all the nations of the earth were to be blessed.” It was then, we may reasonably believe, an object of their laudable ambition to contribute to fulfil the prophecy; and we must not wonder if many of Eve’s daughters flattered themselves, like their first parent, with the hope of being the mother of the Messiah, ((Genesis 4:1).) Rachel was, however, so impatient, that she entreated him to take her handmaid Bilhah to his bed, (ver. 22.) and probably Laban wished to keep the fraud from the public eye. It is perfectly plain that Jacob did not serve seven years more before he got Rachel to wife. ]—Bagster. Chap. XXX.

Ver. 6, Rachel said, God hath given me a son.—It was remarked above, (Expos. of (Genesis 16:1-6).) that the children of the slave were reckoned to the mistress; and therefore, as it seems in those early times to have been the prerogative of the mother to name her children, Rachel names the son which Bilhah bore as her own, “God hath judged me,” &c. Ver. 8, Rachel said, With great wrestlings.—Margin, ‘With wrestlings of God;” i. e. “with divine and vehement wrestlings.”—Ainsworth. But Parkhurst translates, ‘By the wrestlings, agency, or operation of God, I am intwisted with my sister; i.e. my family is now interwoven with my sister’s, and has a chance of producing the promised seed.”’ The LXX., Aquila, and Vulgate, give nearly the same meaning.—Dr.

A. Clarke. Ver. 11. Gad is commonly explained to mean “a troop,” as in the margin: but the LXX., Vulgate, Montanus, and Castellus, render it “prosperity,” and so Dr. Boothroyd; and some think it has an allusion to the goddess Fortune. Theodoret therefore censures it as Paganish, and supposes that Leah might be still attached to idolatry. Ver. 14. And Reuben. a + + Sound MANDRAKES in the field.—What these is whom I have served thee, and let me go: for y 1S8a.1.6. Is.4.1. 2 i.e. adding, a c. 24.54. b 31.55, that, as Sarah had said with respect to Hagar, ((Genesis 16:1-6).) she might be “builded by her;” knowing that the children, in this case, would be reckoned to her account. Notwithstanding the confusion that had been brought by Hagar into the family of his grandfather Abraham, Jacob agrees to this proposal, and Bilhah bears a son, whom Rachel, as claiming it for her own, calls Dan, that is, “Judging;’ for God (said she) hath “judged me, and heard the voice of my supplications.”

And when Bilhah bears another son, she called his name Naphtali, meaning, “‘My wrestlings;” because “with great wrestlings had she wrestled with her sister, and prevailed.” Leah now began to be jealous; and, supposing she had herself done bearing children, gave her handmaid Zilpah also unto Jacob, who bore him two sons. The former was named by Leah, Gad, “a troop cometh,” probably expecting several more to follow; but if so, she was disappointed: for she bore one other only, and she called his name Asher, which signifies “Happy,” or blessed; saying, “Happy am I, for the daughters will call me blessed.” Leah herself, however, had two other children, Issachar and Zebulun. The former name signifies “Hire;””

because, said she, God has given me my hire, or rather rewarded me; and the latter “Dwelling;” for “now my husband will dwell with me, because I have borne him six sons.” Leah bare also a daughter, and called her name Dinah, which is the feminine of Dan, and of the same import. Ver. 22—43. The birth of Joseph, and Laban’s new contract with Jacob.—At length, God remembers Rachel, and she bears a son, whose eventful history occupies more room, and creates greater interest, than the fate of all his brethren, “She bare a were is much disputed. The Hebrew word is Dudaim, which according to some, means love-apples. Hasselquist, in his Voyages, found a great number of these plants (as he says) in Galilee, which were ripe in May, (when the wheat harvest begins in Judea;) and with other travellers and naturalists, describes them of a strong nauseous smell, and not good to eat; but then, as a Samaritan priest told Maundrell, “they were supposed to help conception, by being laid under the bed.”

2. Others think the Dudaim a kind of melon. The editor of Calmet says, the word signifies a woman’s breast, (mamma; see (Ezekiel 23:3), &c.) and that there is a species of melon (chamama) so called in Persia to this day, “nearly the figure of the cologuintida [colour], mingled red and yellow, and of a very agreeable odour. The Syrians and Egyptians call it skemama. It is held in the hand, by way of nosegay, and the Persians call it perfume of the hands.”—Taylor’s Expos. Index. Parkhurst’s Heb. (Leviticus 10:4) Ver. 18. God hath given me mine hire.—Alluding, probably, to the incident related ver. 14—16, y Ver. 25. Send me away.—{The 14 years which Jacob had engaged to serve for Rachel and Leah, being expired, he was willing to depart, depending on God’s promise, without any other recompense from Laban for his hard service, than his large family: though he could appeal to Laban himself, that he had served him with diligence, fidelity, and success.

]—Bagster, Ver. 32. I will pass through all thy flock to day.—The LXX. read, ‘Let all thy flock pass before thee to-day, and do thou drive away from them all the sheep that are black, (or brown,) and all the spotted and speckled of the goats. And of such shall be my hire.”” The meaning was, that Laban should drive away all the brown or speckled that were at present in the flock, and give them to his sons to keep, three days’ journey off, (ver. 15.) and that Jacob should have only the white sheep, and the uniformly-coloured goats of Laban to keep; and that he should have for his hire, for keeping them, only such of the breed of that flock as hereafter should be black of the sheep, or speckled of the goats.”—Dr.

Wall’s Crit. Notes. Among the Hindoos, the cowherd is sometimes paid by milk; and when the kine amount to a certain number, he has a heifer of three years old; but if any were lost, or stolen, or died through his neglect, he was bound to make them good.—Gentoo Laws. Compare (Genesis 31:39). Ver. 33. Stolen.—[Supply the ellipsis by inserting ‘if found,” after stolen,” and the sense will be clear.]—Bagster. Ver. 36, Laban’s flocks.—{The dream which Jacob afterwards relates, (ch. xxxi. 11—13.) is also introduced here in the Samaritan Text: “And the angel of God spake unto Jacob in a dream, and said, Jacob, and he said, Here am I. And he said, Lift up now thine eyes, and see, all the rams which leap upon the sheep are ring-streaked, speckled, and grisled: for I have seen all that Laban doeth unto thee.

I am the God of Beth-el, where thou anointedst the pillar, and where thou vowedst a vow to me: and now arise, depart from this land, and return unto the land of thy father, and I will be with thee for good.” That this addition is genuine appears highly probable; as it differs sufficiently from that in ch. xxxi. to show that it is not a copy; and if it is not admitted, it seems strange that we had not heard of this dream before the relation of it by Jacob, though it seems to have taken place immediately after the bargain of Jacob with Laban—the very order in which it is here placed.]—Bagster. Ver. 37. Green poplar.—[Livneh is the white poplar, so called from the whiteness of its leaves, bark, and wood, from Javan, to be white.

Hazel.— Jerome, Hiller, Celsius, Dr. Shaw, Bochart, and other learned men, say, that luz, is not the “hazel,” but the almond-tree, as the word denotes both in Arabic and Syriac. Chesnut-tree —Armon, is the “plane-tree,” so called from the bark naturally peeling off, and leaving the trunk naked, as its root #7am, signifies.} —Bagster. f Ver. 38. And he set the rods which he had peeled, (or peeled,) &c.—Writers on the breeding of sheep affirm, and shepherds in general believe, that there is no animal on which the imagination has so much influence on the young, as the sheep, during their gestation. Hence Jacob employed the stratagem of placing something spotted before the sheep when they came there, that their lambs might be speckled.

So much is certain, that even in the latest times a similar method is adopted to obtain a contrary result, and something white placed in the water-troughs before the sheep; white cloths hung up in their field; and even water-troughs of perfectly white stone given them, in order to have white lambs.—Michaelis. That they should conceive. Hebrew, (as rgin) “be in heat.” i ait 43. And the man increased exceedingly.—Margin, ‘Broke forth much,’ oh.?? 4 Chap. XXXI. Ver. 1. Hath he gotten all this glory.—The Hebrew Cabid, besides glory, signifies both weight and riches; basi he read of a weight