Notes 34: A family visit (29:1-17)

SYNOPSIS: Jacob completes his eastward journey and comes to a well where shepherds are gathered. The well is covered by a large stone which must be moved to water the flocks. Jacob makes small talk with the shepherds and learns that Laban is well. Along comes Laban's shepherd daughter Rachel, whom Jacob emotionally embraces, she runs home to tell Laban and Laban comes out to invite Jacob into their home. A month passes and Laban offers Jacob a salary for his help with the flocks. Laban has two daughters: Leah the tender-eyed, and Rachel who is very good-looking.

• Text of the passage in Nawat

The curtain rises on a well in the countryside close to Haran, the location for yet another scene, with which the passage starts off, in which an encounter takes place with a pretty maiden from Laban's family which will lead to a marriage (cf. ch. 24). The suitor is Jacob himself; the damsel is Laban's shepherd daughter Rachel (whose name, raxel, means 'ewe').

In the passages that follow, Jacob will marry both Rachel and her sister Leah, and with them and two concubines he will engender many sons (and the occasional daughter). The sons are eponymous of the twelve tribes of Israel (Jacob = Israel). Therefore one dimension of Jacob's story in Padan-Aram is often considered to be an a posteriori attempt at an allegorical account of the origin of the Israelite tribes (cf. notes on 29:31 - 30:13). It remains to readers to decide how much emphasis they wish to place on that perspective in their appreciation of the narrative that now unfolds. For an example of one extreme, I will quote some lines from CB (p. 286):

Jacob is an Arab tribe wandering in Canaan; through a quarrel with Edom, Jacob migrated to the neighbourhood of Haran, and formed a federation with the Aramaean clans of Rachel, Bilhah, Leah, and Zilpah. The fusion of Rachel and Jacob was so close as to constitute a new tribe Joseph, the name Jacob being transferred to the federation.The other federated clans in time became divided up into new clans, or in some instances fresh clans joined the federation, and were reckoned as sub-clans of one of the four main groups.

In all fairness, CB only presents this as what "is sometimes supposed to have been" the meaning, and immediately goes on to say:

But whatever tribal history mat be involved in these chapters is now set in the framework of a personal story. Probably long before the Pentateuch was completed, the Jews read it as such; and we may follow their example...

With or without the layer of tribal interpretation, this is still the story of how a great dynasty began, and it all started at a well in northern Mesopotamia, where once upon a time...

29:1 wayyissa ya‛aqov raglaw wayyélekh
Literally, 'Jacob lifted his feet and went...', a turn of phrase not found elsewhere in the Bible but whose meaning is self-evident.

ártza v'ne qédem
'To the land of the sons of the East', 'to the easterners' country': east, that is, from Canaan, not the east of Mesopotamia.

29:2 sh'losha ‛edre tzon rov'tzim
'Three flocks of sheep lying...' The noun tzon is a collective meaning sheep (or other herd animals), which depending on context we might translate either as 'sheep' or 'flock'; but when talking about separate flocks, such as here, the noun referring to the individual group of animals is ‛éder. The verb r-b-tz means to lie down, of herd animals.

29:4 ff.
Here we are treated to a short dialogue presenting a sample of what might have been ordinary polite conversation with strangers in biblical times. In our own day we also ask strangers certain questions which purport to show polite interest without seeming overly impertinent. Here Jacob's questions are: me'áyin attem 'Where are you from?', hay'da‛tem X 'Do you know X?' and hashalom lo? 'Is he (i.e. X) well?', followed by a question about why his interlocutors are at that place. The shepherds reply with brief but informative answers: We are from Haran, We know X, He is fine (and look, that's his daughter coming this way), and an explanation of why that need to wait there, which makes Jacob a participant of sorts in the social situation.

29:14 xódesh yamim
Lit. 'a month of days'; this is a BH expression, which apparently takes xódesh 'month' (related to xadash 'new' via the notion of 'new moon') as a measure word.

29:17 w'‛ene le'a rakkot
Translators and commentators alike disagree on the meaning in context of rakh 'tender, frail weak, sensitive, delicate, timid...' (CHALOT): KJV and EAS say 'tender (eyed)' , ESV and JPS have 'weak', and EF suggests 'delicate', so which is it? I don't think we know! Speiser comments: "Not necessarily 'weak', for the basic sense of Heb. rak is 'dainty, delicate'... What the narrative appears to be saying is that Leah had lovely eyes, but Rachel was an outstanding beauty." The popular tradition, however, seemingly has it that Rachel and Leah are the pretty and the ugly sister, respectively.