Genesis 30 :: Amplified Bible (AMP)

The Sons of Jacob

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

Gen 30:2

Gen 30:2Then Jacob became furious with Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, who has denied you children?”

Gen 30:3

Gen 30:3She said, “Here, take my maid Bilhah and go in to her; and [when the baby comes] she shall [fn]deliver it [while sitting] on my knees, so that by her I may also have children [to count as my own].”

Gen 30:4

Gen 30:4So she gave him Bilhah her maid as a [[fn]secondary] wife, and Jacob went in to her.

Gen 30:5

Gen 30:5Bilhah conceived and gave birth to a son for Jacob.

Gen 30:6

Gen 30:6Then Rachel said, “God has judged and vindicated me, and has heard my plea and has given me a son [through my maid].” So she named him Dan (He judged).

Gen 30:7

Gen 30:7Bilhah, Rachel’s maid, conceived again and gave birth to a second son for Jacob.

Gen 30:8

Gen 30:8So Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings [in prayer to God] I have struggled with my sister and have prevailed.” So she named him Naphtali (my wrestlings).

Gen 30:9

When Leah saw that she had stopped bearing [children], she took Zilpah her maid and gave her to Jacob as a [[fn]secondary] wife.

Gen 30:10

Gen 30:10Zilpah, Leah’s maid, gave birth to a son for Jacob.

Gen 30:11

Gen 30:11Then Leah said, “How fortunate!” So she named him Gad (good fortune).

Gen 30:12

Gen 30:12Zilpah, Leah’s maid, gave birth to a second son for Jacob.

Gen 30:13

Gen 30:13Then Leah said, “I am happy! For women will call me happy.” So she named him Asher (happy).

Gen 30:14

Now at the time of wheat harvest Reuben [the eldest child] went and found some [fn]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.”

Gen 30:15

Gen 30:15But Leah answered, “Is it a small thing that you have taken my husband? Would you take away my son’s mandrakes also?” So Rachel said, “Jacob shall sleep with you tonight in exchange for your son’s mandrakes.”

Gen 30:16

Gen 30:16When Jacob came in from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must sleep with me [tonight], for I have in fact hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he slept with her that night.

Gen 30:17

Gen 30:17God listened and answered [the prayer of] Leah, and she conceived and gave birth to a fifth son for Jacob.

Gen 30:18

Gen 30:18Then Leah said, “God has given me my reward because I have given my maid to my husband.” So she named him [fn]Issachar.

Gen 30:19

Gen 30:19Leah conceived again and gave birth to a sixth son for Jacob.

Gen 30:20

Gen 30:20Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good [marriage] gift [for my husband]; now he will live with me [regarding me with honor as his wife], because I have given birth to six sons.” So she named him [fn]Zebulun.

Gen 30:21

Gen 30:21Afterward she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah.

Gen 30:22

Then God remembered [the prayers of] Rachel, and God thought of her and opened her womb [so that she would conceive].

Gen 30:23

Gen 30:23So she conceived and gave birth to a son; and she said, “God has taken away my disgrace and humiliation.”

Gen 30:24

Gen 30:24She named him Joseph (may He add) and said, “May the LORD add to me another son.”

Jacob Prospers

Gen 30:25

Now when Rachel had given birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go back to my own place and to my own country.

Gen 30:26

Gen 30:26“Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, and let me go; for you know the work which I have done for you.”

Gen 30:27

Gen 30:27But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your sight, stay with me; for I have learned [from the omens in divination and by experience] that the LORD has blessed me because of you.”

Gen 30:28

Gen 30:28He said, “Name your wages, and I will give it [to you].”

Gen 30:29

Gen 30:29Jacob answered him, “You know how I have served you and how your possessions, your cattle and sheep and goats, have fared with me.

Gen 30:30

Gen 30:30“For you had little before I came and it has increased and multiplied abundantly, and the LORD has favored you with blessings wherever I turned. But now, when shall I provide for my own household?”

Gen 30:31

Gen 30:31Laban asked, “What shall I give you?” Jacob replied, “You shall not give me anything. But if you will do this one thing for me [which I now propose], I will again pasture and keep your flock:

Gen 30:32

Gen 30:32Let me pass through your entire flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep and every dark or black one among the lambs and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and those shall be my wages.

Gen 30:33

Gen 30:33“So my honesty will be evident for me later, when you come [for an accounting] concerning my wages. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats and dark among the young lambs, if found with me, shall be considered stolen.”

Gen 30:34

Gen 30:34And Laban said, “Good! Let it be done as you say.”

Gen 30:35

Gen 30:35So on that same day Laban [secretly] removed the male goats that were streaked and spotted and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one with white on it, and all the dark ones among the sheep, and put them in the care of his sons.

Gen 30:36

Gen 30:36And he put [a distance of] three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob was then left in care of the rest of Laban’s flock.

Gen 30:37

Then Jacob took branches of fresh poplar and almond and plane trees, and peeled white stripes in them, exposing the white in the branches.

Gen 30:38

Gen 30:38Then he set the branches which he had peeled in front of the flocks in the watering troughs, where the flocks came to drink; and they mated and conceived when they came to drink.

Gen 30:39

Gen 30:39So the flocks mated and conceived by the branches, and the flocks [fn]gave birth to streaked, speckled, and spotted offspring.

Gen 30:40

Gen 30:40Jacob separated the lambs, and [as he had done with the peeled branches] he made the flocks face toward the streaked and all the dark or black in the [new] flock of Laban; and he put his own herds apart by themselves and did not put them [where they could breed] with Laban’s flock.

Gen 30:41

Gen 30:41Furthermore, whenever the stronger [animals] of the flocks were breeding, Jacob would place the branches in the sight of the flock in the watering troughs, so that they would mate and conceive among the branches;

Gen 30:42

Gen 30:42but when the flock was sickly, he did not put the branches there; so the sicker [animals] were Laban’s and the stronger Jacob’s.

Gen 30:43

Gen 30:43So Jacob became exceedingly prosperous, and had large flocks [of sheep and goats], and female and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

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AMP Footnotes

(30:3)

This ritual symbolized that the wife was providing the child for her husband through a surrogate mother.

(30:4)

I.e. concubine (see note 22:24).

(30:9)

I.e. concubine (see note 22:24).

(30:14)

A narcotic plant thought by ancient peoples to be an aphrodisiac or cure for infertility.

(30:18)

Related to Hebrew for “reward.”

(30:20)

Possibly related to Hebrew for “home” or “elevated place.”

(30:39)

The success of Jacob’s action was undoubtedly the answer to an unrecorded prayer. Later (31:7-12), Jacob gives God the credit for what happened, citing a special dream that he had from God.

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