30:25–28 As noted earlier, it is “as soon as” (Hb. kaʾasher) Rachel bears her first son that Jacob’s mind turns to returning to his homeland. This is very revealing of Jacob’s thoughts about the way in which God’s promise to him of a land and offspring (Gen. 28:13–15) would be fulfilled. First, he knows that the land in question will be the land of Canaan, which the Lord promised to Abraham (“my own home and country”; 30:25).402 Even after Jacob has lived there for fourteen years and married into Laban’s family, Paddan-aram is not home. Jacob is merely a sojourner there (cf. 32:4).

Second, Jacob clearly anticipates that his offspring will be numbered through Joseph and not through his other sons, in the same way that the blessing descended from Abraham to Isaac and from Isaac to himself—thus excluding Ishmael and Esau. He has not yet grasped the significance of his father’s blessing, which prayed that he would become a “company [or “assembly”] of peoples” (qahal ʿammim; 28:3)—which finds its fulfillment in the inclusion of all twelve of his sons in the line of promise. Indeed, the seed of promise descends from Jacob not through Joseph but through Judah, one of unloved Leah’s sons.

The way in which Jacob makes his request of Laban highlights the power dynamics at play. Jacob asks in very formal terms to be dismissed from Laban’s service and sent home (cf. 1 Kings 11:21). He uses the word “serve” or “service” twice, identifying his wife and children as the wages he has earned over the previous fourteen years. Laban holds all the power, and he is eager not to let Jacob slip away so easily. His language to Jacob is equally formal and surprisingly deferential (“If I have found favor in your sight”;403 Gen. 30:27; cf. 50:4), and he acknowledges that the Lord has blessed him because of Jacob (30:27). Yet Laban’s language is rarely straightforward; though he uses the Lord’s name as the source of his blessing, he also attributed his insight to divination (nakhash; v. 27),404 a practice forbidden to Israel (Lev. 19:26). This by itself should leave the reader uneasy. Is Laban taking the Lord’s name in vain? Moreover, when did this supposed act of divination take place? If Laban had divined this truth earlier, why is he only mentioning it now—and why had he not sought to compensate Jacob better earlier? It is plausible that Laban is simply fabricating this insight in a bid to retain Jacob’s services. Nothing he says can be trusted.

The normal expectation is that an indentured servant who has completed his full contract faithfully, as Jacob has, might expect some additional compensation and not simply be turned away with nothing (“empty handed”; cf. Deut. 15:13–14; Jacob uses the same language in Gen. 31:38–42).405 But here Laban offers nothing to Jacob except the invitation to stay with him for a further period of time. “Name your wages, and I will give it” (30:28) sounds like the height of generosity, but, as Jacob knows only too well, Laban is not to be trusted when it comes to making deals (cf. 29:15).

30:29–34 In his response to Laban Jacob stresses the second-person pronoun, “You yourself know,”406 in such a way as to suggest that he thinks that divination ought hardly to have been necessary for Laban to discern Jacob’s value. Common sense should have told Laban that Jacob was more than worthy of his keep, yet he is also careful to attribute the benefit to the Lord’s presence, not merely his own hard work. Nevertheless, beyond his two wives and their children Jacob has gained nothing personally out of his Herculean labors in caring for Laban’s livestock. When will he get a chance to look after his own family interests (Hb. bethi, “my own household”; 30:30)?407

Laban then reiterates his earlier offer: “What shall I give you?” (v. 31). Perhaps mindful of Laban’s last “gift” to him (Leah instead of Rachel), Jacob responds sharply: “You shall not give me anything” (v. 31). Rather, he prefers to be able to keep a portion of the increase of the flock in return for his shepherding duties—wages rather than a “gift” (v. 33). Jacob has clearly thought through the possibility of this kind of offer ahead of time. His proposal to Laban is straightforward enough in its broad outlines, if also difficult enough to unravel in all its details, keeping generations of commentators arguing. In essence Jacob requests all the unusually colored animals in the flock—the black sheep and speckled and spotted sheep and goats,408 which would naturally be a small proportion of the whole—while Laban can have the rest. This looks like an eminently fair deal; statistically speaking, a roughly consistent percentage of the flock would have these characteristics and thus belong to Jacob. If the flock gets bigger, both will benefit. If it gets smaller, both will suffer. The different coloration will make it easy to divide the flock and identify each man’s share without dispute or argument. Any subsequent inspection can vindicate Jacob’s “honesty” (tsidqati; Hb. “my righteousness”; v. 33).

Jacob may be offering the contract in good faith, but Laban’s eagerness to seal the deal should raise his suspicions. Laban begins his response with two particles, hen and lu, expressing his eagerness to “let it be as you have said” (v. 34). Unfortunately for Jacob, Laban has no intention of keeping his own word. He has his own idea of how to ensure that, once again, Jacob will end up serving him for nothing.

30:35–43 Laban puts his nefarious plan into action immediately, removing all animals from his flocks that fit the description Jacob has specified and putting them in a separate flock watched over by his sons (v. 35).409 In this way he will rob Jacob not only of his present share of the flock but the likelihood of any significant future share, since it is basic biology that striped and spotted animals are more likely to have offspring with matching coloration than solid-colored animals. He puts his sons’ flocks at three days’ distance from the main flock so that there can be no possibility of accidental interbreeding.410 It seems he has thought of everything, and Jacob will be outwitted yet again.

Jacob is not so easily defeated, however. He responds with a complex strategy of his own involving strange practices with branches and selective breeding (30:37–42). The idea behind this is the ancient one that a mother’s experiences during pregnancy could have an imprint on the baby.411 So exposing a mother to a constant vision of striped or blotched materials might increase the likelihood of her having striped or blotched offspring. Some older commentators claimed a scientific method behind all this,412 or that God revealed the process to Jacob in a dream.413 However, this is based on a misreading of Genesis 31:8–12. Nowhere in that passage does it refer to Jacob’s strategy with the branches; rather, what Jacob sees in his dream is that all the goats mating with his flock are speckled or multicolored.414 In other words, the Lord ensures the increase of his flock, a process that has nothing to do with anything Jacob does involving superstitious breeding techniques!

As with the mandrakes in the previous passage, there is more superstition than science behind Jacob’s ploy.415 Jacob neither prays nor requests help from God; he believes he can defeat Laban through his own cleverness. It is not until the Lord sends him the dream that he relates in the following chapter how he has come to see that every blessing is from the Lord, not from his own ingenuity. One way or another, however, the outcome of the scheming and counter-scheming is that Jacob grows rich at Laban’s expense. Thanks to God’s intervention on Jacob’s behalf—which becomes explicit in the following chapter but ought to have been expected by all parties based on their earlier interchange (cf. 30:27, 30)—Laban has been outmaneuvered at his own game. The two things that attracted Jacob’s attention when he first arrived in Paddan-aram twenty years earlier, Rachel and the flocks, have after a long and convoluted struggle finally become his.

Jacob’s wealth is not limited to sheep or goats. The final verse of the chapter summarizes Jacob’s situation, linking his prosperity to that of his father and, especially, his grandfather, including servants and maidservants, camels and donkeys (30:43; cf. 12:16; 24:35; 26:13).416 He now “increased greatly,” just as anticipated in God’s blessing in 28:14. The blessing that Laban experienced from the Lord earlier for his sake (cf. 30:30) has been transferred to Jacob: Laban now decreases so that Jacob might increase.