Genesis 30:25-43
The Voice
25-26 After Rachel had given birth to Joseph, Jacob asked Laban for release.
Jacob: It’s time for me to return home, to my own people and country. Please release me with my wives and my children. I have worked for you a long time to obtain them, and you know how well I have served you.
Laban: 27 If you look upon me with favor, please stay here. You are a good omen. The Eternal One has blessed me because of you. 28 Name your price, and I will give it to you.
Jacob: 29 You know how well I have served you. You have seen your livestock flourish and your herds grow under my supervision. 30 You had little before I arrived, but your wealth has increased significantly since the Eternal One has blessed you in whatever I did for you. But now, when will it be time for me to provide for my own household?
Laban: 31 What do you want me to give you?
Jacob: I don’t want you to give me anything. I only ask for one favor. Do this for me, and I’ll keep on feeding and taking care of your flocks. 32 Let me go through the flock today and put aside for myself every speckled and spotted sheep and every black lamb, and also the spotted and speckled goats, and this is how you can pay me. 33 My honesty will be evident when you come to check on me. If you find one lamb or goat among my flocks that isn’t speckled, spotted, or black, then you may count it as stolen.
Laban: 34 Agreed. Do this exactly as you have said.
35 But that day, Laban secretly removed the male goats that were striped and spotted, all the female goats that were speckled and spotted—every one with any white on it at all—and every lamb that was black. He put them under the watch of his sons. 36 Then he set off with his sons and those mottled animals a three-day distance away from Jacob to make sure the flocks would stay separated. Meanwhile Jacob was pasturing the rest of Laban’s flock.
Jacob soon figures out what Laban has done. The deceiver has once again been deceived.
37 But Jacob cut some fresh branches of poplar, almond, and plane trees; and he striped off the bark in streaks exposing the white wood beneath. 38 He set the striped branches in front of the flocks in the troughs—the water troughs, that is—where they came to drink. Since they would mate when they came to drink, 39 the flocks mated in front of the branches and produced young that were striped, speckled, and spotted. 40 Jacob separated these newly born lambs from Laban’s flock, and when they mated again he faced Laban’s animals toward the striped and black animals. He kept his own droves separate from Laban’s. This is how he increased his own flock. 41 Whenever the stronger females of the flock were ready to mate, Jacob laid the striped branches in the troughs right in front of them, so that they would breed among them. 42 But when he saw the feebler animals ready to mate, he didn’t lay the rods out so that in the end, the feebler of the animals became Laban’s and the stronger became Jacob’s. 43 In this way, Jacob grew extremely rich, and he ended up with very large flocks, male and female slaves, and camels and donkeys too.
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