“Genesis 31:43-55”

Thursday, February 20, 2020

“Then Laban replied to Jacob, 'The daughters are my daughters, and the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine. But what can I do this day to these my daughters or to their children whom they have borne? So now come, let us make a covenant, you and I, and let it be a witness between you and me.' Then Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar. Jacob said to his kinsmen, 'Gather stones.' So they took stones and made a heap, and they ate there by the heap. Now Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed. Laban said, 'This heap is a witness between you and me this day.' Therefore it was named Galeed, and Mizpah, for he said, 'May the Lord watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other. If you mistreat my daughters, or if you take wives besides my daughters, although no man is with us, see, God is witness between you and me.' Laban said to Jacob, 'Behold this heap and behold the pillar which I have set between you and me. This heap is a witness, and the pillar is a witness, that I will not pass by this heap to you for harm, and you will not pass by this heap and this pillar to me, for harm. The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.' So Jacob swore by the fear of his father Isaac. Then Jacob offered a sacrifice on the mountain, and called his kinsmen to the meal; and they ate the meal and spent the night on the mountain. Early in the morning Laban arose, and kissed his sons and his daughters and blessed them. Then Laban departed and returned to his place.”

---End of Scripture verses---

“The daughters are my daughters, and the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine.” (verse 43) “Now publicly exposed as the scoundrel, Laban lamely tries to cover his loss of face with empty rhetoric that has no legal force behind it, only emotion. It is as though he is saying, 'All the same, were it not for me, you would still be a nobody possessing nothing. Besides, how could you think I might harm my own offspring.” (Nahum Sarna) Another way to look at “But what can I do this day to these my daughters or to their children whom they have borne?” is that Laban has finally realized that he is helpless to do a single thing about Jacob taking “his family” away from him.

“So now come, let us make a covenant, you and I, and let it be a witness between you and me.” (verse 44) “To show good faith, Laban now proposes that he and Jacob conclude a pact of mutual non-aggression. By so doing, he capitulates to reality. In legal terms, it means that he tacitly acknowledges Jacob as constituting a separate, independent social entity of equal status. This is reflected in the narrative in several ways: there are two stone markers, two meals, two place-names; the deity is twice invoked, and by two separate names. Moreover, the pact contains two provisions—one dealing with family matters, the other of a political nature. The first seeks to protect the interests of Laban's two daughters in a foreign land, the second delineates the boundary between the two ethnic groups.” (Nahum Sarna)

“Now Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed.” (verse 47) “Each party uses his native language, indicating the broader interethnic implications, an accommodation between the Hebrews and the Arameans.” (Nahum Sarna) “Jegar-sahadutha.—These are two Syriac words of the same meaning as Gal-’eed, Heap of Witness. A Syriac (or Aramaic) dialect was most probably the ordinary language of the people in Mesopotamia, but it seems plain that Laban and his family also spoke Hebrew, not merely from his calling the place Mizpah, a Hebrew word, but from the names given by his daughters to their children.” (Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers)

“And Mizpah, for he said, 'May the Lord watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other.” (verse 49) The word “Mitzpah” means “Watchtower”. It appears to be a name of Laban's choosing, but if anyone needed to have his every move watched it was certainly Laban the lowdown liar! “What Laban meant by his statement was, 'May God watch you, when I can't!... This covenant arose out of mutual suspicion and sought protection not for the other but for themselves from the other's malice.'" (James Burton Coffman quoting Meredith G. Kline)

“ If you mistreat my daughters, or if you take wives besides my daughters, although no man is with us, see, God is witness between you and me.” (verse 50) It is obvious that Laban didn't approve of anyone abusing his beloved daughters besides himself! If only Laban had realized that the Lord had been watching every despicable move that he had ever made, what a different person he might have turned out to be, and what completely different tune the song of his life and the lives of his daughters would have produced!

“This heap is a witness, and the pillar is a witness, that I will not pass by this heap to you for harm, and you will not pass by this heap and this pillar to me, for harm.” (verse 52) “Objects of nature were frequently thus spoken of. But over and above, there was a solemn appeal to God; and it is observable that there was a marked difference in the religious sentiments of the two. Laban spake of the God of Abraham and Nahor, their common ancestors; but Jacob, knowing that idolatry had crept in among that branch of the family, swore by the 'fear of his father Isaac.'” (Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary) “It is evident that the covenant meant two different things to the participants. To Jacob, it was a victory; to Laban it was a face-saving device.” (James Burton Coffman)

Please read Genesis 32:1-8 for tomorrow.

Have a blessed day!

- Louie Taylor

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