Laban #35

Laban is the brother of Rebekah, the uncle of Jacob, and the father of Leah and Rachel. He lives in Haran in northern Mesopotamia, and his dealings with Jacob, recorded in Genesis 24 to 31, are among the most vivid family stories in the Bible.

Biblical Significance

Laban first appears when Abraham’s servant comes looking for a wife for Isaac. Seeing the jewelry Rebekah has been given, Laban hurries out to the well and welcomes the visitor into the house (Genesis 24:29-31). Years later, Jacob arrives in Haran after fleeing from his brother Esau, and Laban greets him warmly as “my bone and my flesh” (Genesis 29:1-14).

Jacob agrees to work seven years for Laban’s younger daughter Rachel. On the wedding night, Laban gives him Leah, the older daughter, instead, and justifies it by saying that the younger cannot be given before the firstborn. He then offers Rachel as well in return for another seven years of service (Genesis 29:15-30). The pattern of deceiver being deceived is hard to miss, since Jacob had earlier taken Esau’s blessing by trickery.

Over the following years, Jacob serves Laban for flocks, and Laban repeatedly changes his wages, a complaint Jacob later voices when he says that Laban “changed my wages ten times” (Genesis 30:25-43; 31:7). Jacob prospers all the same, and Laban’s sons begin to resent him. Jacob takes his wives, children, and livestock and slips away without warning (Genesis 31:1-21).

The Covenant at Gilead

Laban pursues Jacob for seven days and overtakes him in the hill country of Gilead. God warns Laban in a dream not to speak to Jacob “either good or bad” (Genesis 31:24). Laban accuses Jacob of stealing his household gods, which Rachel has in fact taken and hidden, and searches the camp without finding them (Genesis 31:25-35). After Jacob answers angrily, the two men set up a heap of stones and make a covenant, agreeing that neither will cross it to do harm. Laban says, “The LORD watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another” (Genesis 31:44-55). This phrase, called the Mizpah blessing, is often quoted, though its original setting was mutual suspicion and not affection.

Legacy

Laban is not mentioned again in the story, though Deuteronomy’s confession of Israel’s origin begins, “A Syrian ready to perish was my father,” which is usually taken as a reference to Jacob’s time in Laban’s household (Deuteronomy 26:5). He is often read as a figure of clever self-interest, while the account also shows how God protected and prospered Jacob despite that treatment.