The Koine Bible

And Rachel, seeing that she had not borne to Jacob, was envious of her sister, and Rachel said to Jacob, Give me children; and if not, I shall die.

And Jacob was angry with Rachel and said to her, Am I instead of God, who has deprived you of the fruit of the womb?

And Rachel said to Jacob, Behold, my maidservant Balla; go in to her, and she will bear on my knees, and I also shall be built up through her.

And she gave him Balla her maidservant to him as a wife, and Jacob went in to her.

And Balla, Rachel’s maidservant, conceived and bore a son to Jacob.

And Rachel said, God has judged me and has heard my voice and has given me a son; therefore she called his name Dan

And Balla, Rachel’s maidservant, conceived again and bore a second son to Jacob.

And Rachel said, God has contended with me, and I contended with my sister and I prevailed, and she called his name Naphtali.

And Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, and she took Zilpah her maidservant and gave her to Jacob as a wife.

And Jacob went in to her, and Zilpah, Leah’s maidservant, conceived and bore a son to Jacob.

And Leah said, By fortune, and she named his name Gad.

And Zilpah, Leah’s maidservant, conceived and bore to Jacob a second son.

And Leah said, Blessed am I, because the women call me blessed; and she called his name Asher

And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest and found mandrakes in the field and brought them to Leah his mother. And Rachel said to Leah, Give me of your son’s mandrakes.

And Leah said, Is it not enough for you that you have taken my husband? Will you also take my son’s mandrakes? And Rachel said, Not so; let him lie with you this night in exchange for your son’s mandrakes.

And Jacob came in from the field at evening, and Leah went out to meet him and said, You shall come in to me today, for I have hired you for the mandrakes of my son. And he lay with her that night.

And God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son.

And Leah said, God has given me my reward because I gave my maidservant to my husband; and she called his name Issachar, which is Reward.

And Leah conceived again and bore a sixth son to Jacob.

And Leah said, God has granted me a good gift at this present time; my husband will prefer me, for I have borne him six sons. And she called his name Zebulon.

And afterward she bore a daughter, and she called her name Dina.

And God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb.

And having conceived, she bore a son to Jacob, and Rachel said, God has taken away my reproach.

And she called his name Joseph, saying, God add to me another son.

And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said to Laban, Send me away, that I may go to my place and to my land.

Give me my wives and the children for whom I have served you, that I may go away; for you know the service with which I have served you

But Laban said to him, If I have found favor before you, I would have divined, for God has blessed me at your entrance.

Set your wages toward me, and I will give.

And Jacob said to him, You know what I have served you for, and how much your livestock was with me.

For the little that you had before me was increased into a multitude, and the Lord blessed you at my foot; now then, when shall I also make a house for myself?

And Laban said to him, What shall I give you? And Jacob said to him, You shall give me nothing, if you do this thing for me: I will pasture your sheep again and will keep them.

Let all your sheep pass through today, and set apart from there every brown sheep among the lambs and every speckled and white one among the goats; it shall be my wages.

And my righteousness will hear me on the morrow day, because my wages are before you; whatever is not speckled and spotted among the goats and brown among the lambs, it shall be stolen with me.

And Laban said to him, Let it be according to your word.

And on that day he separated the spotted goats and the white-spotted ones and all the spotted goats and the white-spotted ones and everything that was white among them and everything that was brown among the lambs, and he put them into the hand of his sons.

And he set a way of three days between them and between Jacob; and Jacob was pasturing the sheep of Laban that were left behind.

And Jacob took for himself a fresh storax rod and a walnut rod and a plane tree rod, and Jacob peeled them in white strips, stripping off the green; and the white appeared on the rods, which he had peeled, variegated.

And he set the rods which he had peeled in the troughs of the watering places of water, so that whenever the sheep should come to drink, they might be in front of the rods when they came to drink.

And the flocks conceived at the rods, and the flocks bore streaked, speckled, and grizzled ones.

But Jacob separated the lambs, and set before the sheep a white ram and every speckled one among the lambs, and he set apart for himself flocks by themselves, and he did not mix them with Laban’s sheep.

And it came to pass at the time when the sheep conceived, Jacob set the rods before the sheep in the troughs, so that they might conceive according to the rods

But whenever the sheep gave birth, he did not put them; and the unmarked ones became Laban’s, but the marked ones Jacob’s.

And the man prospered exceedingly exceedingly, and he came to have many livestock and oxen and male servants and female servants and camels and donkeys