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Genesis 30

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1 And when Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister, and said to Jacob, Give me children, or else I die.

2 And Jacob's anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, Am I in God's stead, who has withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?

3 And she said, Behold, there is my maid, Bilhah: go in to her, in order that she may bear on my knees, and I may also be built up by her.

4 And she gave him Bilhah her maidservant as wife, and Jacob went in to her.

5 And Bilhah conceived, and bore Jacob a son.

6 And Rachel said, God has done me justice, and has also heard my voice, and given me a son; therefore she called his name Dan.

7 And Bilhah Rachel's maidservant again conceived, and bore Jacob a second son.

8 And Rachel said, Wrestlings of God have I wrestled with my sister, and have prevailed; and she called his name Naphtali.

9 And when Leah saw that she had ceased to bear, she took Zilpah her maidservant and gave her to Jacob as wife.

10 And Zilpah Leah's maidservant bore Jacob a son.

11 And Leah said, Fortunately! and she called his name Gad.

12 And Zilpah Leah's maidservant bore Jacob a second son.

13 And Leah said, Happy am I; for the daughters will call me blessed! and she called his name Asher.

14 And Reuben went out in the days of wheat-harvest, and found mandrakes in the fields; and he brought them to his mother Leah. And Rachel said to Leah, Give me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes.

15 And she said to her, Is it [too] little that thou hast taken my husband, that thou wilt take my son's mandrakes also? And Rachel said, Therefore he shall lie with thee to-night for thy son's mandrakes.

16 And when Jacob came from the fields in the evening, Leah went out to meet him, and said, Thou must come in to me, for indeed I have hired thee with my son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night.

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

18 And Leah said, God has given me my hire, because I have given my maidservant to my husband; and she called his name Issachar.

19 And Leah again conceived, and bore Jacob a sixth son;

20 and Leah said, God has endowed me with a good dowry; this time will my husband dwell with me, because I have borne him six sons. And she called his name Zebulun.

21 And afterwards she bore a daughter, and called her name Dinah.

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

23 And she conceived, and bore a son, and said, God has taken away my reproach.

24 And she called his name Joseph; and said, Jehovah will add to me another son.

25 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 country.

26 Give [me] my wives for whom I have served thee, and my children; that I may go away, for thou knowest my service which I have served thee.

27 And Laban said to him, I pray thee, if I have found favour in thine eyes -- I have discovered that Jehovah has blessed me for thy sake.

28 And he said, Appoint to me thy wages, and I will give it.

29 And he said to him, Thou knowest how I have served thee, and what thy cattle has become with me.

30 For it was little that thou hadst before me, and it is increased to a multitude, and Jehovah has blessed thee from the time I came; and now, when shall I also provide for my house?

31 And he said, What shall I give thee? And Jacob said, Thou shalt not give me anything. If thou doest this for me, I will again feed [and] keep thy flock:

32 I will pass through all thy flock to-day, to remove thence all the speckled and spotted sheep, and all the brown lambs, and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and [that] shall be my hire.

33 And my righteousness shall answer for me hereafter, when thou comest about my hire, before thy face: all that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the lambs, let that be stolen with me.

34 And Laban said, Well, let it be according to thy word.

35 And he removed that day the he-goats that were ringstraked and spotted, and all the she-goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white in it, and all the brown among the lambs, and gave [them] into the hand of his sons.

36 And he put three days' journey between himself and Jacob. And Jacob fed the rest of Laban's flock.

37 And Jacob took fresh rods of white poplar, almond-tree, and maple; and peeled off white stripes in them, uncovering the white which was on the rods.

38 And he set the rods which he had peeled before the flock, in the troughs at the watering-places where the flock came to drink, and they were ardent when they came to drink.

39 And the flock was ardent before the rods; and the flock brought forth ringstraked, speckled, and spotted.

40 And Jacob separated the lambs, and set the faces of the flock toward the ringstraked, and all the brown in the flock of Laban; and he made himself separate flocks, and did not put them with Laban's flock.

41 And it came to pass whensoever the strong cattle were ardent, that Jacob laid the rods before the eyes of the flock in the gutters, that they might become ardent among the rods;

42 but when the sheep were feeble, he put [them] not in; so the feeble were Laban's, and the strong Jacob's.

43 And the man increased very, very much, and had much cattle, and bondwomen, and bondmen, and camels, and asses.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 3951

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3951. 'For I have surely hired you with my son's dudaim' means that this had accordingly been seen to and agreed beforehand. This is clear from the meaning of 'surely hiring' as an agreement, as well as its being evident from what is said prior to this. The reason why it had been seen to beforehand is that the joining of truth to good or of good to truth in a person is something seen to beforehand, that is, seen to by the Lord in His providence. For at present the subject is the joining of good to truth and of truth to good, and so the subject is the good which is made a person's own. Indeed good is not good with anyone until it has been joined to truth. And since all good comes from the Lord, that is, all good is made a person's own through the joining of that good to truth, the expression 'seen to beforehand' is used here. The Lord's providence is concerned first and foremost with that joining together of the two. It is good and truth thus joined together that makes a person human and marks him off from animals, making him a human being insofar as he accepts that providence, that is, insofar as he allows the Lord to achieve the objective. This therefore is the good that exists with a person. No other kind of good exists which is spiritual and lasts for ever.

[2] Furthermore, forms of good with the external man, which are the delights of life while a person lives in the world, are truly good only in the measure that they hold that spiritual good within them. Take for example the good served by riches. In the measure that riches hold spiritual good within them, that is, in the measure that a person regards the good of his neighbour, the good of his country or the public good, and the good of the Church, as the end in view to be served by riches, they are truly good. But people who come to the conclusion that the spiritual good spoken of here and material opulence do not go together, one within the other, and who therefore become convinced that to make room for heaven they must renounce riches, are much mistaken. For if they renounce them or divest themselves of them they are not then in a position to do good to anyone and they themselves cannot live in the world in anything but misery. Thus they are not able any longer to have the good of their neighbour and the good of their country, or even the good of the Church, as their end in view, only their own salvation and their becoming greater than others in heaven. What is more, when they renounce worldly possessions they also throw themselves open to contempt, which makes them of little value in the sight of others and therefore useless for rendering service and the performing of duties. But when they do have the good of their neighbour, country, and Church as their end in view, they also have as their end in view, or the means to it, the conditions in which they will be able to attain that end.

[3] It is exactly the same with a person's food, for the end in view with food is that he may have a healthy mind in a healthy body. If someone deprives the body of its food he also deprives himself of the conditions necessary for the attainment of that end. Consequently no one who is a spiritual man despises food or its pleasures. He does not however regard it as an end in itself but the means to an end. From this as an example one can work out the situation with all other forms of such good.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.