Laban

Now Rebekah had a brother named Laban, and he rushed out to the man at the spring.

Laban and Bethuel answered, “This is from the LORD; we have no choice in the matter.

and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan-aram and the sister of Laban the Aramean.

So now, my son, obey my voice and flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran.

“Go at once to Paddan-aram, to the house of your mother’s father Bethuel, and take a wife from among the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother.

So Isaac sent Jacob to Paddan-aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah, who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.

“Do you know Laban the grandson of Nahor?” Jacob asked. “We know him,” they replied.

As soon as Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of his mother’s brother Laban, with Laban’s sheep, he went up and rolled the stone away from the mouth of the well and watered his uncle’s sheep.

When Laban heard the news about his sister’s son Jacob, he ran out to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his home, where Jacob told him all that had happened.

Then Laban declared, “You are indeed my own flesh and blood.” After Jacob had stayed with him a month,

Laban said to him, “Just because you are my relative, should you work for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.”

Now Laban had two daughters; the older was named Leah, and the younger was named Rachel.

Laban replied, “Better that I give her to you than to another. Stay here with me.”

Finally Jacob said to Laban, “Grant me my wife, for my time is complete, and I want to sleep with her.”

So Laban invited all the men of that place and prepared a feast.

And Laban gave his servant girl Zilpah to his daughter Leah as her maidservant.

When morning came, there was Leah! “What have you done to me?” Jacob said to Laban. “Wasn’t it for Rachel that I served you? Why have you deceived me?”

Laban replied, “It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older.

Laban also gave his servant girl Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her maidservant.

Now after Rachel had given birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me on my way so I can return to my homeland.

But Laban replied, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please stay. I have learned by divination that the LORD has blessed me because of you.”

“Agreed,” said Laban. “Let it be as you have said.”

Then he put a three-day journey between himself and Jacob, while Jacob was shepherding the rest of Laban’s flocks.

Jacob set apart the young, but made the rest face the streaked dark-colored sheep in Laban’s flocks. Then he set his own stock apart and did not put them with Laban’s animals.

But if the animals were weak, he did not set out the branches. So the weaker animals went to Laban and the stronger ones to Jacob.