Rachel and Leah (Women of Genesis) (17 page)

“I don’t know,” said Laban. “Leah could never see well enough to spin yarn.”

“But that’s a different task, drawing the fleece, using the distaff. You can keep your eyes much closer to the book. It holds steady. And the ink is black on the white of the papyrus. Will you let me try?”

“Not if it makes her tired. She’s fragile, and must be taken care of.”

Again, Rachel felt Leah flinch. Silly girl, she wanted it both ways—to be coddled, but to have everyone treat her as if she were as useful as a regular person.

“She’s a beautiful girl—quiet, not wild like that young lioness beside her.”

“Yes, both my daughters look like their mother, thank the Lord.”

But Father used the word
ba’al
for “the Lord,” and now it was Jacob’s turn to stiffen. “My father and mother taught me
never to call the Lord by that name.” Jacob used the word
Adonai
for “Lord.”

“What does it matter?” said Father. “Neither one is his right name.”

“But Ba’al is the name that is used by false priests to oppress the people and keep them in ignorance of the true and living God.”

“Then with my friend and brother I will never say ‘Ba’al.’ Except when I need to say what word it is that I’m not saying!”

Father and Jacob both laughed at this.

“Well, I’ve met your daughters and I’ve met your sons,” said Jacob. “They’re all fine adornments to their father’s house.”

Laban laughed with some bitterness. “How kindly you put it. Adornments, yes, that’s what my older sons are. Adornments. Which of them can take my place in this camp when I die? Here you are, the greatest guest this camp has ever known, and I could hardly get them to come home when you arrived, and now they’re off doing some useless thing, wasting their time and, no doubt, their inheritance. Oh, I’m proud of those boys.”

Rachel was stunned to hear Father speak so plainly about Nahor and Terah. While every word of what he said was true, Rachel had not known till now that Father knew it.

“I tell you, sometimes I’m tempted to give my flocks and herds to a son-in-law. A stranger would be better trusted with my household than my own sons!”

“You say this in frustration with them,” said Jacob. “But they’re young, and young men get older and learn wisdom. And your youngest son, Choraz, may be the wisest of all
when he comes home from the house of Kedar. Be patient. Don’t even think of disinheriting them. Your daughters should go to a man who loves them for themselves, not to one who thinks that by marrying them, he’ll inherit all that you have.”

Laban grinned at Jacob. “Well said, loyally spoken. My sons have nothing to fear from you, is that it? No danger that you’ll take their place? But what do
I
do about the fact that you own nothing and see no prospect of getting any part of your father’s household? If you don’t aspire to my fortune, and have none of your own, how do you plan to support a wife, and why would a loving father sentence one of his daughters to a life of want?”

“Perhaps you should measure me, not by what another man will give me—even my father—but by what I can earn with my own labor.”

“And what can you earn?”

“Let me serve with you under a seven-year bond. What value would you place on such service?”

“You? A prince in the service of the Lord? Become a bondservant to me, your uncle?”

“For a fixed term of years. But you would pay me no wage. Instead, I set a much higher value on my own service than mere money or possessions. The price of my seven years of service will be your daughter Rachel.”

“But you’ll still be a poor man, dependent upon others.”

“But you’ll be a richer one, having had my service all those years, and at no cost, for you will have given me what God gave to you and your wife for love alone.”

“How will you support her?”

“If my labor for seven years is worth a daughter, what do
you think I will be able to earn after that, when I work for hire?”

“I’ve seen your labor,” said Father. “The value is high. But the price you ask of me is higher yet. As you said, my daughters are gifts to me, from God and from my wife. And yet they are not mine the way that flocks and herds are mine. They belong to themselves more than to me, and to God more than to themselves.” He turned to Rachel and spoke her name. “If this man serves me as a bondsman for seven years, obeying my commands and faithfully working to make my house greater, will you then consent to marry him?”

No discussion with a suitor had ever gone this far, or even close to it. Yet even without prior experience, Rachel knew that this was the telling moment. Father would not have put the question to her if his own answer was not yes, and he would have put the question privately if he had thought her answer might be no.

It was now that she would be giving her own oath, and binding herself as surely as Jacob was offering to bind himself to Laban. But Jacob’s bondage would be only seven years, and hers would be for the rest of her life. His would involve labor, but hers would require the mysterious sharing of wife and husband, the bearing of babies, the passage into the borderlands of death to bring new life into the world.

Suddenly Leah’s voice broke the silence. “Would she marry him at the beginning or the end of his seven years?”

Father looked at her in surprise, but since it was a sensible question, he did not rebuke her. Instead he looked at Jacob. “Of course the end of the seven years. She’s far too young right now.”

“I can wait seven years,” said Jacob. “Every hour of service
will be a happy one, knowing that I’m an hour closer to earning the right to be her husband.”

Rachel felt the words as if they rushed like a blush into her face. In all their conversations, he had never spoken like that to her. Words of love—this was nothing like the bantering and bragging of the boys and men of the camp as they spoke to—or, worse, about—girls.

“I will also wait the seven years,” said Rachel. “And at the end of that time, when you are free again, I will freely marry you.”

She felt Leah’s hand stroke her back. Comfort from her sister? But why should she need comfort? She had just promised her future to this man, but he was a good man, a prince that God had brought to her, first in dreams, and then in body. How could she not rejoice, to know she had set her feet upon God’s path for her?

Yet if she did not need her sister’s comfort, why was she crying, and why did her legs tremble as if they were cold? Why was her heart mourning the loss of her girlhood and the ending of her carefree days among the lambs and sheep, out in the sunlight and the rain? Why did she feel that her whole life now had closed behind her, and the future was strange and frightening? She should be feeling nothing but pure joy.

“Leah,” said Father, “your sister trembles with joy, as you will tremble someday when you accept betrothal to a good man.”

Rachel felt Leah’s hand withdraw from her. Why did she have to take offense? Father was only reassuring her that Rachel would not shame her by marrying first. Why shouldn’t he? Why did she always take it as an insult?

“Father,” said Leah, “shouldn’t Rachel remain to hear her
future husband swear his bond to you? At present she isn’t sworn to any man, because Jacob remains unsworn to you.”

Jacob laughed pleasantly. “And this from a girl who has never heard priests arguing the fine points of scripture.”

“You’re right, Leah,” said Father. “Jacob, kneel before me, my brother, and become my son.”

Rachel knew, of course, that what Jacob was becoming was not a son at all, but a slave. For a fixed term of years, yes, and with the promise of becoming a son-in-law when the time was done. But not a son. Yet those were the words. So many untrue things were part of such bargains, yet it seemed as if everyone agreed that if some parts of a covenant were lies, that was all right, but if other parts were lies, a man could be killed for it. Why not just tell the truth to everyone all the time? Why all the posing? Why did Leah have to be brought in to this presentation, when everyone knew it was for Rachel that Jacob was going to make his bargain? There was a pretense of trying to assuage Leah’s feelings, but it only hurt her more; yet Leah pretended not to be hurt, at least in front of company, and Father pretended to believe that a husband just as good as Jacob would be found for her, even though everyone knew that there
was
no husband just as good to be had in all the world.

Jacob knelt and put his right hand on the inside of Father’s thigh. Each swore an oath to the other. Jacob swore to be Laban’s true and obedient servant for seven years, to labor for him and fight for him in battle, on the promise of Rachel’s hand in marriage at the end of those years.

And Laban answered, “Rachel my daughter will be your wife when your seven years of service are complete, and
during your service I will be your good master, providing for your wants and governing you wisely.”

But
my
oath was given first, thought Rachel. Without my oath, there would be nothing between these men. As surely as if I stood between them, it was for love of me that this prince has humbled himself before my father.

It filled her with a rush of some heady emotion that she could not name. She was not trembling now. She felt light-footed, as if she could dance from the room, or float like a tuft of lambswool in a breeze.

“Can we go now, Father?” asked Leah.

Father looked at Rachel. “Come here, little one,” he said.

Rachel went to him.

“Give me your hand,” said Father.

She gave it to him.

“I dreaded the day I would promise you to your husband,” he said. “I’m glad that seven years will pass before I give this hand to him. And I’m glad that when I do, I will be giving you to such a man as this. What man has ever married better?” Then he turned to Jacob. “Except perhaps your father Isaac, when he took my sister Rebekah for his wife.”

“I am content to have a marriage that is the equal of my father’s,” said Jacob. “What contest can there be between youth and age? Each age has its beauties and wisdoms, and its own kind of love. May God bless us to be old together, as well as to be together in our youth.”

“Amen!” cried Father.

“Amen,” whispered Rachel.

Then Leah took her by the arm and led her kindly from the tent.

Outside, some of the women were gathered, openly
weeping and smiling, eager to hug Rachel and pat her and tell her how lucky and blessed she was and what a fine man she was getting. Even Reuel had tears in his eyes, Rachel saw.

Leah stood back apart from them all, not looking.

A hand gripped Rachel’s arm tightly. Startled—because the older women had been so affectionate—she turned to find Zilpah holding her. “So it’s done?” asked the girl.

Rachel nodded, wondering why Zilpah looked so fiercely happy about it. What was this to her? Why should she care?

“Let me be your servant when you marry him,” said Zilpah.

Rachel shook her head. “That’s not mine to promise,” she said. “You don’t belong to me.”

“Your father will give you whomever you ask for,” said Zilpah.

“But that will be seven years from now. You’ll be married by then, with three fat babies.”

“No I won’t,” said Zilpah.

Rachel couldn’t help looking at the way the older girl was dressed, the way her body’s curves cried out for men to notice her, her bright eyes and full lips and smooth and slithering hair as showy as the brightest fruit on a gray-green tree.

“Yes you will,” said Rachel. “Or the boys in this camp will all run mad and marry sheep.”

Zilpah laughed and winked, as if somehow in the past few minutes they had become great friends. Then she backed away and disappeared around the outside of the tent.

One of the old women leaned close. “Stay away from that one. Low born and low bred, there’s a stain in her very breath, you can be sure.”

That seemed unfair to Rachel. Zilpah couldn’t help being
born fatherless. The things Rachel didn’t like about Zilpah were those she chose herself—how she dressed, how she carried herself, and that grasping hand that had gripped Rachel’s arm as tightly as someone falling from a cliff might hold to the one sapling that might save him.

Rachel smiled politely to the older women. “Thank you, it
is
a happy day. Thank you. Seven years is a long time, I’m still just a girl, but yes I’m glad.”

Finally Reuel intervened. “Let the girl be. Her life has been decided tonight. Let her have some time by herself, or with her sister.”

Please not with my sister. Let me not have to worry about what Leah’s feeling.

And when she looked around, Rachel realized that her prayer had been granted before it was even thought of—Leah was not there. Leah had gone off by herself.

Reuel walked silently beside her to her tent and held the flap open for her. “Sleep in peace, little one,” said Reuel. “If your father were not so rich and important, you wouldn’t have had to think of things like this until you were old enough to want them.”

“But I do want them,” said Rachel.

Reuel smiled and shrugged. “Only because you don’t yet understand what they are.”

Annoyed, Rachel turned her back on him and went inside. What did he think she didn’t understand? She knew all about marriage, all about men and women. She knew that men didn’t butt heads together the way rams did, and the winner got the ewes. But then, wasn’t the bargain between Father and Jacob just the human equivalent? I have the girl, you want her,
let’s see who has the bigger, stronger set of horns, and the thicker head.