Genesis 30 - Simple English

1When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister. She said to Jacob, "Give me children, or else I will die."

2Then Jacob became angry with Rachel. He said, "Am I in God's place? He is the one who has kept you from having children."

3She said, "Here is my servant Bilhah. Go in to her. She will give birth on my knees, so that I too may have children through her."

4So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife, and Jacob went in to her.

5Bilhah became pregnant and bore Jacob a son.

6Rachel said, "God has judged me. He has also heard my voice and has given me a son." So she named him Dan.

7Bilhah, Rachel's servant, became pregnant again and bore Jacob a second son.

8Rachel said, "I have wrestled great wrestlings with my sister, and I have won." So she named him Naphtali.

9When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.

10Zilpah, Leah's servant, bore Jacob a son.

11Leah said, "A troop is coming." So she named him Gad.

12Zilpah, Leah's servant, bore Jacob a second son.

13Leah said, "I am happy, for the daughters will call me blessed." So she named him Asher.

14During the wheat harvest Reuben went out and found mandrakes in the field, and he brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, "Please give me some of your son's mandrakes."

15She said to her, "Is it a small thing that you have taken my husband? Would you take my son's mandrakes too?" Rachel said, "Then he shall lie with you tonight in return for your son's mandrakes."

16In the evening Jacob came in from the field, and Leah went out to meet him. She said, "You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son's mandrakes." So he lay with her that night.

17God listened to Leah, and she became pregnant and bore Jacob a fifth son.

18Leah said, "God has given me my wages, because I gave my servant to my husband." So she named him Issachar.

19Leah became pregnant again and bore Jacob a sixth son.

20Leah said, "God has given me a good gift. Now my husband will live with me, because I have borne him six sons." So she named him Zebulun.

21Afterwards she bore a daughter, and named her Dinah.

22Then God remembered Rachel. God listened to her and opened her womb.

23She became pregnant and bore a son. She said, "God has taken away my shame."

24She named him Joseph, and said, "The LORD will add to me another son."

25After Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, "Send me away, so that I may go to my own place, and to my own country."

26"Give me my wives and my children, for whom I have served you, and let me go. You know the service I have done for you."

27Laban said to him, "Please, if I have found favour in your eyes, stay. I have learned by experience that the LORD has blessed me because of you."

28He said, "Name your wages, and I will give them."

29Jacob said to him, "You know how I have served you, and how your livestock has fared with me."

30"You had little before I came, and now it has grown into a great number. The LORD has blessed you since I came. But now, when shall I provide for my own house too?"

31He said, "What shall I give you?" Jacob said, "You shall not give me anything. If you will do this one thing for me, I will again feed and keep your flock."

32Let me go through all your flock today, taking out from it every speckled and spotted animal, and every brown one among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the goats. Those shall be my wages.

33"So my righteousness will answer for me in the days to come, when you come to check my wages in front of you. Every goat that is not speckled and spotted, and every sheep that is not brown, will count as stolen by me."

34Laban said, "Look, let it be as you have said."

35That same day he took out the male goats that were streaked and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had some white in it, and all the brown ones among the sheep. He handed them over to his sons.

36He put a three days' journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob fed the rest of Laban's flocks.

37Jacob took fresh rods of poplar, hazel and chestnut. He peeled white stripes in them, so that the white inside the rods showed.

38He set the rods that he had peeled in front of the flocks, in the channels of the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink, so that they would mate when they came to drink.

39The flocks mated in front of the rods, and they gave birth to young that were streaked, speckled and spotted.

40Jacob separated the lambs, and he turned the faces of the flocks toward the streaked ones and all the brown ones in Laban's flock. He kept his own flocks by themselves, and did not put them with Laban's animals.

41Whenever the stronger animals mated, Jacob laid the rods in the channels before their eyes, so that they would mate among the rods.

42But when the animals were weak, he did not put the rods in. So the weaker ones were Laban's, and the stronger ones Jacob's.

43The man grew very rich. He had many animals, and female servants and male servants, and camels and donkeys.