Genesis 30:34 - Forerunner Commentary

Genesis 30:34

32 Let me pass through all your flock today, removing from there all the speckled and spotted sheep, and all the brown ones among the lambs, and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and ^athese shall be my wages.

33 So my ^arighteousness will answer for me in time to come, when the subject of my wages comes before you: every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the lambs, will be considered stolen, if it is with me.”

34 And Laban said, “Oh, that it were according to your word!”

35 So he removed that day the male goats that were ^aspeckled and spotted, all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had some white in it, and all the brown ones among the lambs, and gave them into the hand of his sons.

36 Then he put three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob fed the rest of Laban’s flocks.

37 Now ^aJacob took for himself rods of green poplar and of the almond and chestnut trees, peeled white strips in them, and exposed the white which was in the rods.

38 And the rods which he had peeled, he set before the flocks in the gutters, in the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink, so that they should conceive when they came to drink.

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Genesis 30:34-36

Today, and apparently back then also, the dominant color of Bedouin sheep is solid white and the dominant color Bedouin goats is dark brown or black. Spotted animals are in the minority and these are what Jacob proposed as his wages.

Moreover, he proposed to take only those that would be born thereafter and only those that would be born normally colored goats and sheep. This is why Laban removed that speckled animals from the others and place them in a three days journey away.

He may not have known much about genetics at that time, but he knew that speckled animals tend to give birth to speckled animals and solid colored animals tend to give birth to solid colored animals. Yet it was Jacob who proposed and welcomed this apparently disadvantageous arrangement, and he did so because he had faith in God.

His faith that God was going to bless him in spite of the cards not being stacked in his favor, and that he had been around animals for a long time and he knew that solid colored parents do sometimes give birth to speckled offspring, he felt very comfortable in making this agreement.

Excerpted from Created to Do God's Will and Work

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