When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he replied, "She is my sister." He was afraid to say, "She is my wife," for he thought to himself, "The men of this place will kill me to get Rebekah because she is very beautiful."

Then Abimelech exclaimed, "What in the world have you done to us? One of the men might easily have had sexual relations with your wife, and you would have brought guilt on us!"

When Isaac planted in that land, he reaped in the same year a hundred times what he had sown, because the Lord blessed him.

So the Philistines took dirt and filled up all the wells that his father's servants had dug back in the days of his father Abraham.

So Isaac left there and settled in the Gerar Valley.

Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug back in the days of his father Abraham, for the Philistines had stopped them up after Abraham died. Isaac gave these wells the same names his father had given them.

When Isaac's servants dug in the valley and discovered a well with fresh flowing water there,

Then he moved away from there and dug another well. They did not quarrel over it, so Isaac named it Rehoboth, saying, "For now the Lord has made room for us, and we will prosper in the land."

Then Isaac built an altar there and worshiped the Lord. He pitched his tent there, and his servants dug a well.

so that you will not do us any harm, just as we have not harmed you, but have always treated you well before sending you away in peace. Now you are blessed by the Lord."

Early in the morning the men made a treaty with each other. Isaac sent them off; they separated on good terms.

When Esau was forty years old, he married Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, as well as Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite.

When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he was almost blind, he called his older son Esau and said to him, "My son!" "Here I am!" Esau replied.

Now Rebekah had been listening while Isaac spoke to his son Esau. When Esau went out to the open fields to hunt down some wild game and bring it back,

Bring me some wild game and prepare for me some tasty food. Then I will eat it and bless you in the presence of the Lord before I die.'

Go to the flock and get me two of the best young goats. I'll prepare them in a tasty way for your father, just the way he loves them.

My father may touch me! Then he'll think I'm mocking him and I'll bring a curse on myself instead of a blessing."

So his mother told him, "Any curse against you will fall on me, my son! Just obey me! Go and get them for me!"

Then Rebekah took her older son Esau's best clothes, which she had with her in the house, and put them on her younger son Jacob.

She put the skins of the young goats on his hands and the smooth part of his neck.

But Isaac asked his son, "How in the world did you find it so quickly, my son?" "Because the Lord your God brought it to me," he replied.

Isaac said, "Bring some of the wild game for me to eat, my son. Then I will bless you." So Jacob brought it to him, and he ate it. He also brought him wine, and Isaac drank.

So Jacob went over and kissed him. When Isaac caught the scent of his clothing, he blessed him, saying, "Yes, my son smells like the scent of an open field which the Lord has blessed.

May God give you the dew of the sky and the richness of the earth, and plenty of grain and new wine.

Isaac had just finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had scarcely left his father's presence, when his brother Esau returned from the hunt.

When Esau heard his father's words, he wailed loudly and bitterly. He said to his father, "Bless me too, my father!"

But Isaac replied, "Your brother came in here deceitfully and took away your blessing."

Isaac replied to Esau, "Look! I have made him lord over you. I have made all his relatives his servants and provided him with grain and new wine. What is left that I can do for you, my son?"

Esau said to his father, "Do you have only that one blessing, my father? Bless me too!" Then Esau wept loudly.

You will live by your sword but you will serve your brother. When you grow restless, you will tear off his yoke from your neck."

When Rebekah heard what her older son Esau had said, she quickly summoned her younger son Jacob and told him, "Look, your brother Esau is planning to get revenge by killing you.

Now then, my son, do what I say. Run away immediately to my brother Laban in Haran.

Stay there until your brother's anger against you subsides and he forgets what you did to him. Then I'll send someone to bring you back from there. Why should I lose both of you in one day?"

Then Rebekah said to Isaac, "I am deeply depressed because of these daughters of Heth. If Jacob were to marry one of these daughters of Heth who live in this land, I would want to die!"

So Isaac sent Jacob on his way, and he went to Paddan Aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean and brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

He reached a certain place where he decided to camp because the sun had gone down. He took one of the stones and placed it near his head. Then he fell asleep in that place

and had a dream. He saw a stairway erected on the earth with its top reaching to the heavens. The angels of God were going up and coming down it

and the Lord stood at its top. He said, "I am the Lord, the God of your grandfather Abraham and the God of your father Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the ground you are lying on.

Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west, east, north, and south. All the families of the earth will pronounce blessings on one another using your name and that of your descendants.

Then Jacob woke up and thought, "Surely the Lord is in this place, but I did not realize it!"

He was afraid and said, "What an awesome place this is! This is nothing else than the house of God! This is the gate of heaven!"

Early in the morning Jacob took the stone he had placed near his head and set it up as a sacred stone. Then he poured oil on top of it.

Then Jacob made a vow, saying, "If God is with me and protects me on this journey I am taking and gives me food to eat and clothing to wear,

So Jacob moved on and came to the land of the eastern people.

He saw in the field a well with three flocks of sheep lying beside it, because the flocks were watered from that well. Now a large stone covered the mouth of the well.

When all the flocks were gathered there, the shepherds would roll the stone off the mouth of the well and water the sheep. Then they would put the stone back in its place over the well's mouth.

When Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of his uncle Laban, and the sheep of his uncle Laban, he went over and rolled the stone off the mouth of the well and watered the sheep of his uncle Laban.

When Jacob explained to Rachel that he was a relative of her father and the son of Rebekah, she ran and told her father.

When Laban heard this news about Jacob, his sister's son, he rushed out to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house. Jacob told Laban how he was related to him.

Then Laban said to him, "You are indeed my own flesh and blood." So Jacob stayed with him for a month.

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

Since Jacob had fallen in love with Rachel, he said, "I'll serve you seven years in exchange for your younger daughter Rachel."

In the evening he brought his daughter Leah to Jacob, and Jacob had marital relations with her.

In the morning Jacob discovered it was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, "What in the world have you done to me! Didn't I work for you in exchange for Rachel? Why have you tricked me?"

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

Complete my older daughter's bridal week. Then we will give you the younger one too, in exchange for seven more years of work."

Jacob did as Laban said. When Jacob completed Leah's bridal week, Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife.

When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, he enabled her to become pregnant while Rachel remained childless.

So Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, "The Lord has looked with pity on my oppressed condition. Surely my husband will love me now."

She became pregnant again and had another son. She said, "Because the Lord heard that I was unloved, he gave me this one too." So she named him Simeon.

When Rachel saw that she could not give Jacob children, she became jealous of her sister. She said to Jacob, "Give me children or I'll die!"

Jacob became furious with Rachel and exclaimed, "Am I in the place of God, who has kept you from having children?"

Then Rachel said, "I have fought a desperate struggle with my sister, but I have won." So she named him Naphtali.

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

At the time of the wheat harvest Reuben went out and found some mandrake plants in a field and brought them to his mother Leah. Rachel said to Leah, "Give me some of your son's mandrakes."

But Leah replied, "Wasn't it enough that you've taken away my husband? Would you take away my son's mandrakes too?" "All right," Rachel said, "he may sleep with you tonight in exchange for your son's mandrakes."

When Jacob came in from the fields that evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, "You must sleep with me because I have paid for your services with my son's mandrakes." So he had marital relations with her that night.

After Rachel had given birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, "Send me on my way so that I can go home to my own country.

But Laban said to him, "If I have found favor in your sight, please stay here, for I have learned by divination that the Lord has blessed me on account of you."

Indeed, you had little before I arrived, but now your possessions have increased many times over. The Lord has blessed you wherever I worked. But now, how long must it be before I do something for my own family too?"

So Laban asked, "What should I give you?" "You don't need to give me a thing," Jacob replied, "but if you agree to this one condition, I will continue to care for your flocks and protect them:

My integrity will testify for me later on. When you come to verify that I've taken only the wages we agreed on, if I have in my possession any goat that is not speckled or spotted or any sheep that is not dark-colored, it will be considered stolen."

So that day Laban removed the male goats that were streaked or spotted, all the female goats that were speckled or spotted (all that had any white on them), and all the dark-colored lambs, and put them in the care of his sons.

But Jacob took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond, and plane trees. He made white streaks by peeling them, making the white inner wood in the branches visible.

Then he set up the peeled branches in all the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink. He set up the branches in front of the flocks when they were in heat and came to drink.

When the sheep mated in front of the branches, they gave birth to young that were streaked or speckled or spotted.

Jacob removed these lambs, but he made the rest of the flock face the streaked and completely dark-colored animals in Laban's flock. So he made separate flocks for himself and did not mix them with Laban's flocks.

When the stronger females were in heat, Jacob would set up the branches in the troughs in front of the flock, so they would mate near the branches.

In this way Jacob became extremely prosperous. He owned large flocks, male and female servants, camels, and donkeys.

When Jacob saw the look on Laban's face, he could tell his attitude toward him had changed.

In this way God has snatched away your father's livestock and given them to me.

"Once during breeding season I saw in a dream that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled, and spotted.

In the dream the angel of God said to me, 'Jacob!' 'Here I am!' I replied.

Then Rachel and Leah replied to him, "Do we still have any portion or inheritance in our father's house?

So Jacob immediately put his children and his wives on the camels.

He took away all the livestock he had acquired in Paddan Aram and all his moveable property that he had accumulated. Then he set out toward the land of Canaan to return to his father Isaac.

So he took his relatives with him and pursued Jacob for seven days. He caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead.

But God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream at night and warned him, "Be careful that you neither bless nor curse Jacob."

Laban overtook Jacob, and when Jacob pitched his tent in the hill country of Gilead, Laban and his relatives set up camp there too.

Whoever has taken your gods will be put to death! In the presence of our relatives identify whatever is yours and take it." (Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen them.)

(Now Rachel had taken the idols and put them inside her camel's saddle and sat on them.) Laban searched the whole tent, but did not find them.

Rachel said to her father, "Don't be angry, my lord. I cannot stand up in your presence because I am having my period." So he searched thoroughly, but did not find the idols.

Jacob became angry and argued with Laban. "What did I do wrong?" he demanded of Laban. "What sin of mine prompted you to chase after me in hot pursuit?

When you searched through all my goods, did you find anything that belonged to you? Set it here before my relatives and yours, and let them settle the dispute between the two of us!

This was my lot for twenty years in your house: I worked like a slave for you -- fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, but you changed my wages ten times!

If the God of my father -- the God of Abraham, the one whom Isaac fears -- had not been with me, you would certainly have sent me away empty-handed! But God saw how I was oppressed and how hard I worked, and he rebuked you last night."

Then he said to his relatives, "Gather stones." So they brought stones and put them in a pile. They ate there by the pile of stones.

It was also called Mizpah because he said, "May the Lord watch between us when we are out of sight of one another.

If you mistreat my daughters or if you take wives besides my daughters, although no one else is with us, realize that God is witness to your actions."

May the God of Abraham and the god of Nahor, the gods of their father, judge between us." Jacob took an oath by the God whom his father Isaac feared.