'Flock' in the Bible

while Abel brought the best parts of some of the firstborn from his flock. The LORD looked favorably upon Abel and his offering,

Go to the flock and bring me two healthy young goats. I'll prepare some delicious food for your father, just the way he loves it.

But they responded, "We can't do that until all the sheep have been gathered and the stone has been rolled away from the opening of the well. Only then can we water the flock."

When Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of Laban, his mother's brother, accompanied by Laban's sheep, Jacob approached the well, rolled the stone from the opening of the well, and then watered his mother's brother Laban's flock.

Jacob responded, "You don't have to give me anything. Just do this for me: Let me tend your flock again and watch over it. Let me walk among your flocks today and remove every speckled or spotted sheep, along with every black lamb, and let me do the same with the speckled and spotted goats. These will be my wages.

Meanwhile, Jacob kept tending the rest of Laban's flock. Jacob took branches from white poplar trees, freshly cut almond trees, and some other trees, stripped off their bark to make white streaks, and uncovered the white part inside the branches.

Then he placed the branches that he had stripped bare in all the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink. He placed the branches in front of the flock, and they went into heat as they came to drink.

Jacob kept the lambs separate, facing the striped and entirely black ones that belonged to Laban's flock. He set his own herd by itself and would not let them be with Laban's flock.

Whenever the more vigorous of the flock came into heat, Jacob would place the branches in the troughs in front of the flock to make them mate by the branches.

But he didn't put the branches in front of any of the feeble members of the flock. As a result, the feeble ones belonged to Laban, but the stronger ones belonged to Jacob.

Jacob sent for Rachel and Leah to come out to the field where his flock was

"When Laban said, "The speckled ones will be your wages,' then all the flock gave birth to speckled ones. Then when he said, "The streaked ones will be your wages,' all the flock gave birth to streaked offspring.

As it was, when it was time for the livestock to breed, I once looked up in a dream, and the male goats that were mating with the flock were producing streaked, speckled, and spotted offspring.

""Look around!' he said. "Go ahead, look! All the male goats have been mating with the flock, producing offspring that are streaked, speckled, and spotted, because I've been watching everything that Laban has done to you.

Meanwhile, these past 20 years that I've been with you, your sheep and goats never had miscarriages, I never once ate any of the rams from your flock,

"Sir, you know that the children are frail," Jacob suggested, "and the ewes and cows with me are still nursing their young. If they're driven even for a day, the entire flock will die.

Some time later, his brothers left to tend their father's flock in Shechem.

And Israel instructed Joseph, "Your brothers are tending the flock in Shechem. Come here, because I'm going to send you to them." "Here I am!" he responded.

"Go and see how things are with your brothers," Israel ordered him. "And see how things are with the flock. Bring back a report for me." Then he sent Joseph from the valley of Hebron.

"I'm searching for my brothers," he responded. "Tell me, where are they tending the flock?"

Some years later, Shua's daughter (that is, Judah's wife) died. As Judah was grieving, he visited the shearers of his flock in Timnah, accompanied by his Adullamite friend Hirah.

"I'll send you a young goat from the flock," he responded. But she pressed him, asking, "What security will you put up until you've sent it?"