Old Testament

New Testament

Genesis 31:30-49 Modern English Version (MEV)

30. Now you surely have gone away because you longed desperately after your father’s house, yet why have you stolen my gods?”

31. Then Jacob answered and said to Laban, “Because I was afraid, for I thought that you would take your daughters from me by force.

32. But anyone with whom you find your gods, let him not live. In the presence of our kinsmen, point out what I have that is yours and take it.” For Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen them.

33. So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the two female servants’ tents, but he did not find them. Then he went out of Leah’s tent and entered into Rachel’s tent.

34. Now Rachel had taken the household idols and put them in the camel’s saddle and sat on them. Laban searched the entire tent, but could not find them.

35. She said to her father, “Let not my lord be displeased that I cannot rise before you, for the manner of women is on me.” So he searched, but he did not find the household idols.

36. Then Jacob became angry and berated Laban. And Jacob asked Laban, “What is my offense? What is my sin that you have so hotly pursued after me?

37. You have searched all my things, and yet what have you found of all your household things? Set it here before my kinsmen and your kinsmen, so that they may judge between us both.

38. “This twenty years I have been with you. Your ewes and your female goats have not miscarried their young, and the male goats of your flock I have not eaten.

39. That which was torn by beasts I did not bring to you. I bore the loss of it. You required it from my hand whether it was stolen by day or stolen by night.

40. It was like this with me: In the day the heat consumed me and the frost by night, and my sleep fled from my eyes.

41. I have been twenty years in your house. I served you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flock, and you have changed my wages ten times.

42. If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, surely you would have sent me away empty now. God has seen my affliction and the labor of my hands and rebuked you last night.”

43. Laban answered and said to Jacob, “These daughters are my daughters, and these children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine. But what can I do this day to my daughters or to their children whom they have borne?

44. Now therefore come, let us make a covenant, you and I, and let it be as a witness between you and me.”

45. So Jacob took a stone and set it up for a pillar.

46. Jacob said to his kinsmen, “Gather stones.” So they took stones and made a pile, and they ate there on the pile.

47. And Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed.

48. Laban said, “This pile is a witness between me and you this day.” Therefore its name was called Galeed,

49. and Mizpah, for he said, “May the Lord watch between you and me, when we are apart from one another.

Read complete chapter Genesis 31