Genesis 29: 1-13

There are fifty chapters found in the book of Genesis that are divided into main subject units, and presented chronologically: 1:1-2:3 – A description of creation, 2:4-11:26 – the emergence, development, and degeneration of the human race, and 11:27-50:26 – [Majority of the Book], the stories of the lives of the fathers of the people of Israel. “The narratives about the patriarchs of Israel are framed by two historic migrations in and out of the Promised Land. Between those migrations we are not given a continuous history but cycles of individual episodes about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” The predominant genre of the book of Genesis and the selected text found in Genesis 29:1-14 is narrative. “A narrative is the telling of stories in prose.

This means, that person in scene travels to a far-away place, and in this scenario, stops at a well, meets a young lady, draws water for her family’s flock after overcoming an obstacle, followed by father inviting the man to stay and then the man eventually marrying the woman. Hamilton refers to the person in the scene as the hero (or his representative). Jacob’s first encounter with Rachel and Laban parallels the encounter of Abraham’s servant with Rebekah (24:10-33). “The two Genesis stories contain the further parallels that the strange land is in fact the land of the father (or his ancestors). And that the young lady who comes to draw water is a cousin or the daughter of a cousin of the groom-to-be.” Similar stories of this type scene is also Moses’ encounter with the daughters of Jethro (Exodus 2:15-21). Wenham encourages readers to pay close attention to the features of Jacob meeting Rachel because it differentiates this scene from its parallels and gives light on the personality of those involved. “The kiss of kinship sets the Jacob narrative with his uncle, Laban. When Jacob meets Rachel, he kisses her and when Laban meets Jacob, he kisses him. However, years later, Hartley points out when, Laban separated never to meet again. Laban kissed his grandchildren and daughters. But he did not kiss Jacob – evidence of the distance between them