Genesis 29:27

Genesis 29:27, in plain English

Laban offers Jacob a deal: finish celebrating this wedding week with Leah, and then you can also marry Rachel—but you'll have to work another seven years to pay for her.

Why it's here

A wedding celebration lasted a full week in that culture. Laban is essentially saying, 'Live with your new wife for a week, then marry the other one, but you owe me another seven years of labor.' It's adding insult to injury—Jacob is being forced to pay twice for Rachel and to have two wives he didn't plan for.

Who's speaking

Laban is proposing terms to Jacob

Where it sits in the story

This is Laban taking advantage of Jacob's desperation. Jacob is trapped—he loves Rachel and won't leave without her. Laban knows this and uses it to extract even more years of work. What's striking is how Jacob, the man who manipulated his family for a birthright, is now at the mercy of someone more ruthless than he is.

The scholarly reading

Laban offers Jacob Rachel in exchange for completing Leah's bridal week and committing to another seven years of labor.

Language and setting

The 'week's celebration' (shbu'at) refers to the seven-day wedding festivities that constituted the legal completion of marriage. By requiring Jacob to complete this week with Leah, Laban ensures the marriage cannot be dissolved. The demand for another seven years doubles Jacob's original obligation — what he thought was a temporary labor contract has become a fourteen-year commitment. This represents a profound restructuring of the agreement that originally bound Jacob to Laban.

Voice

Laban proposes his terms

Significance

This negotiation exemplifies how deception breeds further obligation and complication — Jacob's quest for blessing becomes entanglement in a progressively more burdensome covenant relationship.

25When morning came, there was Leah! “What have you done to me?” Jacob said to Laban. “Wasn’t it for Rachel that I served you? Why have you deceived me?”

26Laban replied, “It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older.

27Finish this week’s celebration, and we will give you the younger one in return for another seven years of work.”

28And Jacob did just that. He finished the week’s celebration, and Laban gave him his daughter Rachel as his wife.

29Laban also gave his servant girl Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her maidservant.

Read all of Genesis 29 — The deceiver gets deceived. Jacob works seven years for Rachel, wakes up married to Leah, and learns what it feels like to be tricked.