Bible Strands
Genesis 29:18
Since Jacob loved Rachel, he answered, “I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter Rachel.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Jacob addresses Laban immediately after the narrator contrasts Leah’s weak eyes with Rachel’s beauty, responding to Laban’s marriage proposal. He makes this statement in the land of Aram following his arrival at the well.
The words — The text highlights וַיֹּאמֶר (va/i.Yo.mer, "he said") and אֶעֱבָדְךָ (‘e.‘e.va.de./Kha, "I will serve you") to frame Jacob’s conditional pledge. These terms anchor his explicit offer to work seven years in exchange for Rachel.
The thread — Hosea 12:12 recalls Jacob’s flight to Aram and his labor for a wife, while Exodus 22:16 and Genesis 34:12 establish the cultural framework of marriage payments. This verse grounds the later biblical pattern of labor exchanged for marital union.
Why it lands — The passage records a man’s voluntary commitment of seven years of labor to secure a specific marriage. It requires the reader to observe how personal devotion triggers formal economic and familial arrangements in the narrative.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And Jacob loved Rachel; and said, I will serve thee seven years for Rachel thy younger daughter.
Cross-references
- Hosea 12:12 Jacob fled to the land of Aram and Israel worked for a wife—for a wife he tended sheep.
- Exodus 22:16 If a man seduces a virgin who is not pledged in marriage and sleeps with her, he must pay the full dowry for her to be his wife.
- Genesis 34:12 Demand a high dowry and an expensive gift, and I will give you whatever you ask. Only give me the girl as my wife!”
- Genesis 29:20 So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, yet it seemed but a few days because of his love for her.
- Genesis 29:30 Jacob slept with Rachel as well, and indeed, he loved Rachel more than Leah. So he worked for Laban another seven years.
- Genesis 31:41 Thus for twenty years I have served in your household—fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks—and you have changed my wages ten times!
- 2 Samuel 3:14 Then David sent messengers to say to Ish-bosheth son of Saul, “Give me back my wife, Michal, whom I betrothed to myself for a hundred Philistine foreskins.”
- Hosea 3:2 So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a lethech of barley.