Research Tidbits

I love historical writing because I love research–especially once I begin to visualize my characters in their local environments. I’m currently writing the stories of Rachel, Leah, and Jacob, and have been sharing the results of some of my research with my Facebook readers. They’ve enjoyed it so much I thought I might share some tidbits with you.

First, how old was Jacob when he married Leah and Rachel (who, according to Jewish tradition, were twins)? Answers vary, but it’s safe to say he was elderly by modern standards. But by ancient standards, men were still active and fathering children after they had passed 100 (remember Abraham?), so many Bible scholars believe Jacob was in his seventies when he married Rachel and Leah.

The figure is derived from several scriptures.

1. We know that Jacob died at age 147 (Gen. 47:28).

2. We know that Jacob went to Egypt (to join Joseph) when he was 130 (Gen. 47:9).

3. When Jacob entered Egypt, Joseph was about 39, because he started working for Pharaoh at age 30. By the time Jacob joined him, they had experienced the seven years of plenty and two years of famine (Gen. 41:46ff).

4. So Jacob’s 130 years minus Joseph’s 39 means that Jacob was 91 when Joseph was born.

5. Jacob wanted to leave Haran right after Joseph’s birth, but Laban convinced him to stay for another six years (Gen. 30:25-26, Gen. 31:41). So when Jacob finally left Haran, Joseph was around six and Jacob had been in the land twenty years. If Jacob was 91 when Joseph was born, he would have been 97 when he finally left Haran and 77 when he met Rachel.

We might assume that Jacob married at age 40, like Esau, but nothing in Scripture supports that timeline. It is more logical to reason that Isaac, supposing he was near death at age 137 (when Jacob and Esau would have been 77), decided then to give his blessing to his sons, thus setting the stage for Jacob’s flight to Haran to escape Esau’s rage.

Here’s another: What on earth was going on with Jacob and those branches and the livestock? (Genesis 30:35-ff.) I had to do some digging, but here’s the explanation I found and it works for me.

Jacob put branches in the watering troughs of the sheep and goats to increase his herds . . . and here’s how it worked. Laban thought he was getting a great deal when Jacob asked for the spotted goats and spotted and dark sheep, since most of Laban’s flock were white sheep and solid-colored goats. By having his sons remove the spotted/dark animals from his flock, Laban thought he was guaranteeing that his flock would not reproduce spotted or dark-colored animals.

But though Laban tried to cheat Jacob, God intervened and thwarted Laban’s intention. Jacob took fresh branches of poplar, almond, and plane trees, peeled portions of them, and put them in the animals’ watering troughs, where the sun warmed the water and made a sort of an herbal tea. Science has demonstrated that poplar supplementation increases the birth rates of animals by 20-30 percent. Sweet Almond is known to treat hemorrhage, kidney stones, increase mothers’ milk, and heal other various diseases. The bark of the Oriental Plane tree acts as an anti-inflammatory.

God sent Jacob a dream (Gen. 31:11) and showed him that the animals going up to drink in [Laban’s] flock were striped, spotted, and speckled, even though Jacob knew they were all solid colors, because the spotted/speckled animals had been removed. This was God’s way of showing Jacob that those animals carried the genes for striped, spotted, and speckled offspring. And sure enough, Laban’s solid-color flocks produced all kinds of stripped, spotted, and speckled babies.

What about those verses that talk about how he “set the faces of the flocks toward the striped ones?” This wasn’t some magical or supernatural trick, though God certainly worked to prosper Jacob. This is describing how Jacob ensured that the healthiest of Laban’s flock had healthy babies.

I’m no farmer, but I’ve learned this much: after a female animal has a baby, it will eventually go into heat again, even though the mother is still focused on caring for her baby. So Jacob allowed the healthiest rams, ewes, and babies access to the drinking troughs, and he put the babies on one side of the troughs, so their mothers would focus on them as they drank from the trough. While the mothers were drinking and watching their babies, the rams would come up from behind and breed with them for the next season.

Then Jacob would turn those animals out, remove the sticks from the troughs, pour in fresh water, and allow Laban’s weaker animals into the pen to drink.

This method—based on sound scientific knowledge, genetics, and the work of God, allowed Jacob to prosper far more than Laban expected. I’m sure that after the striped and spotted babies were weaned, they were removed from Laban’s flock and transported to the pasture where Jacob kept his flocks of striped, spotted, and speckled sheep and goats. Through trade with other herdsmen, over that six-year period he also accumulated cattle, camels, and servants (Gen. 31:18).

Not bad for people who had not yet discovered genetics!

Until next time,

Angie