FOR MANY, the love story between Rachel and Jacob shows the text’s preference for Rachel over Leah. If one reads the story through modern eyes, where love conquers all, then Rachel seems to be more important than Leah. However, if one reads this parashah with an eye toward its own biblical concerns, then Rachel and Leah look very different.
The love story begins with Jacob seeing Rachel (29:10). The text notes that Rachel is “beautiful of form and of face” (v. 17). To modern readers beauty is positive, but in the Hebrew Bible it is dangerous for women. Abram charges that Sarai’s beauty threatens his life (12:11–12), and Amnon rapes Tamar, supposedly because of her beauty (II Samuel 13). In other places in the Bible, when people make choices because of what they see, those choices prove to be misguided. For example, Lot chooses to live in the Jordan plain because it looks nicer than Canaan (Genesis 13:10–11). Samson marries a Philistine woman because of her appearance (Judges 14:1–3), and the results are disastrous. Clearly the Bible does not recommend judging a book by its cover.
The text notes that “seeing Leah was disfavored, יהוה opened her womb” (Genesis 29:31). This clearly means that the Deity sympathized with Leah. Leah names her first child Reuben because of a play on words that the Deity saw her plight, but she adds what she hopes it will bring her: the love of her husband (v. 32). The second child follows the same pattern; Simeon is so named because God “heard” of her plight (v. 33). The third son, Levi, is named in the hope that her husband will be attached to her (v. 34). All three names reflect not only thankfulness but also a need for more—namely, Jacob’s love. With her fourth son, something finally changes and she names him Judah because, “This time I give thanks to יהוה” (v. 35). Thus Judah, who becomes the forefather of most of the Jewish people, is so named because his mother was simply thankful to the Deity to have him.
—Tammi J. Schneider