Comentario sobre Génesis 30:16

שכר שכרתיך FOR SURELY I HAVE HIRED THEE — I have given Rachel the hire she demanded.

You will come to me. This will entail no injustice since Rochel agreed. Like Adam before the sin, the Patriarchs and Matriarchs related to reproduction as nothing other than a way to produce more servants for Hashem.

ותצא לאה, Leah went out, etc.. The reason Leah went to meet Jacob, something that was not considered good manners was that she was afraid Rachel might change her mind. If we accept the view that Rachel swore to her and therefore could not go back on her word we must justify Leah's behaviour as being based on the lack of precision of Rachel's promise. Rachel had not said that Jacob could sleep with Leah on that night. Leah did not want to be put off. By displaying eagerness to sleep with her husband she profited by becoming pregnant.

ויבא יעקב, the reason why this whole paragraph has been preserved in the Torah for all times is to demonstrate that what motivated our matriarchs in their relations with their husbands was exclusively their task to produce as many children for them as possible. They were not concerned with indulging their libido. When Rachel, during those years, made a point of sleeping with Yaakov at every opportunity, it was because she hoped that on one of those occasions her prayers would be answered and that she would conceive. We find that in verse 22 this did indeed happen. It stands to reason then that when Leah requested that Yaakov sleep with her on a certain occasion, she too prayed that she would conceive as an answer to her prayers. She had resumed praying for additional children as soon as she had noticed that she no longer seemed to become pregnant easily. G’d did indeed listen to her prayer as we know from verse 17. As to Leah going out towards Yaakov while the latter was on his way home from work, she did this fully in accordance with accepted moral ethical rules, seeing that Yaakov had been unaware of the bargain Leah had made with Rachel. Had she not headed him off, Yaakov would have proceeded to Rachel’s tent, as was his custom. It would have been most inappropriate for Leah to ask Yaakov to leave Rachel’s tent after he had already arrived there.

God helped him... Rashi is saying that הוא refers to Hashem, for otherwise, [if it meant “that night,”] it should say ההוא. How did He help him? Yaakov came from the field riding a donkey, intending to ride to Rochel’s tent. Hashem caused the donkey to bray so that Leah would hear and go out to meet Yaakov, so he would come to her tent. And so it was. He came to Leah’s tent, and that night, Yissachar was conceived. Thus it says יששכר חמור גרם(49:14). I.e., how did יששכר come to be born? חמור גרם. I.e., the donkey was the cause (הגורם).

וישכב עמה בלילה הוא, “he slept with her on that night.” [In order to be grammatically correct, the Torah should have written: בלילה ההוא. Our author points out that this is not a scribe’s error, but that we have a similar formulation in Genesis 32,23: ויקם לילה הוא, “he got up during that night,” where we also would have expected to find: בלילה ההוא. [Perhaps the missing letter is to indicate that in both instances Yaakov made the decision hastily. Ed.]

בלילה הוא THAT NIGHT — With God’s help Isaachar was born (Niddah 31a, and cf. Genesis Rabbah 99).

וישכב עמה בלילה הוא, willingly, not reluctantly. He appreciated her urgent desire to have more children fathered by him.

אלי תבא, to my tent, seeing that each of the matriarchs had her own tent.

Leah may also have walked towards her husband in order not to have to call him to her after Jacob had already entered Rachel's tent. This would have been an embarassment for her sister Rachel. It might have resulted in open jealousy. Leah's virtuous considerations therefore outweighed the unconventional manner of her behaviour. It is clear that G'd appreciated this as He rewarded her by letting her conceive; the Torah wrote: "G'd listened to Leah and she conceived." Look at my commentary on that verse

בלילה הוא the noun has the definitive article, i.e. the patach under the letter ב in the word בלילה, whereas the adjective, the word הוא, does not have the prefix ה which would signal such a definitive article, i.e. referring to a specific night we already know about. There are many such constructions in the Torah, one of the best known ones being in Numbers 28,4 את הכבש אחד, where we would have expected the word האחד instead of merely אחד. Samuel II 6,3 is another such example where we would have expected the word החדשה instead of חדשה.

שכר שכרתיך, "I have rented you, etc." This means: "I have paid a fee to someone for the pleasure of your company." The repetition of the word שכר indicates that she referred to two things, i.e. that Jacob stay with her for the night and that he should have marital relations with her.

בלילה הוא, that night. This is simply a reference to the fact that Jacob fully agreed.