창세기 29:12의 인용 해설

The ninth question: Why did Sarah request that Avraham also expel the maidservant, [together] with her son? For if Yishmael sinned in that he laughed, what was Hagar's sin? And the reason that Sarah gave concerning the inheritance relates to Yishmael, not to his mother, Hagar. All the more so [is it difficult], since the Holy One, blessed be He, agreed with this in His saying (Genesis 29:12) "all that Sarah says to you, listen to her voice."

Surely we must understand his question as one that was designed to pay Jacob less than his labour was worth. Maimonides writes in Hilchot Shluchin VeShutafim chapters six and eight that when a shepherd has not made an agreement with the owner of the flock before he accepted the position he receives one third of the profit of stationary goods (items that do not need his special daily care) and two thirds of mobile goods such as calves and young asses which need to be fed, etc., by the shepherd. Laban was afraid that Jacob's silence on the subject of wages indicated that he expected to be recompensed according to this rate. He thought Jacob expected to receive one third of the increase of the adult animals and two thirds of any increase in the ones not yet fully developed. Laban would have been quite right to continue to let Jacob work for free if the latter had been the average fool not bothering to make a contract. However, since Jacob had already spelled out to Laban that he was no fool, i.e. that he was just as capable of tricking Laban as the latter was in the habit of tricking others, he told him we have to make an agreement precisely because "you are my brother (in the art of trickery)." He challenged Jacob by saying "surely you do not want me to believe that you will work for me for free?" Laban therefore wanted to clarify at once what conditions Jacob expected him to meet.

And a daughter confides only in her mother. Although it is written about Rachel: “She ran and told her father” (29:12), that was because her mother had died. (Bereishis Rabbah)