Matthew Henry on Genesis 30:1-13
We have here the bad consequences of that strange marriage which Jacob made with the two sisters. Here is,
I. An unhappy disagreement between him and Rachel (Gen 30:1, Gen 30:2), occasioned, not so much by her own barrenness as by her sister's fruitfulness. Rebekah, the only wife of Isaac, was long childless, and yet we find no uneasiness between her and Isaac; but here, because Leah bears children, Rachel cannot live peaceably with Jacob.
1. Rachel frets. She envied her sister, Gen 30:1. Envy is grieving at the good of another, than which no sin is more offensive to God, nor more injurious to our neighbour and ourselves. She considered not that it was God that made the difference, and that…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Genesis 30:3
Bilhah . . . Zilpah--Following the example of Sarah with regard to Hagar, an example which is not seldom imitated still, she adopted the children of her maid. Leah took the same course. A bitter and intense rivalry existed between them, all the more from their close relationship as sisters; and although they occupied separate apartments, with their families, as is the uniform custom where a plurality of wives obtains, and the husband and father spends a day with each in regular succession, that did not allay their mutual jealousies. The evil lies in the system, which being a violation of God's original ordinance, cannot yield happiness.
Adam Clarke on Genesis 30:8
She called his name Naphtali - נפתלי naphtali, my wrestling, according to the common mode of interpretation; but it is more likely that the root פתל pathal signifies to twist or entwine. Hence Mr. Parkhurst translates the verse, "By the twistings - agency or operation, of God, I am entwisted with my sister; that is, my family is now entwined or interwoven with my sister's family, and has a chance of producing the promised Seed." The Septuagint, Aquila, and the Vulgate, have nearly the same meaning. It is, however, difficult to fix the true meaning of the original.
John Gill on Genesis 30:8
And Rachel said, with great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister,.... Or, "with the wrestlings of God" (a), wrestling and striving in prayer with God; being vehement and importunate in her petitions to him, that she might have children as well as her sister: some render it, "I used the craftinesses of God", or "great craftiness with my sisters" (b); by giving her maid Bilhah to her husband, and having children by her:
and I have prevailed; as she strove in her desires and prayers to have another child before her sister had; in that she prevailed, or she was succeeded in her desires, she had children as she wished to have:
and she called his name Naphtali; which signifies "my wrestling…
