Aggada -- Translations into English; Bible. Old Testament -- Legends; Jewish legends; Midrash -- Translations into English
To Zilpah's second son Leah gave the name of Asher, "praise," for, she
said, "Unto me all manner of praise is due, for I brought my handmaid
into the house of my husband as wife. Sarah did likewise, but only
because she had no children, and so it was also with Rachel. But as for
me, I had children, and nevertheless I subdued my passion, and without
jealousy I gave my handmaid to my husband for wife. Verily, all will
praise and extol me."[186] Furthermore she spoke: "As the women will
praise me, so the sons of Asher will in time to come praise God for
their fruitful possession in the Holy Land."[187]
The next son born unto Jacob was Issachar, "a reward," and once more it
was Leah who was permitted to bring forth the child, as a reward from
God for her pious desire to have the twelve tribes come into the world.
To secure this result, she left no means untried.[188]
It happened once that her oldest son Reuben was tending his father's
ass during the harvest, and he bound him to a root of dudaim, and went
his way. On returning, he found the dudaim torn out of the ground, and
the ass lying dead beside it. The beast had uprooted it in trying to
get loose, and the plant has a peculiar quality, whoever tears it up
must die.[189] As it was the time of the harvest, when it is permitted
for any one to take a plant from a field, and as dudaim is, besides, a
plant which the owner of a field esteems lightly, Reuben carried it
home. Being a good son, he did not keep it for himself, but gave it to
his mother. Rachel desired the dudaim, and she asked the plant of Leah,
who parted with it to her sister, but on the condition that Jacob, when
he returned from work in the evening, should tarry with her for a
while. It was altogether unbecoming conduct in Rachel to dispose thus
of her husband. She gained the dudaim, but she lost two tribes. If she
had acted otherwise, she would have borne four sons instead of two. And
she suffered another punishment, her body was not permitted to rest in
the grave beside her husband's.
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