31:45 So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a memorial pillar. 31:46 Then he 1 said to his relatives, “Gather stones.” So they brought stones and put them in a pile. 2 They ate there by the pile of stones. 31:47 Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, 3 but Jacob called it Galeed. 4
1 tn Heb “Jacob”; the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.
2 sn The Hebrew word for “pile” is גַּל (gal), which sounds like the name “Galeed” (גַּלְעֵד, gal’ed). See v. 48.
3 sn Jegar Sahadutha. Laban the Aramean gave the place an Aramaic name which means “witness pile” or “the pile is a witness.”
4 sn Galeed also means “witness pile” or “the pile is a witness,” but this name is Canaanite or Western Semitic and closer to later Hebrew. Jacob, though certainly capable of speaking Aramaic, here prefers to use the western dialect.