Discovery BoxGenesis 29:9-12 
Context29:9 While he was still speaking with them, Rachel arrived with her father’s sheep, for she was tending them. 1 29:10 When Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of his uncle Laban, 2 and the sheep of his uncle Laban, he 3 went over 4 and rolled the stone off the mouth of the well and watered the sheep of his uncle Laban. 5 29:11 Then Jacob kissed Rachel and began to weep loudly. 6 29:12 When Jacob explained 7 to Rachel that he was a relative of her father 8 and the son of Rebekah, she ran and told her father.
1 tn Heb “was a shepherdess.”
2 tn Heb “Laban, the brother of his mother” (twice in this verse).
3 tn Heb “Jacob.” The proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.
4 tn Heb “drew near, approached.”
5 tn Heb “Laban, the brother of his mother.” The text says nothing initially about the beauty of Rachel. But the reader is struck by the repetition of “Laban the brother of his mother.” G. J. Wenham is no doubt correct when he observes that Jacob’s primary motive at this stage is to ingratiate himself with Laban (Genesis [WBC], 2:231).
6 tn Heb “and he lifted up his voice and wept.” The idiom calls deliberate attention to the fact that Jacob wept out loud.
7 tn Heb “declared.”
8 tn Heb “that he [was] the brother of her father.”
