Genesis 30:22

And God remembered Rachel, and God hearkened to her, and opened her womb.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(22-24) God remembered Rachel.—Rachel’s long barrenness had probably humbled and disciplined her; and, cured of her former petulance, she trusts no longer to “love-apples,” but looks to God for the great blessing of children. He hearkens to her prayer, and remembers her. (Comp. 1Samuel 1:19.) In calling his name Joseph, there is again a play upon two words, for it may be formed from the verb used in Genesis 30:23, and would then mean he takes away; or it may signify he adds, which is the meaning made prominent by Rachel. And God did add to her another son, but the boon cost her her life. As Joseph was born six or seven years before Jacob left Padan-aram, Rachel had been barren for twenty-six years. We must add that in her joy at Joseph’s birth there is no trace of the ungenerous triumph over Leah so marked in her rejoicing at the birth of the sons of Bilhah; and in her trust that “Jehovah would add to her another son,” she evidently had in mind the covenant promises, which a son of her own womb might now inherit. As a matter of fact, the long struggle for supremacy lay between the houses of Joseph and Judah; and Judah finally prevailed.

Benson Commentary

Genesis 30:22. God remembered Rachel — Whom he seemed to have forgotten, and hearkened to her, whose prayers had been long denied, and then she bare a son. Rachel called her son Joseph, which, in Hebrew, is akin to two words of a contrary signification: Asaph, abstulit, he has taken away my reproach; as if the greatest mercy she had in this son were, that she had saved her credit: and Joseph, addidit; the Lord shall add to me another son: which may be looked upon as the language of her faith: she takes this mercy as an earnest of further mercy: hath God given me this grace? I may call it Joseph, and say, he shall add more grace.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

30:14-24 The desire, good in itself, but often too great and irregular, of being the mother of the promised Seed, with the honour of having many children, and the reproach of being barren, were causes of this unbecoming contest between the sisters. The truth appears to be, that they were influenced by the promises of God to Abraham; whose posterity were promised the richest blessings, and from whom the Messiah was to descend.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

"God remembered Rachel," in the best time for her, after he had taught her the lessons of dependence and patience. "Joseph." There is a remote allusion to her gratitude for the reproach of barrenness taken away. But there is also hope in the name. The selfish feeling also has died away, and the thankful Rachel rises from Elohim, the invisible Eternal, to Yahweh, the manifest Self-existent. The birth of Joseph was after the fourteen years of service were completed. He and Dinah appear to have been born in the same year.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

21. afterwards, she bare a daughter—The inferior value set on a daughter is displayed in the bare announcement of the birth.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And God remembered Rachel,.... In a way of mercy and kindness, whom he seemed to have forgotten, by not giving her children:

and God hearkened to her; to her prayer, which had been made time after time, that she might have children; but hitherto God had delayed to answer, but now gives one:

and opened her womb; gave her conception, and made her fruitful, and she became the mother of a child she so much desired.

Geneva Study Bible

And God remembered Rachel, and God hearkened to her, and opened her womb.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 22-24. - And God remembered Rachel (cf. Genesis 8:1; 1 Samuel 1:19), and God hearkened to her, - as to Leah (ver. 17) - and opened her womb - as he had previously done to Leah (Genesis 29:31). Rachel's barrenness had not continued so long as either Sarah's or Rebekah's. And she conceived, and bare a son; and said, God hath taken away my reproach - i.e. of sterility. The mandrakes of Leah having proved inefficacious, Rachel at length realizes that children are God s gift, and this thought sufficiently explains the use of the term Elohim. And she called his name Joseph; - יוסֵפ, either, "he takes away," with allusion to the removal of her reproach, or, "he shall add," with reference to her hope of another son. Perhaps the first thought is not obscurely hinted at, though the second appears' from the ensuing clause to have occupied the greater prominence in Rachel's mind - and said, The Lord - Jehovah; a trace of the Jehovistic pen (Tuch, Bleek, et alii); rather an outcome of the higher spiritual life of Rachel, who had now got emancipated from all such merely human devices as resorting to mandrakes, and was able to recognize her complete dependence for offspring on the sovereign grace of the covenant God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob (Hengstenberg, Keil) - shall add to me another son.

CHAPTER 30:25-43 Genesis 30:22

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Birth of Joseph. - At length God gave Rachel also a son, whom she named Joseph, יוסף, i.e., taking away ( equals יאסף, cf. 1 Samuel 15:6; 2 Samuel 6:1; Psalm 104:29) and adding (from יסף), because his birth not only furnished an actual proof that God had removed the reproach of her childlessness, but also excited the wish, that Jehovah might add another son. The fulfilment of this wish is recorded in Genesis 35:16. The double derivation of the name, and the exchange of Elohim for Jehovah, may be explained, without the hypothesis of a double source, on the simple ground, that Rachel first of all looked back at the past, and, thinking of the earthly means that had been applied in vain for the purpose of obtaining a child, regarded the son as a gift of God. At the same time, the good fortune which had now come to her banished from her heart her envy of her sister (Genesis 30:1), and aroused belief in that God, who, as she had no doubt heard from her husband, had given Jacob such great promises; so that in giving the name, probably at the circumcision, she remembered Jehovah and prayed for another son from His covenant faithfulness.

After the birth of Joseph, Jacob asked Laban to send him away, with the wives and children for whom he had served him (Genesis 30:25). According to this, Joseph was born at the end of the 14 years of service that had been agreed upon, or seven years after Jacob had taken Leah and (a week later) Rachel as his wives (Genesis 29:21-28). Now if all the children, whose births are given in Genesis 29:32-30:24, had been born one after another during the period mentioned, not only would Leah have had seven children in 7, or literally 6 1/4 years, but there would have been a considerable interval also, during which Rachel's maid and her own gave birth to children. But this would have been impossible; and the text does not really state it. When we bear in mind that the imperf. c. ו consec. expresses not only the order of time, but the order of thought as well, it becomes apparent that in the history of the births, the intention to arrange them according to the mothers prevails over the chronological order, so that it by no means follows, that because the passage, "when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children," occurs after Leah is said to have had four sons, therefore it was not till after the birth of Leah's fourth child that Rachel became aware of her own barrenness. There is nothing on the part of the grammar to prevent our arranging the course of events thus. Leah's first four births followed as rapidly as possible one after the other, so that four sons were born in the first four years of the second period of Jacob's service. In the meantime, not necessarily after the birth of Leah's fourth child, Rachel, having discovered her own barrenness, had given her maid to Jacob; so that not only may Dan have been born before Judah, but Naphtali also not long after him. The rapidity and regularity with which Leah had born her first four sons, would make her notice all the more quickly the cessation that took place; and jealousy of Rachel, as well as the success of the means she had adopted, would impel her to attempt in the same way to increase the number of her children. Moreover, Leah herself may have conceived again before the birth of her maid's second son, and may have given birth to her last two sons in the sixth and seventh years of their marriage. And contemporaneously with the birth of Leah's last son, or immediately afterwards, Rachel may have given birth to Joseph. In this way Jacob may easily have had eleven sons within seven years of his marriage. But with regard to the birth of Dinah, the expression "afterwards" (Genesis 30:21) seems to indicate, that she was not born during Jacob's years of service, but during the remaining six years of his stay with Laban.