Skip to content
FAMILY · TOLD GENTLY

Bible Stories

“Suffer little children to come unto me.” — Mark 10:14 · KJV

"And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her."

Genesis 29:20 · King James Bible

The story

Rachel is the daughter of Laban. When Jacob flees his brother Esau and comes to Haran, he meets Rachel at a well and rolls the stone away for her flocks. He loves her at first sight. He agrees to work seven years for Laban to marry her. Laban tricks him and gives him Leah first; Jacob works another seven years for Rachel. Rachel is barren for years while her sister has son after son. At last God "remembered Rachel" and she bears Joseph. She dies giving birth to her second son, Benjamin, on the road to Bethlehem. Jacob buries her and sets a pillar over her grave — "the pillar of Rachel's grave unto this day" (Genesis 35:20).

Why she matters

Rachel is the picture of love that costs everything, and of the woman who prays through years of waiting. Jeremiah 31:15 gives Rachel a voice weeping for her children in exile, which Matthew 2:18 quotes at Herod's slaughter of the innocents. Her sorrow becomes a hidden line in the story of Christmas.

Where to read

Genesis 29 · 30 · 31 · 33 · 35:16–20 (KJV).

Walk further

Continue Your Journey

Where else this page opens into the household library.

JacobRachel's husbandJosephRachel's firstborn sonBethlehemNear where Rachel was buriedWomen of the BibleRachel among the great women of Scripture
← Walk back to the front door