Genesis 30, 31

Take My Handmaiden, Please!

Rachel is understandably upset that her sister, Leah, is squeezing out pups while she herself can't get knocked up. Of course, Jacob is to blame--an odd reaction considering he's already had 4 with Leah, proving his sperm's mobility. Jacob rightfully blames God, and God blames--well, God has no one to blame but himself, considering he's the one that sealed her womb and all. Feeling guilty, God kills a bunch of people for no good reason. Never fails to make him feel better.

Fearing a retirement in Boca with no grandchildren to spoil, Rachel hatches an ingenious plan, one borrowed from Sarah: she will give her handmaiden Bilhah to Jacob to impregnate. The plan works and Bilhah bears a son. Rachel takes all the credit and claims the boy, Dan, as her own. Bilhah conceives again and gives birth to Naphtali, a name that never caught on as Dan did.

Not to be outdone, Leah gives her handmaiden Zilpah to Jacob. Just because, you know? I guess it's a sister thing. Zilpah bears a son, named Gad. Soon, Zilpah has a second son, named Asher.

Rachel is furious that her own handmaiden, her hated sister, and her hated sister's handmaiden are all sleeping with Jacob and having babies by the boatload, so she transfers her rage to basket of mandrakes her nephew Reuben brings home. She really, really, really wants those mandrakes and makes a huge stink about them.

"Is it a small matter that thou hast taken my husband?" the irony-deficient Leah asks. "Wouldest thou take away my son's mandrakes also?" Rachel, clearly not thinking at all, makes a compromise. "OK," she says. "If you giveth me the mandrakes you can spendeth the night with Jacob."

"Reuben," Leah says, "give whatever the hell those things are to Rachel. I'm getting laid tonight!"

Rachel takes the mandrakes home and spends the evening dressing them up and taking them for a stroll in her doll carriage.

Baby Race!

Turns out that Rachel made a bad deal for those mandrakes: as a result of that night's sleeping arrangements, Leah bears Jabob a fifth son. Later, she conceives number six. But wait! She conceives again, this time a daughter, Dinah, who at some point blows some kind of horn or something.

God, in a strange change of heart that makes sense only to him, decides this is a great time to open Rachel's womb. The Big Guy also creates Barry White, which really gets the party going. The result? Rachel bears Jacob a son.

How many is that so far? Let's see...Leah, and Bilhath, and Zilpath, and Rachel...holy shit. Jacob has 11 kids by four different women! Somewhere right now P. Diddy is calling Jacob a playa.

Meanwhile, Jacob is so tired of all this pussy that he asks Laban to release him from his labor. Laban agrees, and he and Jacob agree on a payment: all the spotted and speckled cattle, all the brown sheep, and all the spotted and speckled goats, then asks Laban to move three days journey away. Oh, and Rachel and Leah. Can't forget that they were payment too.

Jacob quickly creates some voodoo to increase his livestock: taking rods of green poplar, hazel, and chestnut, he puts them in the animals' watering troughs. After drinking from the mahic rod water, the animals conceive like mad, and Jacob finds himself with a huge stock. Just to be a prick, Jacob sends the weakest of the new breed to Laban and keeps the strongest for himself. The mighty animals drink the horny water again, and the cycle starts anew. Jacob grows rich.

Laban realizes that Jacob actually accomplished something with the fair wages he was paid for 2 decades of hard work and is characteristically pissed. His sons are pissed too, but because they only now realized that Laban threw their foosball table into the deal when they weren't looking.

Jacob starts bitching to Rachel and Leah about their dad. "And your father hath deceived me, and changed my wages ten times," he says. "And now he wants the friggin' foosball table back? That's bullshit, man." They pack up camels with all their goods, and tote along all the livestock the magic rods, and head for Canaan, Jacob's homeland. Somewhere in there are Jacob's 11 kids and his two handmaiden fuck buddies, I'm sure, but the Bible doesn't say exactly.

Last Dance With Mary Jane

Laban hears of the Jacob's trek 3 days later and immediately sets out after him. God comes to Laban in a dream and warns him not to speak to Jacob "either good or bad." What kind of conversation is left to have is a mystery. Perhaps they can talk about American Idol.

Catching up to Jacob 7 days later, Laban lays into him. "What hast thou done, that thou hast stolen away unawares to me, and carried away my daughters, as captives taken with the sword?" Laban says, totally making up the sword part. "Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me."

"Well,"Jacob says, "fleeing in secret is the best way to flee, actually. And didn't you give me all this stuff as payment for 20 years of work? How am I fleeing from you, exactly?"

Turns out that the reason Laban is pissed is that he wanted to have a party in honor of Jacob's leaving. Imagine that? Chasing a guy for 7 days across the desert to tell him you wanted to throw him a party! What a great father-in-law!

But Laban's not exactly telling the truth. What he's really looking for are his "gods," which he believes Rachel and Leah took with them. According to biblical scholars, "gods," loosely translated, means "weed."

Laban ransaks every tent looking for his ganja, but comes up empty. At last he sees Rachel, sitting on a camel saddle, under which is the goods. She refuses to stand up and he goes all Reefer Madness on her tears the tent apart. Jonesing pretty hard, he storms out.

"These daughters are my daughters, and these children are my children, and these cattle are my cattle, and that sticky icky is my sticky icky," Laban says to Jacob. "You even rolled over your 401(k). You heartless bastard!"

After he calms down, Laban proposes a pact with Jacob. The two build pillars of rocks, and Laban says, "If thou shalt afflict my daughters, or if thou shalt take other wives beside my daughters, no man is with us; see, God is witness betwixt me and thee."

"What about the handmaidens?" Jacob asks.

"Oh, they don't count," Laban says.

Laban points to the rock pillars. "This heap be witness, and this pillar be witness, that I will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not pass over this heap and this pillar unto me, for harm," he says. "Now I gotta go see a guy about a thing."