Genesis 30:12

Summary

Genesis 30:12 reports that Zilpah, the maidservant of Leah, bore a second son to Jacob. The verse continues the narrative sequence of sons born through Leah's household, this time through her maidservant rather than Leah herself.

Key words

• va-Teled ("and she bore", H3205) — qal verb with narrative vav, marking the next sequential event in the birth account; the subject "she" is embedded in the verb form.
• Zilpah (H2153) — proper name identifying the mother of this child, distinct from Leah herself.
• shifChat ("maidservant of", H8198) — feminine singular noun in construct state, linking Zilpah directly to Leah as her possession/servant ("maidservant of Leah").
• ben ("a son", H1121A) — masculine singular noun, the object born.
• sheNi ("second", H8145) — masculine singular ordinal number, specifying that this is Zilpah's second son to Jacob (following the first son mentioned in the prior verse).

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence follows a simple verb-subject-object structure typical of Biblical Hebrew narrative: va-Teled ("and she bore") + subject (Zilpah) + descriptive construct phrase (shifChat Leah, "maidservant of Leah") + object (ben sheni, "a second son") + indirect object (le-Ya'aKov, "to Jacob"). The construct chain shifChat Leah is grammatically tight, presenting Zilpah's identity entirely through her relationship to Leah — she is introduced not as an independent agent but as "the maidservant of Leah," which the Hebrew states before naming the child's father.

The ordinal sheni ("second") is placed immediately after ben ("son"), following standard Hebrew noun-adjective word order, and specifies this birth as the second son borne by Zilpah to Jacob, continuing the count from the previous verse where her first son was mentioned. The preposition le ("to") before Ya'aKov marks Jacob as the recipient/father, a construction repeated across the surrounding birth narratives in this chapter.

Differences between versions

The LXX adds synélaben eti ("she conceived again") before the birth verb, a detail not present in the Hebrew text, which moves directly from the previous verse's action to this birth without mentioning conception. The Vulgate renders the verse with notable brevity — "Peperit quoque Zelpha alterum" ("Zilpah also bore another") — omitting explicit mention of Leah's maidservant status, Jacob's name, and the ordinal "second" is rendered simply as "another" (alterum), condensing the fuller Hebrew construct phrase and ordinal number into a shorter Latin clause.