Genesis 31:4

Summary

Jacob sends word and summons his wives Rachel and Leah, calling them out to the field, to where his flock was. The verse sets up the private conversation that follows, staged away from Laban's household.

Key words

• va-yishlach ("and he sent", H7971G) — qal narrative form with vav-consecutive, opening the verse with sequential action: Jacob "sent" (word/message) before calling.
• va-yikra ("and he summoned/called", H7121G) — second narrative verb, qal, continuing the sequence "and then he called."
• Rachel (H7354) and Leah (H3812) — proper names, both introduced with the preposition le ("to", H9005), marking them as the ones being called to/toward.
• ha-sadeh ("the field", H7704G) — definite noun, masculine singular, used without a preposition, functioning as the destination.
• tzono ("his flock", H6629G) — construct noun with pronominal suffix "his," preceded by el ("to", H0413), naming the second locative point.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence chains two narrative verbs with vav-consecutive: va-yishlach ("and he sent") followed by va-yikra ("and he summoned"). This construction presents the action as a tight sequence — first a sending (commonly understood as sending word or a messenger), then the act of calling. The object of the calling is marked twice with the preposition le: le-Rachel and u-le-Leah ("to Rachel and to Leah"), naming both wives as recipients of the summons.

The final portion of the verse places two locative elements side by side without a connecting particle: ha-sadeh ("the field") stands alone as a definite noun with no preposition, functioning adverbially as a destination ("to the field"), and this is followed by el-tzono ("to his flock"), where tzon ("flock", H6629G) appears in construct with the suffix "his." The juxtaposition of these two phrases — field, then flock — without an explicit conjunction or preposition on the first term is a feature of the Hebrew that translations resolve by inserting connecting words (e.g., "to the field where his flocks were").

Differences between versions

The Hebrew presents ha-sadeh ("the field") and el-tzono ("to his flock") as two closely juxtaposed locative phrases without a relative particle joining them. The LXX renders this as a single relative clause, εἰς τὸ πεδίον οὗ τὰ ποίμνια ("into the field where the flocks were"), supplying "where" (οὗ) to link the two elements. The Vulgate similarly smooths the Hebrew into "in agrum, ubi pascebat greges" ("into the field, where he was pasturing the flocks"), adding the verb "pascebat" ("was pasturing"), which has no corresponding word in the Hebrew text.