The attemped murder by Laban the Aramean: an example of intertextual reading in Midrash

Abstract

This article deals with the question of why Laban the Aramean, a rather harmless character as presented in the biblical text, is generally portrayed in rabbinic literature as a major enemy of Israel. It is argued that the view of Laban as a villain developed as a result of rabbinic hermeneutics, and that the characteristics attributed to him in rabbinic literature were not arbitrarily chosen due to some extra-textual issue or an ideologically motivated wish to provide him with a set of negative characteristics. Rather, they are an outcome of a reading of the biblical text, albeit a reading that is naturally biased and conditioned by a certain set of assumptions. The rabbis were grappling with the biblical text in a process where they filled in gaps that they perceived in the text and explained repetitions and inconsistencies having certain assumptions of how these features were to be understood. It is suggested that a factor which most probably played a significant role in developing a negative view of Laban was an intertextual reading of Deut 26:5 and Gen 31:23-25 that seems to have given rise to the idea that Laban attempted to kill Jacob when the latter fled from Haran.