Zilpah was given to Leah as a handmaid by Leah's father, Laban, upon Leah's marriage to Jacob (see Genesis 29:24, 46:18). According to the early rabbinical commentary Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer, Zilpah and Bilhah, the handmaids of Leah and Rachel, respectively, were actually younger daughters of Laban.[3] But modern scholars believe that Zilpah and Bilhah were most likely foreign, like Tamar and Asenath.[4]
Zilpah also figured in the competition between Jacob's wives to bear him sons. Leah stopped conceiving after the birth of her fourth son, at which point [5] Rachel, who had not yet borne any children, offered her handmaid, Bilhah, to Jacob like a wife in order to have children through her. After Bilhah bore two sons, Leah took up the same idea and presented Zilpah to Jacob so she could have more children through her handmaid. Leah named the two sons of Zilpah and was directly involved in their upbringing.
According to Rashi, an 11th-century commentator, Zilpah was younger than Bilhah, and Laban's decision to give her to Leah was part of the deception he used to trick Jacob into marrying Leah, who was older than Rachel. The morning after the wedding, Laban explained to Jacob, "This is not done in our place, to give the younger before the older" (Genesis 29:26). But at night, to mask the deception, Laban gave the veiled bride the younger of the handmaids, so Jacob would think that he was really marrying Rachel, the younger of the sisters.[6]
