I. Name

On the assumption that he was originally a semi-divine hero or a god (Meyer 1906), Laban, the son of Bethuel (Gen. 28.5) and father of Leah and Rachel (Gen. 29.16) has been connected with the Old Assyrian god Laba(n) (E. Schrader, Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament [Berlin 1903; 3rd ed. by H. Winckler & H. Zimmern] 363). The name of the latter deity has been interpreted as a shortened form of Labnān, which would mean that Laban was “originally an ancient West-Semitic deity venerated in the Lebanon” (Le…