What Does Genesis 30:41 Mean?

Whenever the stronger of the flock were mating, Jacob would lay the sticks in the troughs before the eyes of the flock, that they might mate in front of the sticks. The selective application of the stick strategy is now revealed: Jacob used it with the "stronger" (mequsharot) animals, not with the weaker ones. The Hebrew root for "stronger" here may refer to animals that mated in the early season, which produced hardier offspring. The selective use of the sticks with only the stronger animals is the key to the economic strategy.

If the sticks were used only for the early-mating animals (the stronger ones) and not for the late-mating animals (the weaker ones, verse 42), then the abnormally colored offspring produced through Jacob's stick strategy would tend to be the stronger animals in that category. The weak animals would produce normal-colored offspring (Laban's) without stick stimulation. The result: Jacob's herd would be disproportionately strong; Laban's would be disproportionately weak.

This selective application is the legal sophistication of the strategy: everything is within the agreed terms (all abnormally colored offspring are Jacob's; all normally colored offspring are Laban's), but the application of the breeding management to favor strength in Jacob's category produces not just more of Jacob's type of animals but stronger ones. After six years, Jacob's herd is both larger and of higher quality than Laban's remaining flock.