Genesis 31:17 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Then Jacob arose, &c.— Finding his wives agreeable to his proposal, Jacob resolved to put it into execution; he accordingly seized the proper opportunity, when Laban was absent from home, employed in the fields in shearing his sheep, and consequently much engaged, as it was a time of great festivity. The 19th verse would be much better rendered, Now, or For Laban had departed, or was gone to shear his sheep, when Rachel stole the images, &c. Iverat tum Laban, is Houbigant's version; the French is, Or, comme Laban etoit alle tondre ses brebis, Rachel deroba les marmousets, &c. What we render images, is in the Hebrew teraphim. Laban calls them his gods, אלהי elohai. They were a kind of Penates, or houshold gods, says Shuckford, to which they directed their worship as symbols of the Divinity, and which they consulted as oracles. That they were used as instruments of divination in after-times, appears from Ezekiel 21:21. Thus they somewhat resembled the Arabian talismans, which being made under such or such constellations, were supposed to receive the influences of those constellations, and served as oracles. Some think they were of a human shape, because we read, 1 Samuel 19:13 that Michal put one of these teraphim into David's bed, that it might pass for him. But Laban's teraphim must have been of a very small size, since Rachel hid them under the camel's furniture, and sat upon them. Some think they were representations of angelical powers, (teraphim and seraphim being the same, only with the change of a letter,) who were imagined to declare the mind of God; and that they were made in imitation of the Shechinah or Divine Presence which appeared to Abraham's family. See Spencer, Dissert. Urim et Thummim, c. iii. sect. 7, 8. Rachel stole them either for their curiosity, or for their intrinsic worth, as being of gold or silver, or some precious material; or, which is most probable, she still retained a tincture of her father's superstition or idolatry, and carried them with her, lest her father, inquiring after them, should know which way they were gone; or perhaps she hoped, by their means, to be prospered in her journey, and designed to make them the objects of her worship in Canaan; for it appears from ch. Genesis 35:4. that soon after this, idol-worship was introduced into Jacob's family. Her view could not be what some alledge, to reclaim her father from idolatry; for then she would hardly have exposed herself to danger by keeping them, and to the necessity of telling a lie to conceal them, but would rather have thrown them away. The learned Mede observes as above, that these teraphim were small images made under a certain constellation, and usually consulted both in things doubtful and future. Teraphim, among the idolaters, says he, answered the Urim and Thummim of the patriarchs.