Genesis 31:44 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Now therefore come, &c.— Finding it impossible to do Jacob any injury, Laban assumes the language of tenderness and affection; and, like a true worldly man, carefully provides against receiving any injury from Jacob, whom his conscience assured him he had great cause to fear: he therefore proposes the solemn engagement of a mutual covenant, which was accordingly ratified between them by all the usual ceremonies of sacrifice, Genesis 31:54 feasting and erecting heaps of stone in memorial. Jacob said to his brethren, Genesis 31:46. (where, as well as in Genesis 31:23 we have further instances of the general sense given to the word brethren,) gather stones, &c.; and they did EAT there the feast upon the sacrifice. Laban gave the pillar, or heap of stones; a Syrian name, Jegar—sahadutha, and Jacob a Hebrew one, Galeed, each importing the same thing, namely, the heap of witness, as Laban explains in Genesis 31:48. And for another purpose it was also called Mizpah, Genesis 31:49 that is, a beacon, or watch-tower, for the reasons immediately assigned. Laban uses the word Jehovah in that verse; whence it seems to follow, that Jehovah was known to him, the God of Jacob, as indeed there can be no doubt but he was, considering the time Jacob had sojourned with him.