Good Fortune Has Come: A Story of Zilpah

Leah had borne four sons, and then she stopped bearing. Rachel had already given her maid Bilhah to Yaakov, and Bilhah had borne Dan and Naftali. Leah saw this, and she took Zilpah and gave her to Yaakov as a wife. Targum Yonasan says that before she did so, she freed her.

Zilpah bore a son. Chazal point out that the Torah does not say she conceived, as it says of all the other mothers, but only that she bore. Rashi explains that she was so young that no one could see she was expecting until the child was born.

Leah said, Good fortune has come, and called him Gad. The Midrash hears even more in her words: the good fortune of the house has come, the good fortune of the world has come. Rashi adds the Midrash that Gad was born already circumcised.

Then Zilpah bore a second son. Leah said, In my happiness, for women will call me happy, and she called him Asher. The Midrash explains that people would see and say: Happy is the one who merited this. It also says that Asher never had to lodge at an inn, and Yaakov would later bless him that his bread would be rich, fit for kings.

The Torah sums it up simply: the sons of Zilpah, Leah's maid, Gad and Asher. Leah gave the names, but the children were Zilpah's, and they were counted among the twelve tribes.

Source: Bereishis 30:9–13 and 49:20; Targum Yonasan on Bereishis 30:9; Rashi on Bereishis 30:10–11; Midrash Bereishis Rabbah 71:9–10. English: The Sefaria Midrash Rabbah (2022); The Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel, trans. J. W. Etheridge (London 1862).