Talk:Laban (Bible)

rename article
Please consider renaming this article Laban, son of Bethuel as per Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Bible. Lemmiwinks2 (talk) 21:11, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Laben not stepfather of Jacob?
I can't find any part of the bible that actually states that Laben is stepfather of Jacob. Could you offer a reference to the exact line in the bible that asserts this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Guidocalvano (talk • contribs) 12:31, 28 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Laben not stepfather of Jacob-- nor does Wikipedia claim that he is.
 * Laben is father-in-law (and uncle) to Jacob. tahc chat 15:28, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

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Copying text I deleted about Balaam and Laban
"Aram was a place filled with witchcraft . It appears than Laban was a magician as he said "I divined" .  Laban and Bilaam, also identified as being from Aram, are identified as the same person ."

I think if we attribute this to Yehuda Nachshoni and reference it properly it might be ok. Since I don't have the source I don't know.

"Yehuda Nachshoni wrote that Aram was full of witchcraft and that Laban was probably a magician, based on the fact that he said "I devined". He also identified Laban with Bilaam who is also described as being from Aram." Then the citation with pages 183-184. But I'd like to see quotes first.

There's another problem however. I don't know why Balaam (that's the spelling we use) isn't mentioned already, and we can't just mention one perhaps obsolete identification without mentioning the other possibilities, that Balaam was Laban's grandson, nephew, son or not related at all(see the first link and ). Doug Weller talk 14:36, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

The problem is in transliteration. Any transliteration that gets the consonant pronunciation correct, is technically not wrong, but it may not be the most common use (Remember the vowels are sometimes lost to history, since they were often not written in the ancient texts). Sometimes the commonly accepted pronunciation or spelling is just wrong, but the incorrect version became so popular that it overwrote the original pronunciation. For example Pharoah is pronounced Par-oh with a hard P in Hebrew, which is an older source than any I know of for this title. However Far-oh is used so commonly that it overwrote the original pronunciation and the original is no longer recognized by most people. For many proper names in the texts, the names get pronounced in more than one way. Adam's son Able is really Hevel originally. Cain is Kay-in (rhymes with Sky-in) and so on for many names. I've seen Bilaam spelled differently too and there might be more than one Bilaam or Baalam but they lived in different time periods, but since the text is not always chronological, it can get confusing. Also the vowel placement of the name might be disputed because the vowels are probably lost to history, so people disagree on the proper pronunciation and for some words or names it may never have one correct answer.

Bottom line, please don't let the radically different spellings throw you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mage67usa (talk • contribs) 20:59, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Don't let one our policy to use the most commonly used term throw you off from addressing everything else he said. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:21, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Don't understand why I need the quotes if I'm not directly quoting. Wouldn't I be misleading by putting in quotes when it's not a direct quote? I understand I still need to put in the reference, even without the quotes. However I did cite the reference, and I believe I cited it properly. So I'm not sure what the issue is here. Even the editor said the source is probably credible. Did I miss any other points brought up that more explanation is still necessary on my part? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mage67usa (talk • contribs) 21:53, 15 November 2018 (UTC)