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you don’t succeed, then you are free from this oath; but under no circumstances are you to take my son there.”
         9  So the servant vowed * to follow Abraham’s instructions.
         10  He took with him ten of Abraham’s camels loaded with samples of the best of everything his master owned and journeyed to Iraq, to Nahor’s village. 11  There he made the camels kneel down outside the town, beside a spring. It was evening, and the women of the village were coming to draw water.
         12  “O Jehovah, the God of my master,” he prayed, “show kindness to my master Abraham and help me to accomplish the purpose of my journey. 13  See, here I am, standing beside this spring, and the girls of the village are coming out to draw water. 14  This is my request: When I ask one of them for a drink and she says, ‘Yes, certainly, and I will water your camels too!’—let her be the one you have appointed as Isaac’s wife. That is how I will know.”
         15-16  As he was still speaking to the Lord about this, a beautiful young girl * named Rebekah arrived with a water jug on her shoulder and filled it at the spring. (Her father was Bethuel the son of Nahor * and his wife Milcah.) 17  Running over to her, the servant asked her for a drink.
         18  “Certainly, sir,” she said, and quickly lowered the jug for him to drink. 19  Then she said, “I’ll draw water for your camels, too, until they have enough!”
         20  So she emptied the jug into the watering trough and ran down to the spring again and kept carrying water to the camels until they had enough. 21  The servant said no more, but watched her carefully to see if she would finish the job, * so that he would know whether she was the one. 22  Then at last, when the camels had finished drinking, he produced a quarter-ounce gold earring * and two five-ounce gold bracelets for her wrists.
         23  “Whose daughter are you, miss?” he asked. “Would your father have any room to put us up for the night?”
         24  “My father is Bethuel,” she replied. “My grandparents are Milcah and Nahor. 25  Yes, we have plenty of straw and food for the camels, and a guest room.”
         26  The man stood there a moment with head bowed, worshiping Jehovah. 27  “Thank you, Lord God of my master Abraham,” he prayed; “thank you for being so kind and true to him, and for leading me straight to the family of my master’s relatives.”
         28  The girl ran home to tell her folks, * 29-30  and when her brother Laban saw the ring, and the bracelets on his sister’s wrists, and heard her story, he rushed out to the spring where the man was still standing beside his camels, and said to him, 31  “Come and stay with us, friend; * why stand here outside the city when we have a room all ready for you, and a place prepared for the camels!”
         32  So the man went home with Laban, and Laban gave him straw to bed down the camels, and feed for them, and water for the camel drivers to wash their feet. 33  Then supper was served. But the old man said, “I don’t want to eat until I have told you why I am here.”
         “All right,” Laban said, “tell us your errand.”
         34  “I am Abraham’s servant,” he explained. 35  “And Jehovah has overwhelmed my master with blessings so that he is a great man among the people of his land. God has given him flocks of sheep and herds of cattle, and a fortune in silver and gold, and many slaves and camels and donkeys.
         36  “Now when Sarah, my master’s wife, was very old, she gave birth to my master’s son, and my master has given him everything he owns. 37  And my master made me promise not to let Isaac marry one of the local girls, * 38  but to come to his relatives here in this far-off land, to his brother’s family, * and to bring back a girl from here to marry his son. 39  ‘But suppose I can’t find a girl who will