And now, though you would wish to be gone, because you greatly longed after your father's house, yet why have you stolen my gods?
All Commentaries on Genesis 31:30 Go To Genesis 31
John Chrysostom
AD 407
What extraordinary folly—what kind of gods are these of yours that can be stolen? Aren’t you ashamed to say, “Why did you steal my household gods?” See the extraordinary extent of Laban’s selfdeception such that people endowed with reason should worship wood and stone. These gods of yours, Laban, could not prevent their being stolen. How could they, after all, being made out of stone? The God of this good man, on the contrary, even if the good man was unaware of it, checked your aggression. Are you ignorant of your own error while still charging the good man with theft? After all, why on earth would the good man bring himself to steal them when he despised them, or rather realized they were made of stone and had no feeling? Homilies on Genesis
