Exposing the Manipulator - Laban the Scorpion

One of the hardest types of people for us normal folk to understand: the compulsive manipulator. He or she will scheme and manipulate even when it is not to their benefit to do so. Against the regular predator or bully, we can contain their behaviour by ensuring it is always to their benefit to not give us problems. For the compulsive manipulator, on the other hand, that is not good enough. Even if it is to their detriment they cannot help but to scheme, plot and deceive.

I don't know much about how to manage such people; being able to recognize them in the first place will allow us to be on our guard and not be caught by surprise. The Scriptural account of Jacob and Laban gives us crucial insights into how they behave and think, so we can tell what we are up against and plan our escape accordingly.

Foothold

Gen 29:15 - Then Laban said to Jacob, “Because you are my relative, should you therefore serve me for nothing? Tell me, what should your wages be?”

On the surface, Laban looks very noble here. It looked as if he wanted a fair exchange of value between Jacob and him. But actually, Jacob serving Laban freely made Laban VERY uncomfortable. Why? Because there was nothing to manipulate. The compulsive manipulator knows subconsciously that Jacob was free to walk away at any moment. And he was fishing for some way to hold on to Jacob, not only for the sake of tangible benefit, but because it was his nature to scheme and manipulate.

Jacob gave Laban the opening he wanted; when Laban knew Jacob wanted to Rachel as his wife, he made a deal and sank his hooks into Jacob. However, instead of keeping his word and securing Jacob's trust and loyalty, he foisted off Leah on Jacob.

Breaking Trust

Genesis 29:25-27 (NKJV) - And he said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? Was it not for Rachel that I served you? Why then have you deceived me?”

And Laban said, “It must not be done so in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn.  Fulfill her week, and we will give you this one also for the service which you will serve with me still another seven years.”

There are two sorts of liars in this world:

• those that want to be believed (so they make their lies believable)
• and those who don't care. They actually get a kick out of forcing people around them to swallow their nonsense.

Laban is obviously the second sort. If what he said was true, how could Jacob have worked for him seven years and never saw that happen before? Or that Jacob would not just ask a local if that really was the custom in that part of the world? But Laban was the sort who would never admit to being wrong or committing it. He would either double-down on the lie (use outrageous lies to cover up the earlier ones) or change the topic and use manipulation instead. "You are my son-in-law, how could you not trust me?" Laban could have said something like "I could have refused to let you marry either of my daughters in the first place; is this how you repay my kindness?"

How did I know Laban was such a sort? It comes out later in the account. For now, suffice it to say that if you meet someone who refuses to give you a straight answer to your questions but keeps diverting them away, or his or her claims get more ludicrous as the conversation continues, recognize that you are dealing with such a compulsive manipulator. Better to cut your losses and leave the situation as soon as possible.

Note also how Laban cunningly manipulated the situation. By the time Jacob realized what Laban did, these were his options:

1) dump Leah and leave - then his seven years would have gained him NOTHING.

2) take Leah and leave - then he would not have gotten what he wanted. Laban would have taken it as a win. Make no mistake about it; Laban counts it as a win if he can make you lose. Meanwhile, he could still use his other daughter, Rachel, as a bargaining chip with other men and secure another beneficial alliance.

3) take both Leah and Rachel and leave immediately, breaking his promise to work another seven years - then Jacob would have only gotten what he originally wanted. Leah would still be off Laban's hands. Given that Leah was harder to marry off, he may have already written her off as an asset that would unlikely to yield much of a return on his investment in the first place.

Jacob, being inherently an honourable person, kept his promise and stayed his term. So, when Jacob's term of service was up, Laban had to make yet another play to secure Jacob. Jacob thought he was prepared for this.

You're never really prepared

Genesis 30:25 - 26 (NKJV) - And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own place and to my country. Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, and let me go; for you know my service which I have done for you.”

One of the biggest clues that you are facing a manipulator boss - none of his or her staff want to stay. Or they don't want to take up higher positions and the boss has to find outsiders to fill the managerial or leadership roles. Staff either resign or are fired. In this case, you see Jacob, a long-time employee of Laban, not keen to stay, even though he had married into Laban's family. Why? Because he knows Laban cannot be trusted.

Laban makes yet another play on Jacob's good nature, as manipulators do to the people around them.

Genesis 30:27-28 (NKJV) - And Laban said to him, “Please stay, if I have found favor in your eyes, for I have learned by experience that the LORD has blessed me for your sake.” Then he said, “Name me your wages, and I will give it.”

If you are the regular run-of-the-mill Christian, odds are that you would be taken in by Laban's words here. We'd take Laban's words to mean that he recognizes God's blessing through Jacob and will respect Jacob accordingly. Nope. It was just a ploy. Even the call to Jacob to name his wages was to give Laban the opportunity to find loopholes in Jacob's terms and exploit them. Watch and see...

Genesis 30:31-36 - So he said, “What shall I give you?”

And Jacob said, “You shall not give me anything. If you will do this thing for me, I will again feed and keep your flocks: Let me pass through all your flock today, removing from there all the speckled and spotted sheep, and all the brown ones among the lambs, and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and these shall be my wages. So my righteousness will answer for me in time to come, when the subject of my wages comes before you: every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the lambs, will be considered stolen, if it is with me.

 And Laban said, “Oh, that it were according to your word!” So he removed that day the male goats that were speckled and spotted, all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had some white in it, and all the brown ones among the lambs, and gave them into the hand of his sons. 36 Then he put three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob fed the rest of Laban’s flocks.

Jacob made the number one mistake we make with such people; he thought that if he gave Laban a good deal at the beginning, Laban would just take it and not try to shortchange Jacob further. Nope, such people do not see concessions as a sign of goodwill, they see concessions as a sign of your weakness, as an invitation to prey on you further. Laban was not content with the extremely good deal Jacob offered him. Before Jacob could take out for himself the speckled and spotted animals, Laban took them away first.

Can you imagine the chagrin on Jacob's face at the end of the day when he looked through the flocks and found nothing he could take for his own? Was Laban sniggering at one side? In a modern setting I can imagine Laban ghosting Jacob's text messages and always being too 'busy' to answer Jacob's demands for an explanation.

Laban is like the scorpion in the story of the frog and the scorpion; the scorpion stings the frog in the middle of the river even though it means itself drowning to death, because that is in its nature. Likewise for Laban; he cannot resist the temptation to immediately show he has outwitted Jacob. Regardless of the long-term consequences, Laban has convinced himself that his wit and quick tongue will always enable him to come out on top.

You can see the next move coming

Genesis 31:1-2 - Jacob heard that Laban’s sons were saying, “Jacob has taken everything our father owned and has gained all this wealth from what belonged to our father.”  And Jacob noticed that Laban’s attitude toward him was not what it had been.

Scorpion Supporters - Don't be surprised if the scorpion has supporters. Sometimes they are people who are convinced the scorpion is working towards their good, such as the beneficiaries of a charity the scorpion is heading. Sometimes they are manipulated into supporting the scorpion. Sometimes the supporter is a toady, he himself is also a manipulator who has figured out the chief scorpion's weakness and is happily pandering to it. Why? Maybe that's how he can wheedle out luxury watches from the chief scorpion later, or he sees the chief scorpion as the means to achieving his dreams of living on landed property in Singapore. Who knows?

Whatever it is, when the supporters of the scorpion are eying you and the scorpion himself/herself is clearly unhappy with you (because you managed to work your way around their scheming), be prepared. It is obvious that Laban and his sons were up to something; since Jacob knew they held the overwhelming advantage in their home territory, he figured out it was time to leave.

Genesis 31:19 - When Laban had gone to shear his sheep, Rachel stole her father’s household gods.

The daughters themselves resented their father. Rachel pretty much betrayed her own father. What do you expect? Everytime Laban shortchanged Jacob, he shortchanged their husband, the one who was providing for them. Laban obviously did not care about his daughters once he had married them off to Jacob.

Here is another clue to help you recognize manipulators; they are always on their guard against betrayal. They'll complain about how hard it is to find people they can trust or rely on, conveniently forgetting that they themselves created bad blood with people who know them best. Sometimes the untrusting person is not one who has been preyed often too often; sometimes it is a predator who discovered that occasionally the prey bites back!

Genesis 31:26-30: Then Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done? You’ve deceived me, and you’ve carried off my daughters like captives in war. Why did you run off secretly and deceive me? Why didn’t you tell me, so I could send you away with joy and singing to the music of timbrels and harps? You didn’t even let me kiss my grandchildren and my daughters goodbye. You have done a foolish thing. I have the power to harm you; but last night the God of your father said to me, ‘Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.’ Now you have gone off because you longed to return to your father’s household. But why did you steal my gods?”

Finally, the confrontation between Laban and Jacob takes place. Note how Laban just HAD to mention that he had the power to harm Jacob. Manipulators are often enjoy making threats, because everything is ultimately a power game to them, and they know that threats are often effective in either intimidating, confusing or distracting people. He then tries to show how woke he is by saying Jacob left because he missed his family at home. Nope. Jacob left because Laban was a horrible person, but Laban grabbed the opportunity to get his point in first to sway the audience his way.

Jacob, of course, would have none of it.

Genesis 31:36 -37 -  Jacob was angry and took Laban to task. “What is my crime?” he asked Laban. “How have I wronged you that you hunt me down? Although you have searched all my things, what part of your household things have you found? Set it here before my brethren and your brethren, that they may judge between us both!"

Manipulators shrink away from such public exposure like a vampire from garlic. They want to stay on their home territory so that they can control the narrative and what the people around them hear. The last thing they want is a face-to-face confrontation with someone in public and openly displaying all the evidence clearly against them. Laban brought along his relatives both as a show of strength and for an audience for his intended humiliation and defeat of Jacob; now they stood as witness that Jacob was innocent and Laban had mistreated and shortchanged Jacob horribly. Did Jacob's following words make them recall occasions when Laban pulled a fast one on them too?

Genesis 31:38-42 - “I have been with you for twenty years now. Your sheep and goats have not miscarried, nor have I eaten rams from your flocks.  I did not bring you animals torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss myself. And you demanded payment from me for whatever was stolen by day or night.  This was my situation: The heat consumed me in the daytime and the cold at night, and sleep fled from my eyes.  It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times. If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.”

Trying desperately to salvage face

Genesis 31:43 - Laban answered Jacob, “The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne?

And even after he is exposed, did he repent? Nope. People like that find it very hard to repent. That takes reflecting upon their own actions, and acknowledging to themselves and to others that ALL their motivations and actions have been based on selfishness and a sick desire to control others, regardless of whatever cause they claimed to have been serving. Even when they appear outwardly contrite, their minds are scrabbling frantically for ways to save face, then rewrite the narrative in their favour. Admitting to wrong feels like dying to them.

So even if you somehow manage to stop their schemes in their tracks (by police action, independent arbitration or such), expect that they will still scramble to eke out some way to salvage their lost face.

Genesis 31:49 - 50 - May the LORD keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other. If you mistreat my daughters or if you take any wives besides my daughters, even though no one is with us, remember that God is a witness between you and me.”

Honestly, Laban is in no position to demand that Jacob not shortchange Leah and Rachel. Jacob has the track record of being responsible, Laban doesn't. Laban is only grandstanding, trying to regain some face in front of his own relatives and trying to fish for sympathy from his two daughters. I bet they rolled their eyes when he said all this!

Two Parting Thoughts

A) In the end, Jacob was able to out-maneuver Laban only because of God intervening and Rachel taking her own action behind his back. Otherwise it would not have ended so well for Jacob. If you ever think of trying to confront or bring down a scorpion, please recognize that it will not be easy. They are the sort who will have lawyers on retainer, professional indemnity insurance and maybe even a PR firm on call. This is not an easy battle to survive, much less win. Personally I think it is safer for you to learn to recognize such scorpions and just avoid them as much as you can.

B) Laban left defeated this time. His relatives now knew there was some truth to all the rumours circulating about him before. Even though Laban would still have the support of his sons, and there was nothing to keep him from finding a new victim to exploit and shortchange, how would it all have ended? Were his sons each manipulators in their own rights, and tore the family apart in the inheritance wars that would have begun even while Laban was still alive? Or did the brightest among them manage to scam all the rest of his brothers and get the lion's share of whatever remained of Laban's wealth?

Whatever the scenario, I cannot imagine Laban living out the rest of his days happy and fulfilled. He always had to wonder if his sons were preparing to move against him behind his back, even while he was still alive. And if there was a chief toady, would that toady have remained with Laban after he got his branded watches and fulfilled his landed-property dreams? Or would he have ghosted Laban and left Laban alone in his declining years? Who's to say? I only know that the law of sowing and reaping will eventually bite such scorpions hard, and they will discover that there are many who would smile at seeing their fate.

So guard yourself against such scorpions, and for God's sake don't ever become one of them yourself!