“And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes in the field, and brought them unto his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, Give me, I pray thee, of thy son’s mandrakes.”
During wheat harvest, Reuben went out into the fields and found some mandrake plants, which he brought to his mother Leah. Rachel said to Leah: please give me some of your son's mandrakes. Mandrakes were believed in the ancient world to promote fertility — Rachel, still childless from her own womb, wants them. The request from Rachel to Leah is the first direct speech between the sisters, and it is a request for fertility aid. The application: the competition between the sisters has been conducted through children; now it is conducted through the plants believed to produce children. Both are reaching for the same thing through different means.
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