Genesis 12

Notes

1. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "Get thee out" (KJV) / "Go" (RSV)

   Rulings 1, 74

   לֶךְ־לְךָ is the imperative with a dative of the same person, "go, to you." The construction turns the act back on the one who does it ("arise… and go, to you," Song 2:10, 13; Josh 22:4), and the KJV's "get thee" keeps a trace of it. Rashi reads it as "for your benefit and for your good": there you will become a great nation, which here you cannot. Later Jewish readers hear "go to yourself." The words come again only at 22:2, at the binding of Isaac: "go for yourself to the land of Moriah." Both calls name what is left and leave the goal unnamed, "the land that I will make you see," "one of the mountains that I will tell you," and both narrow by three steps: land, birth, father's house here; "your son, your only one, whom you love" there. "For yourself" keeps the dative and leaves its sense open (1).

2. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "from thy kindred" (KJV) / "your kindred" (RSV)

   Rulings 2, 39

   מוֹלֶדֶת is from יָלַד "bear": the land one was born in (11:28, "the land of his birth"; 24:7) and the kin one was born among (43:7; Esth 2:10, "her people and her birth"). The KJV prints "nativity" at 11:28 and "kindred" here, two words for one. "Birth" holds both, and keeps the link with 11:28 (2).

3. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "that I will shew thee" (KJV) / "that I will show you" (RSV); at v. 7 "the LORD appeared" (KJV, RSV)

   Rulings 37, 2

   אַרְאֶךָּ is the hiphil of רָאָה "see," "I will make you see," and וַיֵּרָא and הַנִּרְאֶה in v. 7 are its niphal, "was seen." The chapter is built on the verb: Adonai will make Abram see the land (v. 1) and is seen by him (v. 7, twice), and in Egypt the Egyptians see Sarai and Pharaoh's officers see her (vv. 12, 14, 15). The KJV and RSV "show" and "appeared" hide the chain; the home gloss holds through it (37), so the reader can hear that Abram's seeing and the Egyptians' seeing are the same verb. The place of the binding is named for it, "Adonai will see" (22:14).

4. Reading↩ Back to the text

   Rulings 37, 95

   גָּדַל in the piel is "make great," of the root of גָּדוֹל "great" ("a great nation," the same verse) and מִגְדָּל "tower" (11:4). The builders said "let us make for ourselves a name" and built a tower (11:4); here Adonai makes the name great. The verb shares "great" with its adjective, and the pair is raised in the report.

5. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "and thou shalt be a blessing" (KJV) / "so that you will be a blessing" (RSV)

   Rulings 10, 1

   וֶהְיֵה is an imperative, "and be." After the run of "I will make… I will bless… I will make great," an imperative can state the result, "so that you will be" (the RSV), and the LXX reads a future, "and you will be blessed" (καὶ ἔσῃ εὐλογητός). The imperative is printed as it stands (10); English "and be" holds the command and lets the result be heard (1). בְּרָכָה "blessing" is the noun of בָּרַךְ "bless," and the root comes five times in vv. 2–3.

6. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "and curse him that curseth thee" (KJV, RSV)

   Rulings 105, 37, 2

   Two verbs: מְקַלֶּלְךָ is the piel participle of קָלַל, "make light of," and אָאֹר is אָרַר "curse." The KJV and RSV print "curse" for both and lose the difference. The one who makes light of Abram, who treats him as of no weight, is cursed by Adonai: the human act is the lighter, the divine answer the heavier. קָלַל is the verb of the waters that "became light" (8:8, 11) and of Adonai's word after the flood, "I will not again make light of the ground" (8:21); its home gloss holds (105a). Those who bless are plural and the one who makes light is singular, as in the Hebrew.

7. Decision↩ Back to the text

   Expected: "and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed" (KJV) / "and by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves" (RSV)

   Rulings 1, 46, 93

   וְנִבְרְכוּ is the niphal of בָּרַךְ, which comes only in this promise (12:3; 18:18; 28:14). The niphal may be passive, "shall be blessed," or reflexive, "shall bless themselves," that is, use Abram's name when they bless: "may you be like Abram." The same promise has the hithpael, plainly reflexive, at 22:18 and 26:4, and Ps 72:17 uses it so ("they shall bless themselves in him"). The LXX (ἐνευλογηθήσονται) and the Vulgate (benedicentur) read the passive; Rashi gives the reflexive ("a man says to his son, be like Abraham"). Paul quotes this promise in the passive as the gospel told beforehand to Abraham, that the nations would be justified by faith (Gal 3:8; also Acts 3:25). English cannot hold both. The reflexive would settle the crux against the reading the NT builds on, so under ruling 93 the passive, the niphal's commoner sense and the reading of the versions, is printed, and the reflexive is given here (46).

8. Reading↩ Back to the text

   Rulings 2, 37

   "The clans of the ground": אֲדָמָה, not אֶרֶץ. The ground was cursed for the human's sake (3:17); Noah was named for comfort "from the ground that Adonai has cursed" (5:29); after the flood Adonai said he would not again make light of it (8:21). The blessing to the clans of the ground answers those curses. "Clans" are the kin groups of the Table (10:5, 18, 20, 31–32).

9. Reading↩ Back to the text

   Ruling 6

   רְכוּשׁ and רָכַשׁ are noun and verb of one root, "gains… gained," kept as a cognate pair (6), as in 11:3. "Acquire" is held for קָנָה (4:1). The noun is movable property, goods and herds (13:6; 14:11–12; 15:14, "they will go out with great gains"). The pair is raised in the report.

10. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "and the souls that they had gotten in Haran" (KJV) / "and the persons that they had gotten in Haran" (RSV)

    Rulings 2, 46

    הַנֶּפֶשׁ אֲשֶׁר עָשׂוּ is "the soul that they had made," a collective singular. עָשָׂה can mean to get wealth ("he has made all this weight," 31:1; "my hand has made me this power," Deut 8:17), and so slaves and household may be meant. Targum Onkelos reads "the souls they had made subject to the Torah," and Genesis Rabbah 39:14, with Rashi, says that Abram converted the men and Sarai the women, and scripture counts them as if they had made them. The core gloss "soul" and the home gloss "make" are both kept (2), and the sense is left where the Hebrew leaves it; the expected "gotten" is one of its readings.

11. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 6

    "To go to the land of Canaan, and they came to the land of Canaan": the purpose of 11:31 is repeated word for word, and this time it is reached. Terah set out for Canaan and stopped in Harran (11:31); Abram goes on.

12. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "unto the plain of Moreh" (KJV) / "to the oak of Moreh" (RSV)

    Rulings 2, 18, 112

    אֵלוֹן is a great tree that marks a holy place: "the terebinths of Mamre" (13:18; 18:1), "the terebinth of the diviners" (Judg 9:37). The species is unsure. The Hebrew has three near words, אֵלָה, אֵלוֹן and אַלּוֹן, which English versions print "terebinth" and "oak" without a rule; the field is fixed as a set (112): אֵלוֹן and אֵלָה "terebinth," אַלּוֹן "oak." The KJV's "plain" comes from the Targums (מֵישַׁר). מוֹרֶה is "one who teaches" or "gives oracles," the participle of יָרָה, whose noun is תּוֹרָה; the tree may have been a place of oracles. Shechem's name is also the word for "shoulder" (H7926), perhaps from the ridge between Ebal and Gerizim.

13. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 74

    "And the Canaanite was then in the land." Abraham ibn Ezra remarks that the clause seems to look back from a time when the Canaanite was no longer in the land, and adds that "it has a secret, and the one who understands will keep silent." Spinoza cites it as evidence that Moses did not write the whole Pentateuch (Theological-Political Treatise 8). Rashi reads it of the Canaanite conquering the land from the line of Shem at that time. The clause also sets the promise of v. 7 against the fact: the land is given to a seed not yet born, while others hold it.

14. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Rulings 4, 46

    "To your seed": זֶרַע is the seed of 3:15 and 4:25, offspring in a collective singular. Sarai is barren (11:30), and the promise is made to a seed. Paul argues from the singular of the promise to Abraham's seed, "not 'and to seeds,' as of many, but as of one" (Gal 3:16), following the Greek σπέρμα (4). The Hebrew word is singular in form and collective in use, and the one gloss "seed" keeps both readings in view.

15. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Rulings 9, 18

    בֵּית־אֵל is "house of El." Jacob names the place Bethel at 28:19, where its first name is said to have been Luz; here it already has the later name. El in a place name is printed as part of the name (9). The chapter's names are in the names table, reached from the note at v. 15.

16. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Rulings 39, 18

    "Bethel from the sea and Ai from the east": Hebrew names the west for the sea (the Mediterranean) and the east for what is in front, קֶדֶם, of one who faces the sunrise. The directions are kept as the Hebrew gives them (39); the WPRB has "to the west" and "to the east." Ai, הָעַי, has the article, "the ruin": Joshua burns it and makes it "a heap of the age" (Josh 8:28).

17. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 2

    "And called on the name of Adonai": the words of 4:26, when it was begun to call on the name of Adonai. Abram builds an altar and calls on the name at his stopping places (12:7–8; 13:4, 18; 21:33). Targum Onkelos has "and prayed in the name of the LORD."

18. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "toward the south" (KJV) / "toward the Negeb" (RSV)

    Rulings 18, 39

    נֶגֶב is the dry land south of the Judean hills, and so "south" in general (13:14; Exod 26:18). Here it has the ה of direction, "Negev-ward," and is the region, not the point of the compass, so the name is printed (18). The two infinitives, "going and breaking camp," are the Hebrew way of saying that he went on by stages.

19. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "a famine" (KJV, RSV)

    Rulings 2, 39

    רָעָב is hunger, in a body and in a land: "they will die by the sword and by hunger" (Jer 11:22); "all the land of Egypt hungered" (41:55, the verb). The famines of Genesis (12:10; 26:1; 41–47) are the hunger of a land, and "hunger" keeps the word a person feels (39). The verse says it twice, and the second time the hunger is "heavy."

20. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "grievous" (KJV) / "severe" (RSV)

    Rulings 39, 2

    כָּבֵד is "heavy," the adjective of the root of כָּבוֹד "weight, glory." A heavy hunger (41:31; 43:1; 47:4, 13) is the same word as Abram's being "very heavy in livestock" (13:2) and Pharaoh's heavy heart (Exod 7:14). The concrete word is kept (39).

21. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "when he was come near" (KJV) / "when he was about to enter" (RSV)

    Ruling 20

    הִקְרִיב is the hiphil of קָרַב, "bring near" when it has an object. Here it has none and means "drew near," as at Exod 14:10 ("and Pharaoh drew near," וּפַרְעֹה הִקְרִיב). The stem is split by construction (20), and the row records it. In the cult the hiphil with an object is to bring an offering near (Lev 1:2).

22. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 74

    "Say, please, that you are my sister": at 20:12 Abram says she is his father's daughter but not his mother's, and the same ruse is told of him at Gerar (20:1–18) and of Isaac (26:6–11). The Genesis Apocryphon from Qumran (1QapGen 19–20) gives Abram a dream of a cedar and a palm, in which the palm saves the cedar, and praises Sarai's beauty at length. נָא is "please" both times (vv. 11, 13): Abram asks; he does not command.

23. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 18

    פַּרְעֹה is Egyptian pr-ʿꜣ, "great house," the palace and so the king. The Hebrew uses it as a name and gives no personal name, and the verse goes on to "the house of Pharaoh." The names of the chapter are in the names table below.

    See the table

24. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "maidservants" (KJV, RSV)

    Rulings 76, 34

    שִׁפְחָה is a woman in service, here among the livestock and slaves given to Abram. Ruling 76 leaves the word to be ruled at Gen 16, where Hagar the Egyptian is Sarai's שִׁפְחָה (16:1), with "maid" as the candidate. "Maid" is printed here, and the gloss is settled there (113). Genesis Rabbah 45:1 makes Hagar one of the gifts of this verse, a daughter of Pharaoh. עֲבָדִים are "slaves," given as property (34).

25. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "plagued Pharaoh with great plagues" (KJV, RSV)

    Rulings 2, 6

    וַיְנַגַּע is the piel of נָגַע "touch," and נְגָעִים is its noun: a cognate construction, "touched… with touches." The noun is a blow and the mark it leaves: the "stroke" of a lawsuit (Deut 17:8; 21:5, KJV "stroke"), the skin disease of Lev 13, and the last blow on Egypt (Exod 11:1). The verb keeps its home gloss "touch"; the noun is printed "strokes," since "touches" would make the blows light, the reverse of the sense. The scene foreshadows the Exodus: Pharaoh struck, Abram's woman released, Abram sent away with wealth (Genesis Rabbah 40:6).

26. Decision↩ Back to the text

    Expected: "because of Sarai" (KJV, RSV)

    Rulings 2, 1

    עַל־דְּבַר is "on the word of," the idiom for "on account of" (20:11, 18; 43:18). Genesis Rabbah 41:2 and Rashi read it as it stands: the messenger struck at Sarai's word; she said "strike," and he struck. "On the word of Sarai" holds the idiom and the literal sense (1) and keeps the home gloss of דָּבָר (2).

27. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Ruling 37

    "What is this you have done?" (מַה־זֹּאת עָשִׂיתָ) are the words of Adonai Elohim to the woman in the garden (3:13). Abimelech puts it to Isaac (26:10), and Jacob to Laban (29:25). Here a foreign king puts to Abram the question put to the woman.

28. Reading↩ Back to the text

    Rulings 20, 37

    "Sent him away" is the piel of שָׁלַח, the verb of Moses' demand, "send my people away" (Exod 5:1), and of Pharaoh's yielding (Exod 12:33; 13:17). With the going down for hunger (v. 10) and the strokes (v. 17), the chapter tells in small what Exodus tells at length.