11:10 This is the account of Shem.
Shem was 100 old when he became the father of Arphaxad, two years after the flood.
12:4 So Abram left, 1 just as the Lord had told him to do, 2 and Lot went with him. (Now 3 Abram was 75 years old 4 when he departed from Haran.)
15:9 The Lord 5 said to him, “Take for me a heifer, a goat, and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”
17:1 When Abram was 99 years old, 6 the Lord appeared to him and said, 7 “I am the sovereign God. 8 Walk 9 before me 10 and be blameless. 11
18:13 The Lord said to Abraham, “Why 15 did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really 16 have a child when I am old?’
26:34 When 28 Esau was forty years old, 29 he married 30 Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, as well as Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite.
1 sn So Abram left. This is the report of Abram’s obedience to God’s command (see v. 1).
2 tn Heb “just as the
3 tn The disjunctive clause (note the pattern conjunction + subject + implied “to be” verb) is parenthetical, telling the age of Abram when he left Haran.
4 tn Heb “was the son of five years and seventy year[s].”
sn Terah was 70 years old when he became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran (Gen 11:26). Terah was 205 when he died in Haran (11:32). Abram left Haran at the age of 75 after his father died. Abram was born when Terah was 130. Abram was not the firstborn – he is placed first in the list of three because of his importance. The same is true of the list in Gen 10:1 (Shem, Ham and Japheth). Ham was the youngest son (9:24). Japheth was the older brother of Shem (10:21), so the birth order of Noah’s sons was Japheth, Shem, and Ham.
5 tn Heb “He”; the referent (the
6 tn Heb “the son of ninety-nine years.”
7 tn Heb “appeared to Abram and said to him.” The proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“him”) and the final phrase “to him” has been left untranslated for stylistic reasons.
8 tn The name אֵל שַׁדַּי (’el shadday, “El Shaddai”) has often been translated “God Almighty,” primarily because Jerome translated it omnipotens (“all powerful”) in the Latin Vulgate. There has been much debate over the meaning of the name. For discussion see W. F. Albright, “The Names Shaddai and Abram,” JBL 54 (1935): 173-210; R. Gordis, “The Biblical Root sdy-sd,” JTS 41 (1940): 34-43; and especially T. N. D. Mettinger, In Search of God, 69-72. Shaddai/El Shaddai is the sovereign king of the world who grants, blesses, and judges. In the Book of Genesis he blesses the patriarchs with fertility and promises numerous descendants. Outside Genesis he both blesses/protects and takes away life/happiness. The patriarchs knew God primarily as El Shaddai (Exod 6:3). While the origin and meaning of this name are uncertain (see discussion below) its significance is clear. The name is used in contexts where God appears as the source of fertility and life. In Gen 17:1-8 he appeared to Abram, introduced himself as El Shaddai, and announced his intention to make the patriarch fruitful. In the role of El Shaddai God repeated these words (now elevated to the status of a decree) to Jacob (35:11). Earlier Isaac had pronounced a blessing on Jacob in which he asked El Shaddai to make Jacob fruitful (28:3). Jacob later prayed that his sons would be treated with mercy when they returned to Egypt with Benjamin (43:14). The fertility theme is not as apparent here, though one must remember that Jacob viewed Benjamin as the sole remaining son of the favored and once-barren Rachel (see 29:31; 30:22-24; 35:16-18). It is quite natural that he would appeal to El Shaddai to preserve Benjamin’s life, for it was El Shaddai’s miraculous power which made it possible for Rachel to give him sons in the first place. In 48:3 Jacob, prior to blessing Joseph’s sons, told him how El Shaddai appeared to him at Bethel (see Gen 28) and promised to make him fruitful. When blessing Joseph on his deathbed Jacob referred to Shaddai (we should probably read “El Shaddai,” along with a few Hebrew
9 tn Or “Live out your life.” The Hebrew verb translated “walk” is the Hitpael; it means “to walk back and forth; to walk about; to live out one’s life.”
10 tn Or “in my presence.”
11 tn There are two imperatives here: “walk…and be blameless [or “perfect”].” The second imperative may be purely sequential (see the translation) or consequential: “walk before me and then you will be blameless.” How one interprets the sequence depends on the meaning of “walk before”: (1) If it simply refers in a neutral way to serving the
12 tn Heb “saying.”
13 tn It has been suggested that this word should be translated “conception,” not “pleasure.” See A. A. McIntosh, “A Third Root ‘adah in Biblical Hebrew,” VT 24 (1974): 454-73.
14 tn The word “too” has been added in the translation for stylistic reasons.
15 tn Heb “Why, this?” The demonstrative pronoun following the interrogative pronoun is enclitic, emphasizing the
16 tn The Hebrew construction uses both הַאַף (ha’af) and אֻמְנָם (’umnam): “Indeed, truly, will I have a child?”
17 tn The verb שָׁכַב (shakhav) means “to lie down, to recline,” that is, “to go to bed.” Here what appears to be an imperfect is a preterite after the adverb טֶרֶם (terem). The nuance of potential (perfect) fits well.
18 tn Heb “and the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, from the young to the old, all the people from the end [of the city].” The repetition of the phrase “men of” stresses all kinds of men.
19 tn Or “she conceived.”
20 tn Heb “to my master.” This has been replaced by the pronoun “him” in the translation for stylistic reasons.
21 tn Heb “after her old age.”
22 tn Heb “and he.” The referent (the servant’s master, Abraham) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
23 tn Heb “And Isaac was the son of forty years when he took Rebekah.”
24 sn Some valuable information is provided here. We learn here that Isaac married thirty-five years before Abraham died, that Rebekah was barren for twenty years, and that Abraham would have lived to see Jacob and Esau begin to grow up. The death of Abraham was recorded in the first part of the chapter as a “tidying up” of one generation before beginning the account of the next.
25 tn The disjunctive clause describes an important circumstance accompanying the birth. Whereas Esau was passive at birth, Jacob was active.
26 tn Heb “And he called his name Jacob.” Some ancient witnesses read “they called his name Jacob” (see v. 25). In either case the subject is indefinite.
sn The name Jacob is a play on the Hebrew word for “heel” (עָקֵב, ’aqev). The name (since it is a verb) probably means something like “may he protect,” that is, as a rearguard, dogging the heels. It did not have a negative connotation until Esau redefined it. This name was probably chosen because of the immediate association with the incident of grabbing the heel. After receiving such an oracle, the parents would have preserved in memory almost every detail of the unusual births.
27 tn Heb “the son of sixty years.”
28 tn The sentence begins with the temporal indicator (“and it happened”), making this clause subordinate to the next.
29 tn Heb “the son of forty years.”
30 tn Heb “took as a wife.”
31 tn Heb “and Isaac expired and died and he was gathered to his people.” In the ancient Israelite view he joined his deceased ancestors in Sheol, the land of the dead.
32 tn Heb “old and full of years.”