Genesis 12:12

12:12 When the Egyptians see you they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will keep you alive. ¹ 

Genesis 18:16

Abraham Pleads for Sodom

18:16 When the men got up to leave, ²  they looked out over ³  Sodom. (Now ⁴  Abraham was walking with them to see them on their way.) ⁵ 

Genesis 18:21

18:21 that I must go down ⁶  and see if they are as wicked as the outcry suggests. ⁷  If not, ⁸  I want to know.”

Genesis 21:19

21:19 Then God enabled Hagar to see a well of water. ⁹  She went over and filled the skin with water, and then gave the boy a drink.

Genesis 42:9

42:9 Then Joseph remembered ¹⁰  the dreams he had dreamed about them, and he said to them, “You are spies; you have come to see if our land is vulnerable!” ¹¹ 

Genesis 43:3

43:3 But Judah said to him, “The man solemnly warned ¹²  us, ‘You will not see my face ¹³  unless your brother is with you.’

Genesis 44:23

44:23 But you said to your servants, ‘If your youngest brother does not come down with you, you will not see my face again.’

Genesis 44:34

44:34 For how can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? I couldn’t bear to see ¹⁴  my father’s pain.” ¹⁵ 

Genesis 45:12

45:12 You and my brother Benjamin can certainly see with your own eyes that I really am the one who speaks to you. ¹⁶ 

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¹ tn The Piel of the verb חָיָה (khayah, “to live”) means “to keep alive, to preserve alive,” and in some places “to make alive.” See D. Marcus, “The Verb ‘to Live’ in Ugaritic,” JSS 17 (1972): 76-82.

² tn Heb “And the men arose from there.”

³ tn Heb “toward the face of.”

⁴ tn The disjunctive parenthetical clause sets the stage for the following speech.

⁵ tn The Piel of שָׁלַח (shalakh) means “to lead out, to send out, to expel”; here it is used in the friendly sense of seeing the visitors on their way.

⁶ tn The cohortative indicates the Lord’s resolve.

sn I must go down. The descent to “see” Sodom is a bold anthropomorphism, stressing the careful judgment of God. The language is reminiscent of the Lord going down to see the Tower of Babel in Gen 11:1-9.

⁷ tn Heb “[if] according to the outcry that has come to me they have done completely.” Even the Lord, who is well aware of the human capacity to sin, finds it hard to believe that anyone could be as bad as the “outcry” against Sodom and Gomorrah suggests.

⁸ sn The short phrase if not provides a ray of hope and inspires Abraham’s intercession.

⁹ tn Heb “And God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water.” The referent (Hagar) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁰ sn You are spies. Joseph wanted to see how his brothers would react if they were accused of spying.

¹¹ tn Heb “to see the nakedness of the land you have come.”

¹² tn The infinitive absolute with the finite verb stresses the point. The primary meaning of the verb is “to witness; to testify.” It alludes to Joseph’s oath, which was tantamount to a threat or warning.

¹³ tn The idiom “see my face” means “have an audience with me.”

¹⁴ tn The Hebrew text has “lest I see,” which expresses a negative purpose – “I cannot go up lest I see.”

¹⁵ tn Heb “the calamity which would find my father.”

¹⁶ tn Heb “And, look, your eyes see and the eyes of my brother Benjamin, that my mouth is the one speaking to you.”