Exodus 1:9

Summary

The verse reports an unnamed speaker (contextually the king of Egypt) addressing his own people, introducing a direct statement about the Israelites: they are described as numerous and strong, exceeding the speaker's own group in both respects.

Key words

• va-yomer ("and he said", H0559) — qal verb in narrative (vav-consecutive) form, marking a new event in the story sequence; the subject is not repeated by name here, only implied from context.
• hinneh ("here!" / "behold", H2009) — an interjection that draws attention to what follows, introducing the content of the speech as an immediate observation.
• am ("people of", H5971A) and benei ("sons of", H1121G) — both nouns stand in construct state, meaning each is grammatically bound to the next word ("people of the sons of Israel"), forming a chain of possession rather than three separate nouns.
• rav ("numerous", H7227A) — masculine singular adjective, functioning as a predicate describing the construct chain "people of the sons of Israel" as a singular collective.
• mimennu ("more than us", H4480A + H9035) — preposition with pronominal suffix, expressing comparison ("than us") attached to the following adjectives.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with the narrative verb va-yomer ("and he said", H0559), which continues the story without restating the subject's name — the identity of the speaker is carried over from the preceding verses. The object of address is marked by el-ammo ("to his people", H0413 + H5971A + H9023), a prepositional phrase with a possessive suffix ("his people").

The quoted speech begins with hinneh ("behold", H2009), which in Hebrew narrative typically signals a shift into the speaker's direct perception or assertion, functioning almost like a spotlight on the following clause. What follows is a construct chain: am benei Yisra'el ("the people of the sons of Israel", H5971A + H1121G + H3478), where each noun is bound to the next, producing a single compound subject rather than three independent nouns.

This compound subject takes two predicate adjectives, rav ("numerous", H7227A) and atzum ("mighty", H6099), joined by the conjunction ve- ("and", H9002). The comparison is completed by mimennu ("more than us", H4480A + H9035), a preposition with a first-person plural suffix, which attaches the comparative sense to the adjectives rather than requiring a separate verb "to be."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the construct chain as τὸ γένος τῶν υἱῶν Ἰσραὴλ μέγα πλῆθος ("the race of the sons of Israel, a great multitude"), adding the phrase "great multitude" not present as a separate noun in the Hebrew, where rav ("numerous", H7227A) functions only as a predicate adjective. The Vulgate's multus, et fortior nobis est ("numerous, and stronger than us") supplies the verb "is" explicitly, which the Hebrew clause does not contain, since Hebrew nominal sentences typically omit a copula.