Genesis 12:18

Summary

Pharaoh summons Abram and confronts him with two questions: what he has done, and why he did not disclose that Sarai was his wife. The verse is structured as direct speech introduced by two narrative verbs of summoning and speaking.

Key words

• iyikra' ("he summoned", H7121G) — qal narrative form (vav-consecutive), marking the next event in sequence: Pharaoh's action of calling Abram before him.
• mah-zot 'asita — 'asita ("have you done", H6213A) is a qal perfect, expressing a completed action; combined with mah ("what?", H4100) and zot ("this", H2063), it forms the accusatory question "what is this you have done."
• higadta ("did you tell", H5046) — hiphil perfect, a causative form: literally "to cause to be known," i.e., to declare or make known, referring to information Abram allegedly withheld.
• ki ("that/if", H3588A) — a subordinating particle introducing the reported content of what should have been told: that she was his wife.
• hi' ("she", H1931) — an independent personal pronoun placed at the end of the clause, reinforcing the identity of the subject already implied by 'ishtekha ("your wife", H0802H construct + H9021 suffix).

What the text says

The verse opens with two verbs joined by narrative va ("and", H9001): iyikra' ("he summoned") and iYo'mer ("he said"), both qal narrative forms that advance the story in sequence — first the summons, then the speech. The subject Par'oh ("Pharaoh", H6547G) is stated once and governs both verbs.

Pharaoh's speech contains two rhetorical questions. The first, mah-zot 'asita li ("what is this you have done to me"), uses the interrogative mah with the demonstrative zot and the qal perfect 'asita, expressing a completed act now being challenged. The preposition li ("to me", H9005 + H9030 suffix) marks Abram's action as directed against Pharaoh.

The second question, lamah lo'-higadta li ("why did you not tell me"), uses the hiphil perfect higadta, a causative verb meaning to cause information to be known — distinct from a simple qal "to say." The negation lo' ("not", H3808) precedes it, and the object of what should have been disclosed follows the particle ki ("that", H3588A): ki 'ishtekha hi' ("that she [is] your wife"). Here the construct noun 'ishtekha ("wife of you", H0802H + H9021) is followed by the independent pronoun hi' ("she", H1931), which in Biblical Hebrew often functions to identify or emphasize the subject in a nominal clause, since Hebrew nominal sentences lack a verb "to be."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the second question with ἀπήγγειλας ("you announced/reported"), corresponding to the hiphil higadta, and adds ἐστιν ("is") to supply the verb "to be" that the Hebrew nominal clause with hi' leaves implicit. The Vulgate similarly supplies esset ("was," subjunctive) for the same nominal construction, showing how both Greek and Latin versions grammatically explicit a verb that Hebrew expresses only through the pronoun hi'.