Genesis 17:2

Summary

God speaks in first person, announcing the establishment of a covenant between himself and Abram, and promising to increase Abram's numbers to an extreme degree. The verse uses two verbs — one for "giving/establishing" the covenant, one for "multiplying" — joined by parallel purpose clauses.

Key words

• 'etenah ("let me make/give", H5414I) — a form of the verb natan ("to give"), here functioning with a first-person volitional nuance ("I will give/establish"), introduced by the conjunction ve- ("and/so").
• beriti ("covenant", H1285) — noun in construct form with the 1st person suffix -i ("my"), meaning "my covenant."
• beini... uveinekha ("between me... and between you", H0996G) — the preposition/noun bein ("between") is repeated with two different pronominal suffixes (-i "me", -kha "you"), a structure that frames the covenant as strictly bilateral.
• 'arbeh ("I may increase", H7235A) — Hiphil (causative) imperfect, 1st person: "I will cause to multiply," continuing the sentence with ve- as a linked action following the covenant declaration.
• bimo'd me'od ("muchness, muchness", H3966 x2) — the noun me'od ("muchness/exceedingly") is doubled, an intensifying repetition modifying the verb 'arbeh.

What the text says

The verse is built on two parallel clauses, each introduced by ve- attached to a verb: ve'etenah ("and I will give/establish") and ve'arbeh ("and I will increase"). The first clause has berit ("covenant") as its object, specified by the construct suffix "my," and located spatially by the doubled preposition bein... bein ("between... between"), a Hebrew idiom that marks a relationship as mutual and bounded between exactly two parties — here "me" and "you," using the 1st and 2nd person suffixes on bein.

The second clause uses the direct object marker 'et- (glossed as untranslated, H0853) attached to the 2nd person suffix -kha, making "you" the explicit object of the multiplying action. The verb 'arbeh is in the Hiphil stem, indicating that the subject (the speaker) causes the increase rather than the object undergoing it passively. This causative sense is intensified by the doubled noun me'od me'od, literally "in muchness, muchness," a repetition pattern in Biblical Hebrew that functions adverbially to express a superlative degree ("exceedingly," "very much indeed") rather than a simple quantity.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew verb 'etenah (from natan, "to give") is rendered by the LXX as θήσομαι ("I will place/establish") and by the Vulgate as ponam ("I will place"), both shifting the underlying image from "giving" to "placing/establishing."

The doubled Hebrew intensifier bimo'd me'od is handled differently across versions: the LXX collapses it into a single adverb, σφόδρα ("exceedingly"), losing the repetition; the Vulgate preserves a double expression, vehementer nimis ("vehemently, exceedingly"), mirroring the Hebrew doubling with two separate Latin adverbs. The Spanish SBLIBRE renders the object of the second clause as "tu descendencia" ("your descendants") rather than reflecting the Hebrew's direct object suffix "you" ('otekha) alone, expanding the referent beyond what the Hebrew text states literally.