Genesis 20:13

Summary

Abraham explains to Abimelech why he told Sarah to say she was his sister: when God caused him to wander from his father's house, he asked her to declare at every place they went that he was her brother, calling this an act of chesed ("loyalty/kindness") on her part.

Key words

• hit'u ("they caused to wander", H8582) — hiphil (causative) perfect, third person plural. The causative stem indicates an external agent produces the wandering; the plural form is notable given its subject.
• 'Elohim ("God", H0430G) — grammatically plural noun (masculine plural morphology), here functioning as the subject of the plural verb hit'u, an agreement pattern differing from the more common singular-verb construction with this noun.
• chasde-kh ("loyalty of-you", H2617A + H9022) — construct noun with second-person feminine singular suffix, "your loyalty/kindness," addressed to Sarah.
• ta'asi ("you will do", H6213A) — qal imperfect, second-person feminine singular, expressing an ongoing or future obligation ("you shall do/perform").
• achi ("my brother", H0251G + H9020) — construct noun with first-person singular suffix, the identity Abraham instructs Sarah to state.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative formula va-yehi ("and it was", H1961+H9001) followed by the temporal clause ka'asher hit'u 'oti 'Elohim mi-beit avi — "as/when God caused me to wander from my father's house." The verb hit'u (H8582) is a hiphil plural form, and its subject 'Elohim (H0430G) is likewise plural in noun morphology; the agreement here is grammatically consistent with plural verb and plural-form subject, though 'Elohim commonly takes singular verbs elsewhere in the text when referring to a single deity.

The second half records Abraham's reported speech introduced by va-omar ("and I said", H0559+H9001). He calls Sarah's expected action zeh chasdekh ("this is your loyalty," H2088+H2617A+H9022), using a construct noun with a feminine suffix that frames her compliance as an act of loyalty owed to him. The relative clause asher ta'asi 'immadi ("which you shall do with me") uses the qal imperfect ta'asi (H6213A), marking this as an ongoing or repeated future obligation rather than a single act. The instruction culminates in the imperative imri-li achi hu ("say of me, he is my brother"), where achi (H0251G) is a construct noun with a first-person suffix stating the relationship Sarah is to claim in every place (kol ha-maqom asher navo shammah, "every place where we go there").

Differences between versions

The LXX renders hit'u ("caused to wander", H8582) with exēgagen ("led out"), omitting the notion of wandering present in the Hebrew causative verb. The Vulgate similarly uses eduxit ("led out"), matching the LXX's simplification rather than the Hebrew's wandering sense. Additionally, the LXX translates chesed (H2617A, "loyalty/kindness") as dikaiosynē ("righteousness"), a term with a different semantic range than the Hebrew chesed, while the Vulgate's misericordiam ("mercy") more closely parallels the Hebrew concept of loyal kindness.