Genesis 21:5

Summary

Genesis 21:5 states Abraham's age at the birth of his son Isaac: one hundred years. The verse uses a construct chain to express age and a niphal infinitive construction to mark the temporal clause "when he was born."

Key words

• ben ("son of", H1121L) — masculine singular construct noun; here used idiomatically in the phrase "ben-me'at shanah" ("son of a hundred years") to express Abraham's age, a common Hebrew idiom for stating how old someone is.
• me'at ("one hundred", H3967) — feminine singular construct cardinal number; construct form links it to shanah, forming the age expression.
• hiVvaled ("was born", H3205) — niphal infinitive of the root meaning "to bear/beget"; the niphal (passive/reflexive) stem indicates that the subject (Isaac) underwent the action of being born, rather than performing it. The infinitive form, combined with the preposition be, creates a temporal clause meaning "when he was born."
• lo ("to him", H9033 with H9005) — preposition with pronominal suffix, indicating the person to whom the birth occurred, i.e., Abraham.
• beno ("his son", H1121A with H9023) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, appositional to Yitzchak, specifying the family relationship.

What the text says

The verse opens with the conjunction ve ("and", H9002) connecting it to the preceding narrative, followed by the subject Avraham (H0085). The age is expressed through the construct chain ben-me'at shanah — literally "a son of a hundred of year" — a Hebrew idiom in which a person's age is expressed as being "a son of" a certain number of years. This construction does not use a verb "to be" in Hebrew; the predicate is nominal, formed simply by juxtaposing the subject Avraham with the age-phrase.

The temporal clause that follows, be-hiVvaled lo et Yitzchak beno ("when Isaac his son was born to him"), uses the preposition be plus the niphal infinitive hiVvaled — a standard Hebrew construction for expressing "when X happened." The niphal stem of the verb (from the root meaning "to bear") marks Isaac as the one undergoing birth, with Abraham marked by the phrase lo ("to him") as the one to whom the event occurred. The direct object marker 'et (H0853) introduces Yitzchak as the grammatical object of the infinitive despite the passive-toned niphal form, and beno ("his son") stands in apposition to Yitzchak, restating the relationship explicitly.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the construct age-idiom as ἦν ἑκατὸν ἐτῶν ("was of a hundred years"), supplying the verb "to be" (ἦν) that the Hebrew nominal clause lacks. The Vulgate similarly supplies esset ("he was") plus centum annorum ("a hundred years"), and adds an explanatory clause, hac quippe ætate patris ("indeed at this age of the father"), not present in the Hebrew or the LXX. Both LXX and Vulgate render the niphal infinitive construction with a finite verb (ἐγένετο, "was born"; natus est, "was born") rather than preserving the infinitive-clause structure found in the Hebrew.