Genesis 23:11

Summary

Ephron responds to Abraham's request to purchase land for burial, formally declining payment and instead declaring that he gives the field, the cave within it, and the transfer itself before witnesses. The verse is built almost entirely on repeated first-person perfect verb forms of "to give," emphasizing the formality of the offer.

Key words

• lo' ("no", H3808) — negation opening the speech, rejecting Abraham's proposal (likely his offer to pay).
• shema'eni ("listen to me", H8085G) — qal imperative with 1st-person suffix "me" (H9030), a direct command form addressed to Abraham.
• natati ("I have given", H5414G) — qal perfect, 1st person singular; this exact form of natan ("to give") appears four times in the verse (words 8, 19, 26), each time with a different pronominal suffix attached to mark what is being given and to whom.
• 'asher ("which", H0834A) — relative particle introducing the clause identifying the cave's location ("which is in it").
• le'einei ("to the eyes of", H5869H) — construct plural of "eye," forming an idiom meaning "in the sight of/in the presence of," modifying benei-'ammi ("sons of my people", H1121A + H5971A + H9020).

What the text says

The Hebrew opens with the terse lo' 'adoni ("no, my lord") followed immediately by the imperative shema'eni ("hear me"), a two-word command structure that frames the rest of the speech as an authoritative correction of Abraham's proposal. The core of the verse is repetitive: the verb natati ("I have given," from natan, H5414G) — a qal perfect first-person form — occurs three times with the object "field" (word 8), then twice more with feminine singular pronominal suffixes (netatiha, words 19 and 26) referring back to "the cave" and then to the transaction as a whole. This repetition of the same perfect verb form across the verse creates a formulaic, almost legal cadence, as though the giving is being pronounced complete at each stage: field, cave, and the act of giving itself, done "before the eyes of the sons of my people" (le'einei benei-'ammi, words 22–25), establishing witnesses to the transfer.

The verse closes with another imperative, qevor meteka ("bury your dead," H6912 + H4191 with 2ms suffix H9021), a participle construct meaning literally "the one dying of you," i.e., "your dead person."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the initial Hebrew lo' 'adoni ("no, my lord") as Par' emoi genou, kyrie ("be with/near me, lord"), a positive invitation rather than the Hebrew's negation. The Vulgate expands this opening to Nequaquam ita fiat, domine mi, sed tu magis ausculta ("by no means let it be so, my lord, but rather listen"), adding interpretive material not present word-for-word in the Hebrew's compact lo' 'adoni shema'eni. The Hebrew's threefold repetition of natati is reduced in the Greek and Latin to two instances of the giving-verb (δίδωμι/δέδωκα in LXX; trado implied once in the Vulgate, which omits an explicit repetition for the cave alone).