Genesis 24:30

Summary

The verse narrates the moment when Laban (unnamed here, referred to only by pronoun) sees the ring and bracelets on his sister's hands and hears her report of what the man said, prompting him to go out to the man, whom he finds still standing by the camels at the spring.

Key words

• r'ot ("saw", H7200G) — infinitive construct following ki ("when"), forming a temporal clause: "when he saw."
• nezem ("ring", H5141) — singular noun, the object that triggers Laban's action; the Hebrew term covers both nose-rings and rings generally.
• 'achoto ("his sister", H0269 + H9023) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, identifying Rebekah as "his sister," i.e., the subject's sister, without naming the subject.
• sham'o ("heard", H8085G + H9043) — infinitive construct parallel to r'ot, joined by u-khe ("and just as"), creating a second temporal clause matched to the first.
• hinneh ("there!", H2009) — presentative interjection that shifts the narrative into a vivid, scene-setting mode, introducing the sight of the man.
• 'omed ("standing", H5975G) — participle, describing an ongoing state rather than a completed action, indicating the man was still in that position when found.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative formula va-yhi ("and it was", H1961) followed by two parallel temporal clauses built on infinitive constructs: ki r'ot ("when he saw", H7200G) and u-khe-sham'o ("and just as he heard", H8085G). Both clauses share an unnamed subject, recoverable only through the third-person verb forms and the pronominal suffix on 'achoto ("his sister"). This construction places two perceptions — seeing the jewelry and hearing the words — in a coordinated temporal frame before the main narrative verb, va-yavo ("and he went/came", H0935G), advances the action.

The quoted speech embedded within the clause, koh diber 'elai ha-'ish ("thus the man spoke to me"), is presented as Rebekah's own words, marked by le-mor ("saying", H0559) introducing direct discourse. The scene concludes with hinneh ("there!", H2009) plus the participle 'omed ("standing", H5975G), a common Hebrew construction for describing a static scene discovered by the subject — the man is found already in a standing position, distinct from a completed past action.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew nezem ("ring", H5141) is rendered by the LXX as ἐνώτια ("earrings") and by the Vulgate as inaures ("earrings"), both differing from renderings elsewhere as "ring" or "nose-ring." The subject performing the seeing and hearing is unnamed in the Hebrew, LXX, and Vulgate alike (expressed only by pronoun), while the SBLIBRE Spanish translation supplies the name "Labán" explicitly, which is not present in the Hebrew text at this point. The LXX text as given also appears truncated at "πρὸς τὸν ἄ," omitting the noun ἄνθρωπον found in the corresponding Hebrew ha-'ish ("the man", H0376G).