Genesis 25:5

Summary

The verse states that Abraham gave everything that belonged to him to Isaac. It is a short narrative clause reporting a single completed action within the sequence of events following Abraham's dealings with his other sons.

Key words

• va-yitten ("and he gave", H5414G) — verb qal, narrative form (vav-consecutive), marking the next sequential event in the story: "and then he gave."
• 'Avraham ("Abraham", H0085) — proper name, subject of the verb, explicitly stated rather than left implicit.
• kol ("all", H3605) — noun in construct-like use governing the following relative clause, indicating totality of possession.
• 'asher ("that/who", H0834A) — relative particle introducing the clause specifying what "all" refers to: "that [was] to him."
• lo ("to him/his", H9033 + preposition) — preposition with pronominal suffix, expressing possession: "that belonged to him."

What the text says

The clause follows the standard Biblical Hebrew narrative pattern: a vav-consecutive verb (va-yitten, "and he gave") followed by the subject 'Avraham. The object of the giving is expressed through the phrase 'et-kol-'asher-lo, literally "all that [was] to him" — a common Hebrew idiom for expressing total possession without using a verb "to have." The relative particle 'asher combined with the preposition le plus suffix lo forms a possessive construction: "that which belongs to him." This entire phrase functions as the direct object marked by 'et (H0853), the untranslated marker signaling a definite direct object.

The recipient, le-Yitzchak ("to Isaac", H3327), is marked with the preposition le, indicating the beneficiary of the giving. The sentence structure is compact: subject, verb, object (with its embedded relative clause), and indirect object/recipient, in that order — typical of Hebrew narrative syntax where the verb-subject sequence opens the clause.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the recipient not simply as "Isaac" but as Isaak tō huiō autou ("Isaac his son"), adding the noun "son" (huios) and a possessive pronoun not present in the Hebrew text, which has only le-Yitzchak ("to Isaac"). The Vulgate follows the Hebrew more closely with Isaac, without adding "son." The Hebrew phrase kol-'asher-lo ("all that was his") is rendered in the LXX as panta ta hyparchonta autou ("all his possessions/belongings"), using a participial noun construction rather than a relative clause, which shifts the phrasing from "all that belonged to him" to "all his existing goods."