Genesis 26:29

Summary

This verse contains the words spoken by Abimelech and his companions to Isaac, asking him to swear that he will not harm them, recalling that they treated him only with good and let him go in peace, and closing by declaring him "blessed of Yehovah" (Yehovah, H3068G).

Key words

• ta.'aSeh ("you will do", H6213A) — qal imperfect, expressing a future/ongoing action, here governed by the conditional particle 'im ("if", H0518I), forming the core of the oath-like request: "if you do harm with us."
• ra.'Ah ("harm", H7451C) — feminine singular noun, the object of the potential action being forbidden/requested against.
• ne.ga.'a.Nu ("we have touched", H5060) — qal perfect, completed action, negated by lo' ("not", H3808), asserting a past fact as the basis for the present request.
• 'a.Si.nu ("we have done", H6213A) — qal perfect, same root as word 2 but completed aspect, paired with rak ("only", H7535) and Tov ("good", H2896B) to state what was actually done.
• be.Rukh ("blessed of", H1288) — qal passive participle, masculine singular construct, linking Isaac directly to Yehovah (H3068G) as the source of the blessing.

What the text says

The verse is built on two parallel ka'asher ("as", H0834D) clauses, each introduced by the comparative/relative particle and each anchored in a qal perfect verb (ne.ga.'a.Nu, "we have touched," and 'a.Si.nu, "we have done"). This grammatical parallelism sets up a contrast between what was not done (touching/harming) and what was done (only good), both used as the justification for the initial conditional demand introduced by 'im ("if") plus the imperfect ta.'aSeh ("you will do"). The imperfect form of ta.'aSeh keeps the request open-ended, oriented toward future behavior, while the two perfects ground the argument in completed past actions.

The sentence then shifts with the narrative vav on ne.sha.le.cha ("we sent away", H7971G), a piel form indicating an intensified or purposeful sending, followed by be.Shalom ("in peace", H7965G), closing the report of past conduct. The final clause pivots with the independent pronoun 'a.Tah ("you", H0859A) and the adverb 'a.Tah ("now", H6258) — two words that are homographs in transliteration but distinct in Strong's number (H0859A vs H6258), one being the personal pronoun and the other the temporal adverb — leading into the participial predicate be.Rukh ("blessed of", H1288) construct with Yehovah.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ne.ga.'a.Nu.kha ("we have not touched you", H5060) with a different verb sense, ἐβδελυξάμεθα ("we have not abhorred/detested"), shifting the nuance from physical/harmful contact to an attitude of aversion, where the Hebrew naga' ("to touch", H5060) more literally denotes physical contact or striking. The Vulgate's nihil tuorum attigimus ("we have touched nothing of yours") preserves the sense of physical non-interference closer to the Hebrew, adding tuorum ("of your things") not explicit in the Hebrew word-by-word data. The Vulgate also adds auctum benedictione Domini ("increased by the blessing of the Lord"), an interpretive expansion not present in the Hebrew construct phrase be.Rukh Yehovah ("blessed of Yehovah").