Genesis 27:18

Summary

Jacob comes to his father Isaac and addresses him as "father"; Isaac responds with the formula "here I am" and then asks the identifying question "who are you, my son?" The verse marks the direct dialogue that begins the deception scene, using two short exchanges introduced by narrative vav.

Key words

• yavo ("he went", H0935G) — qal narrative form; simple past action moving the story forward, "and he went/came."
• avi ("my father", H0001G + suffix) — noun in construct form with 1st-person suffix; construct nouns with pronominal suffixes function as vocatives/possessives, here "my father" as direct address.
• hineni ("here am I", H2009 + suffix) — interjection hen ("behold") fused with 1st-person suffix; a fixed idiom of attentive response, not a full verbal clause.
• mi ("who?", H4310) — interrogative pronoun opening a nominal question with no verb "to be" required in Hebrew.
• beni ("my son", H1121A + suffix) — construct noun + suffix, vocative address closing Isaac's question.

What the text says

The verse is built from three short narrative units, each introduced by the vav-consecutive pattern (va-yavo, "and he went"; va-yomer, "and he said" — twice). This chaining creates a rapid back-and-forth: Jacob's approach, his single-word address "avi," and Isaac's two-part reply. Isaac's reply itself has an internal structure worth noting: hineni ("here I am") is not a verb but an interjection with an attached pronoun, functioning as a fixed response formula used when someone is addressed by name or relation — it does not yet answer the question of identity. Only after this formula does Isaac ask mi attah, "who [are] you," a nominal (verbless) question typical of Hebrew, followed by the vocative beni, "my son." The juxtaposition of hineni (a response of presence) and mi attah (a request for identity) creates tension: Isaac responds as if he already knows who is addressing him, then immediately reveals uncertainty about which son stands before him.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders va-yavo ("and he came/went," H0935G) as εἰσήνεγκεν ("he brought in/carried"), and the Vulgate similarly reads Quibus illatis ("these things having been brought"), both shifting the verb from Jacob's motion toward his father to the action of bringing something (presumably the food mentioned in the preceding verse) rather than describing Jacob's approach itself. The Hebrew text as given states only that Jacob "went," without an object being carried, while both Greek and Latin traditions introduce a transitive sense of delivering something to Isaac.