Genesis 27:24

Summary

Genesis 27:24 records a short exchange in which a speaker (Isaac) asks directly whether the person before him is his son Esau, and receives a one-word affirmative reply. The verse consists of two brief speech acts joined by the narrative structure of the surrounding story.

Key words

• va-yomer ("and he said", H0559) — qal verb with narrative vav, repeated twice (positions 2 and 9), marking each turn of the dialogue in sequence.
• attah ("you", H0859A) — independent personal pronoun placed at the head of the question, giving emphasis to the identity of the addressee.
• zeh ("this", H2088) — demonstrative particle following attah, reinforcing the pointed, direct nature of the question ("you, this one...").
• beni ("my son", H1121A + H9020) — noun ben in construct form with the first-person suffix -i ("my"), directly linking "son" to the speaker.
• ani ("I", H0589) — independent personal pronoun used alone as the entire reply, without any verb attached.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built from two minimal clauses, each introduced by va-yomer ("and he said", H0559), the standard narrative form for reported speech in this text. The question itself — attah zeh beni Esav — has no verb "to be"; it is a nominal (verbless) clause where the pronoun attah ("you", H0859A), the demonstrative zeh ("this", H2088), and the phrase beni Esav ("my son Esau") are simply juxtaposed. This construction relies on word order and pronouns alone to form the question, a pattern typical of Biblical Hebrew questions of identity.

The reply is even more minimal: a single word, ani ("I", H0589), the independent first-person pronoun standing without any accompanying verb. In Hebrew this one-word answer functions as a complete affirmative statement, contrasting with the fuller phrasing required in the receptor languages shown below.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the exchange with explicit verbs: Σὺ εἶ ("you are") and Ἐγώ (bare "I," matching the Hebrew brevity), while adding the copula "εἶ" absent from the Hebrew nominal clause. The Vulgate similarly supplies "es" ("you are") in the question and expands the answer to "Ego sum" ("I am"), adding a verb where the Hebrew ani stands alone. The Spanish and English versions shown (RV1909, BSB, SBLIBRE) follow this same pattern, inserting "eres/are" and "soy/am/I am" to complete grammatically what the Hebrew leaves as bare pronouns.