Genesis 27:5

וְרִבְקָה שֹׁמַעַת בְּדַבֵּר יִצְחָק אֶל־עֵשָׂו בְּנוֹ וַיֵּלֶךְ עֵשָׂו הַשָּׂדֶה לָצוּד צַיִד לְהָבִֽיא׃

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The same verse in five languages

Hebrew

וְרִבְקָ֣ה שֹׁמַ֔עַת בְּדַבֵּ֣ר יִצְחָ֔ק אֶל־עֵשָׂ֖ו בְּנ֑וֹ וַיֵּ֤לֶךְ עֵשָׂו֙ הַשָּׂדֶ֔ה לָצ֥וּד צַ֖יִד לְהָבִֽיא׃

Greek (Septuagint)

Ῥεβέκκα δὲ ἤκουσεν λαλοῦντος Ἰσαὰκ πρὸς Ἠσαὺ τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ· ἐπορεύθη δὲ Ἠσαὺ εἰς τὸ πεδίον θηρεῦσαι θήραν τῷ πατρὶ αὐτοῦ.

Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0

Latin (Vulgate)

Quod cum audisset Rebecca, et ille abiisset in agrum ut jussionem patris impleret,

Spanish

Rebeca estaba escuchando mientras Isaac hablaba con su hijo Esaú. Así que, cuando Esaú se fue al campo a cazar el animal para su padre,

Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)

Y Rebeca estaba oyendo, cuando hablaba Isaac á Esaú su hijo: y fuése Esaú al campo para coger la caza que había de traer.

English

Now Rebekah was listening to what Isaac told his son Esau. So when Esau went into the field to hunt game and bring it back,

What the text says

Summary

The verse reports that Rebekah was listening while Isaac spoke to his son Esau, and that Esau then went out to the field to hunt game to bring back. The Hebrew frames Rebekah's listening as ongoing and simultaneous with Isaac's speech.

Key words

  • sho.Ma'at ("[was] listening", H8085G) — qal participle, feminine singular; participles describe an action in progress rather than a completed event, presenting Rebekah's listening as continuous action happening at the same time as Isaac's speech.
  • da.Ber ("spoke", H1696G) — piel infinitive construct, following the preposition be ("when/in"); the construction be-dabber ("in the speaking of") is a common Hebrew idiom for "while X was speaking," linking two simultaneous actions without a finite verb.
  • va.yYe.lekh ("and he went", H1980G) — qal narrative form (vav-consecutive); this form advances the storyline chronologically, marking the next event after Rebekah's listening.
  • la.Tzud ("to hunt", H6679A) — qal infinitive construct with preposition le ("to"), expressing purpose: the goal of Esau's going to the field.
  • le.ha.Vi' ("to bring [it]", H0935P) — hiphil infinitive construct with preposition le; the hiphil (causative) stem indicates causing something (the game) to come/be brought, expressing a further purpose after the hunting.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with ve-Rivkah shoma'at ("and Rebekah [was] listening"), using a participle rather than a finite past-tense verb. This grammatical choice presents her listening as a state or ongoing action, not a single completed act — she was in the process of listening. This state is temporally anchored by the phrase be-dabber Yitzchak ("when Isaac spoke" / literally "in the speaking of Isaac"), an infinitive construction that Biblical Hebrew regularly uses to express simultaneity between two clauses.

The narrative then shifts with the vav-consecutive form va.yYe.lekh ("and he went"), which is the standard way Hebrew narrative moves the story forward in sequence. Esau's departure to the field is followed by two purpose infinitives in a chain: la.Tzud tzayid ("to hunt game") and le.havi' ("to bring [it]"). The Hebrew text does not specify an object or recipient for le.havi' — it simply says "to bring," leaving the destination unstated within this verse.

Differences between versions

The LXX adds τῷ πατρὶ αὐτοῦ ("to his father") after "to bring," specifying a recipient not stated in the Hebrew clause itself. The Vulgate diverges further, rendering the purpose clause as ut jussionem patris impleret ("to fulfill his father's command"), an interpretive paraphrase rather than a direct rendering of the hunting-and-bringing infinitives found in the Hebrew.

This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.