Genesis 32:19

Summary

The verse continues Jacob's instructions to his servants, now specifying that the same message about Esau must be given not only to the first servant (from the previous verse) but also to the second, the third, and all the herdsmen following behind the flocks. Each servant is to repeat the identical formula to Esau when they encounter him.

Key words

• va-yetzav ("and he commanded", H6680) — piel narrative form, continuing the sequence of action from the prior verse; the piel stem carries an intensive/causative nuance of formal command.
• gam ("also/as well as", H1571) — appears three times in the verse (before "second," "third," and "all who were going"), creating a distributive list structure that stacks each group as an additional recipient of the same command.
• ha-holekhim ("the ones going", H1980N) — qal participle, describing an ongoing action (the herdsmen who are habitually walking behind the flocks), functioning here as a substantive ("those who go").
• tedabberun ("you will speak", H1696G) — piel imperfect plural with a paragogic nun (H9013), an archaic/emphatic ending that reinforces the instruction without changing its basic future/durative meaning.
• be-motza'akhem ("when you find", H4672) — qal infinitive construct with a second-person plural pronominal suffix, expressing the temporal condition ("in your finding him") under which the speech is to occur.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence structure hinges on the triple repetition of gam (H1571), each instance attached to a group marked by the object particle 'et (H0853): "also the second," "also the third," "also all who were going after the herds." This creates a cumulative list rather than a simple coordinated series, giving weight to the fact that Jacob's command applies uniformly to every servant group, not just the first. The participle ha-holekhim (H1980N) treats "those going after the herds" as an ongoing, characteristic activity rather than a single completed action.

The paragogic nun on tedabberun (H1696G) is a grammatical feature with no direct semantic translation value in English, Greek, or Latin; it marks emphasis or solemnity in the command to speak, but does not alter tense or mood.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the list as τῷ πρώτῳ καὶ τῷ δευτέρῳ καὶ τῷ τρίτῳ ("to the first and to the second and to the third"), explicitly including "the first," whereas the Hebrew text here begins directly with "the second" (ha-sheni, H8145), presupposing the first servant's instruction already given in the preceding verse. The Vulgate's secundo, et tertio follows the Hebrew's starting point (second, third) rather than the LXX's inclusion of "first."