Genesis 34:4

Summary

Genesis 34:4 records Shechem speaking to his father Hamor, requesting that he obtain the girl (previously described as violated by Shechem in the preceding verses) as a wife for him. The verse consists of a narrative introduction followed by a direct command.

Key words

• va-yomer ("and he said", H0559) — qal narrative form, marking the sequential action that moves the story forward: "and then he said."
• le-mor ("saying", H0559) — infinitive construct of the same root as yomer, used to introduce direct speech; it functions as a quotation marker rather than a separate verb.
• qach ("get/take", H3947G) — qal imperative, second person masculine singular; this is a direct command from Shechem to his father, with no softening particle.
• ha-yaldah ha-zot ("the girl, this one", H3207 + H2063) — the noun yaldah takes the definite article and is further specified by the demonstrative zot ("this"), pointing to a particular, already-identified female.
• le-ishah ("for a wife", H0802H) — the preposition le ("to/for") plus ishah ("woman/wife") indicates purpose or result: the girl is to become a wife, not merely acquired for another end.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence structure follows a simple narrative pattern: va-yomer ("and he said") + subject (Shechem) + prepositional phrase indicating the addressee (el-Chamor aviv, "to Hamor his father") + le-mor ("saying"), which opens the quoted speech. The quoted command itself is terse: qach-li et-ha-yaldah ha-zot le-ishah ("get for me this girl as a wife"). The imperative qach ("get", H3947G) is unmodified by any particle of politeness (such as na), giving the request a blunt, direct tone in the Hebrew.

The object of the request, ha-yaldah ha-zot ("this girl"), is marked by the direct object indicator et (H0853), which has no independent gloss but signals that "the girl" is the direct object of "get." The double determination — definite article ha plus demonstrative zot — anchors the reference firmly to a specific, already-known individual within the narrative, rather than introducing a new character.

The final phrase le-ishah ("for a wife") uses the preposition le to express purpose: the outcome of the "getting" is that she become a wife. This construction with le + noun is a common Hebrew way of expressing "to become X" or "as X," here indicating marital status as the intended result of Hamor's action on his son's behalf.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ha-yaldah ("the girl", H3207) as paidiskē ("young female servant/girl"), while the Vulgate uses puellam ("girl"). The Hebrew term yaldah itself denotes a young female without a servile connotation; the LXX's paidiskē introduces a nuance (a term that can also denote a female servant) not present in the Hebrew noun.