Genesis 35:1

Summary

God commands Jacob to go up to Bethel, settle there, and build an altar to the God who had appeared to him when he was fleeing from his brother Esau. The verse is a direct divine speech composed of a chain of four imperatives following the initial narrative statement.

Key words

• va-i.Yo.mer ("and he said", H0559) — qal verb in narrative form, marking the introduction of direct speech and continuing the story sequence.
• kum ("arise", H6965B) and 'a.Leh ("go up", H5927G) — two qal imperatives placed back to back, giving the command urgency without a connecting conjunction between them.
• nir.'Eh ("appeared", H7200G) — niphal participle, passive/reflexive in form, describing God as "the one who appeared" (or "was seen") rather than using an active verb form for the deity.
• be-va.re.cha.kha ("when you fled/in your fleeing", H1272 + suffix) — qal infinitive with preposition be ("when/in") and second-person suffix kha ("your"), forming a temporal clause: "in your fleeing."
• mi.pe.Nei ("from before/from the face of", H6440G) — construct plural noun panim ("face") governed by min ("from"), the standard idiom for "away from" a person.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative vav-consecutive on va-i.Yo.mer ("and he said"), the typical device that advances biblical narrative chronologically. The subject is 'E.lo.Him ("God", H0430G), grammatically plural in form though functioning with a singular verb here, addressing Ya'akov ("Jacob") directly through the preposition 'el ("to").

The divine speech itself consists of four qal imperatives in sequence: kum ("arise"), 'a.Leh ("go up"), shev ("dwell"), and 'a.seh ("make/build"). The first two appear without a conjunction between them, producing a compressed, urgent command ("arise, go up"), while the latter two are joined by ve ("and"). This chain structures the instruction as a sequence of actions: rising, ascending to Bethel, dwelling there, and building an altar there.

The altar is specified as being "to the God" (la-'El, H0410G with the preposition la) who is further described by the niphal participle nir.'Eh ("appeared" / "was seen", H7200G). The niphal form here presents the divine appearing as a completed action rendered in participial, ongoing aspect — "the one appearing/who appeared to you" — attached to Jacob through the second-person suffix kha on 'e.Lei.kha ("to you").

The final clause uses the infinitive construct va.re.cha ("in his/your fleeing", H1272) governed by be ("when/in"), a common Biblical Hebrew construction for temporal clauses, followed by mi.pe.Nei ("from the face of", H6440G), the idiomatic way of expressing "away from" a person — here Esau, called 'a.Chi.kha ("your brother", H0251G), in construct with the following name.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the place name differently, giving "εἰς τὸν τόπον" ("to the place") with a variant marking (λ) rather than transliterating "Bethel" as one word, whereas the Hebrew veit-'el ("Beth-El") and the Vulgate's "Bethel" both preserve the compound place name directly.