Genesis 37:19

Summary

Genesis 37:19 records the brothers of Joseph speaking to one another as they see him approaching, referring to him mockingly as "the master of dreams." The verse consists of a narrative introduction followed by direct speech built around a deictic construction pointing to Joseph's arrival.

Key words

• va-yo'meru ("and they said", H0559) — qal verb with narrative vav, the standard form for advancing dialogue in Hebrew narrative sequence.
• ish ("each/a man", H0376I) — paired idiomatically with 'el-'achiv ("to his brother") to form the reciprocal expression "each to his brother," i.e., "to one another."
• hinneh ("there!/behold", H2009) — an interjection that draws attention to an immediate, present situation; it introduces the participle that follows.
• ba'al ha-chalomot ("master of the dreams", H1167K + H2472) — a construct chain literally "owner/possessor of the dreams," a genitive-type phrase used as an epithet.
• ba ("[is] coming", H0935G) — a qal participle, marking ongoing or imminent action rather than a completed one.

What the text says

The sentence opens with the narrative verb va-yo'meru ("and they said"), followed by the idiom ish 'el-'achiv ("each to his brother"), a construction combining ish ("each," H0376I) with the construct form 'achi ("brother of," H0251I) plus the suffix -v ("his"). This idiom does not name individuals but expresses mutual speech among the group — "they said to one another."

The direct speech begins with hinneh ("there!", H2009), an interjection that in Biblical Hebrew often signals a scene unfolding in real time before the speakers' eyes. It sets up the subject of the sentence, ba'al ha-chalomot ha-lazeh — literally "the master of the dreams, this one." The phrase ba'al ha-chalomot (H1167K construct + H2472) is a construct chain meaning "owner/possessor of the dreams," functioning as a descriptive title rather than a proper name. The demonstrative ha-lazeh ("this," H1976) is an older or more emphatic form of "this one," reinforcing the pointing gesture already carried by hinneh.

The sentence ends with the participle ba ("coming," H0935G, from the qal root H0935). As a participle, it expresses an action in progress or about to happen, matching the immediacy signaled by hinneh — the construction hinneh...ba conveys "here he is, coming," rather than a completed arrival.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ba'al ha-chalomot ("master of the dreams") with the single noun enypniastēs ("dreamer"), collapsing the Hebrew construct chain into one Greek word rather than a possessive phrase. The Vulgate similarly uses somniator ("dreamer"), also compressing the construct phrase into one term. Both versions preserve the deictic force of hinneh through idou (LXX) and ecce (Vulgate), matching the Hebrew's attention-drawing function, though neither reproduces the doubled demonstrative emphasis of hinneh...ha-lazeh found in the Hebrew.