Genesis 37:27

Summary

Judah proposes to his brothers to sell Joseph to the Ishmaelites rather than kill him, giving as reason that Joseph is their brother, "flesh" of their own family. The verse ends with a narrative note that the brothers "listened" to this proposal.

Key words

• lekhu ("come", H1980K) — qal imperative plural, opening the speech as a direct call to collective action.
• nimkerennu ("let us sell him", H4376) — qal imperfect with vav marking purpose/continuation, cohortative sense ("let us..."), with the 3rd person suffix -nu ("him") attached as direct object.
• yadenu ("our hand", H3027G) — construct noun with 1st plural suffix, forming the subject of the negated jussive clause about not touching Joseph.
• achinu besarenu ("our brother, our flesh", H0251G + H1320) — two construct nouns each with 1st plural suffix, stacked without a conjunction, followed by the independent pronoun hu ("he", H1931) for emphasis.
• vayishme'u ("and they listened/heard", H8085G) — narrative (vav-consecutive) verb form, advancing the story by reporting the brothers' response.

What the text says

The verse opens with the imperative lekhu followed by the cohortative-purpose form nimkerennu, a construction that reads literally as "come, and let us sell him" — the sequence of imperative plus vav-imperfect frames the sale as the intended outcome of coming together. The clause ve-yadenu al-tehi-vo uses the negative particle 'al with the jussive tehi ("let it not be") governing the construct noun yadenu ("our hand"), producing a prohibition: "let our hand not be upon him."

The causal clause introduced by ki ("for/because") stacks two construct nouns, achinu ("our brother") and besarenu ("our flesh"), both suffixed with "our," followed by the independent pronoun hu. This pronoun is not grammatically required to complete the sentence but adds emphatic weight to the identification: "he is our brother, our flesh." The final clause switches to the narrative vav form vayishme'u, the standard storytelling tense in Hebrew narrative, followed by 'echav ("his brothers") with a 3rd person suffix, reporting that the brothers "heard" or "listened to" the proposal.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the prohibition differently: "αἱ δὲ χεῖρες ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν" ("but let hands be upon him"), without the negation 'al found in the Hebrew al-tehi-vo ("let it not be upon him"). The Vulgate reads "manus nostrae non polluantur" ("our hands may not be defiled"), preserving a negation but shifting the image from "hand upon him" to "hands defiled," which is not stated in the Hebrew's wording.

For the closing verb, the Hebrew vayishme'u ("and they listened/heard") is rendered by the LXX as "ἤκουσαν" ("they heard"), closer to the Hebrew sense, while the Vulgate has "Acquieverunt fratres sermonibus illius" ("the brothers agreed to his words"), adding "sermonibus illius" ("to his words") not present as a separate object in the Hebrew clause. Modern translations such as BSB ("they agreed") and SBLIBRE ("estuvieron de acuerdo") follow this interpretive sense of "listening" as "agreeing," rather than a purely literal "heard."