Genesis 41:52

Summary

The verse records that Joseph named his second son Ephraim, giving as the reason that God had made him fruitful in the land of his affliction. The naming is explained through a short embedded declaration introduced by ki ("for", H3588A).

Key words

• shem ("[the] name of", H8034) — construct noun beginning the phrase "the name of the second," setting up what is named.
• sheNi ("second", H8145) — masculine singular ordinal, referring back to the second son (not stated by name in this verse, only by birth order).
• kaRa' ("he called", H7121H) — qal perfect, third person masculine singular, indicating a completed act of naming, matching the syntax of the previous verse about the first son.
• hifRani ("he has made fruitful", H6509 + H9030) — hiphil perfect (causative) with a first-person singular suffix "me," meaning literally "he caused me to be fruitful"; the hiphil stem marks God as the causing agent of the fruitfulness.
• 'Eretz 'anyi ("land of my affliction", H0776G + H6040 + H9020) — construct chain "land of affliction-of-me," where 'oni ("affliction") is bound to the first-person suffix, producing the fixed expression "the land of my affliction."

What the text says

The verse opens with the object marker 'et (H0853) attached to shem ha-sheni ("the name of the second"), marking the direct object of the verb kaRa' ("he called"), which follows at the end of the clause — a common Hebrew verb-final placement in naming formulas already seen in the prior verse for the firstborn. The name given, 'Efrayim ("Ephraim", H0669G), is placed immediately after the verb as its complement.

The second half of the verse gives the motivation for the name through the particle ki (H3588A), which here functions causally ("for," "because"), introducing a quotation-like clause: hifRani 'Elohim be-'eretz 'anyi ("God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction"). The verb hifRani is in the hiphil stem, a causative form built on the root related to fruitfulness (compare H6509), with a first-person singular object suffix "-ni" ("me"). This grammatical structure places 'Elohim ("God", H0430G) as the sole grammatical subject causing the fruitfulness experienced by the speaker. The final phrase, be-'eretz 'anyi ("in the land of my affliction"), uses a construct chain joining "land" and "affliction," with the possessive suffix "my" attached to "affliction," binding the location of fruitfulness directly to the previously named condition of suffering.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew hifRani ("he has made fruitful", H6509) is rendered in the LXX as ὕψωσέν ("he exalted/raised up"), a different semantic field from "made fruitful." The Vulgate's Crescere me fecit ("he made me grow/increase") stays closer to the Hebrew sense of growth or fruitfulness than the LXX's "exalted." Modern versions such as BSB and SBLIBRE follow the Hebrew's "made fruitful" sense rather than the LXX's "exalted."