Genesis 42:7
וַיַּרְא יוֹסֵף אֶת־אֶחָיו וַיַּכִּרֵם וַיִּתְנַכֵּר אֲלֵיהֶם וַיְדַבֵּר אִתָּם קָשׁוֹת וַיֹּאמֶר אֲלֵהֶם מֵאַיִן בָּאתֶם וַיֹּאמְרוּ מֵאֶרֶץ כְּנַעַן לִשְׁבָּר־אֹֽכֶל׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וַיַּ֥רְא יוֹסֵ֛ף אֶת־אֶחָ֖יו וַיַּכִּרֵ֑ם וַיִּתְנַכֵּ֨ר אֲלֵיהֶ֜ם וַיְדַבֵּ֧ר אִתָּ֣ם קָשׁ֗וֹת וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֲלֵהֶם֙ מֵאַ֣יִן בָּאתֶ֔ם וַיֹּ֣אמְר֔וּ מֵאֶ֥רֶץ כְּנַ֖עַן לִשְׁבָּר־אֹֽכֶל׃
ἰδὼν δὲ ἸωσὴΦ τοὺς ἀδελφοὺς αὐτοῦ ἐπέγνω, καὶ ἠλλοτριοῦτο ἀπ’ αὐτῶν καὶ ἐλάλησεν αὐτοῖς σκληρά, καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς ΙΙόθεν ἥκατε ; οἱ δὲ εἶπαν Ἐκ γῆς Χανάαν, ἀγοράσαι βρώματα.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
et agnovisset eos, quasi ad alienos durius loquebatur, interrogans eos: Unde venistis? Qui responderunt: De terra Chanaan, ut emamus victui necessaria.
En cuanto José vio a sus hermanos, los reconoció; pero fingió ser un extraño y les habló con dureza: “¿De dónde vienen?”, les preguntó. Ellos le respondieron: “Venimos de la tierra de Canaán, para comprar alimentos”.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y José como vió á sus hermanos, conociólos; mas hizo que no los conocía, y hablóles ásperamente, y les dijo: ¿ De dónde habéis venido? Ellos respondieron: De la tierra de Canaán á comprar alimentos.
And when Joseph saw his brothers, he recognized them, but he treated them as strangers and spoke harshly to them. “Where have you come from?” he asked. “ From the land of Canaan,” they replied. “ We are here to buy food.”
✦ What the text says
Summary
The verse narrates Joseph's first encounter with his brothers in Egypt: he sees and recognizes them, but deliberately acts as a stranger and speaks harshly, asking where they came from. The brothers answer that they have come from the land of Canaan to buy food.
Key words
- va-yikkirem ("and he recognized them", H5234A) — hiphil (causative) stem, narrative form: Joseph actively perceives/identifies his brothers, not a mere passive noticing.
- va-yitnakker ("and he acted as a stranger", H5234B) — hithpael (reflexive) stem of the same root as yikkirem: the text uses the same consonantal root for "recognize" and "make oneself unrecognized/estranged," creating a wordplay between recognition and self-alienation.
- qashot ("harsh", H7186) — feminine plural adjective, functioning adverbially to describe the manner of speech (va-yedabber... qashot, "he spoke... harshly").
- me-'ayin ("from where?", H0370 + H9006) — interrogative particle with prefixed preposition, forming the direct question reported in dialogue.
- lishbor 'okhel ("to buy food", H7666 + H0400) — qal infinitive construct with preposition li ("to/for"), expressing purpose: the reason given for the brothers' journey.
What the text says
The verse is built as a chain of narrative (vav-consecutive) verbs, each advancing the action in sequence: va-yar ("and he saw"), va-yikkirem ("and he recognized them"), va-yitnakker ("and he acted as a stranger"), va-yedabber ("and he spoke"), va-yomer ("and he said"). This chain places Joseph's inner recognition and outer concealment side by side without any explanatory clause between them — the Hebrew simply juxtaposes "he recognized them" and "he made himself a stranger to them," leaving the motive unstated grammatically.
The root ncr (נכר) appears twice in two different stems: hiphil in yikkirem ("he recognized," a causative sense of bringing something to recognition) and hithpael in yitnakker ("he made himself unrecognizable/a stranger"). This morphological pairing—same root, opposite grammatical voice—produces a contrast between Joseph's private knowledge and his public performance that is visible in the Hebrew consonantal structure but not preserved as a wordplay in translation.
The brothers' reply uses the construct noun 'eretz ("land of", H0776G) followed by the proper name Kena'an ("Canaan"), and states their purpose with the infinitive lishbor ("to buy") plus its object 'okhel ("food"), giving a simple purpose clause for their journey.
Differences between versions
The LXX renders the double root-play differently: it uses ἐπέγνω ("he recognized fully") for yikkirem and ἠλλοτριοῦτο ("he was made a stranger/estranged himself") for yitnakker, preserving a similar contrast but with distinct Greek roots rather than a shared one as in the Hebrew. The Vulgate compresses the clause va-yitnakker 'aleihem into "quasi ad alienos" ("as if to strangers"), attaching the estrangement adverbially to the harsh speech rather than as a separate verbal action, which slightly reorganizes the sequence found in the Hebrew's four separate narrative verbs.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.