Genesis 43:26

Summary

Genesis 43:26 narrates Joseph's arrival at his house, the brothers' presentation of the gift they carried, and their prostration before him. The verse is built from three sequential narrative actions marked by the vav-consecutive construction typical of Hebrew storytelling.

Key words

• yavo ("he came", H0935G) — qal narrative verb, third person masculine singular, marking the first sequential event: Joseph's entry.
• habaytah ("toward the house", H1004B + H9011) — noun with definite article and directional he suffix, indicating motion toward a destination rather than simple location.
• yavi'u ("they brought", H0935P) — hiphil (causative) narrative verb, third person masculine plural; the causative stem shows the brothers caused the gift to come in, distinct from Joseph's own coming (yavo).
• minchah ("gift", H4503H) — feminine singular noun, marked as direct object by 'et (H0853), referring to the tribute item mentioned earlier in the narrative.
• yishtachavu ("they bowed down", H7812) — verb in the hishtaphel pattern (a form used specifically for bowing/prostration), third person masculine plural, marking the third sequential action.

What the text says

The verse uses three consecutive narrative verbs joined by the vav-consecutive (va-), a hallmark of Biblical Hebrew storytelling that presents events as a chronological chain: Joseph "came" (yavo), the brothers "brought" (yavi'u), and they "bowed down" (yishtachavu). This chaining creates a tight temporal sequence not always visible in translation, where connectors like "and" may be smoothed over or varied.

Two nouns — habaytah (verse position 5-6) and artzah (position 25-26) — carry the directional he suffix (H9011), a grammatical feature indicating motion toward a place ("toward the house," "toward the ground") rather than static location. This same suffix appears twice for "house" (positions 5-6 and 18-20), first for Joseph's arrival and second for the location where the gift was placed, both marked as goals of movement.

The relative clause 'asher-beyadam ("which [was] in their hand", H0834A + H3027K + H9028) uses the construct form of yad ("hand") with a third-person plural suffix, describing the location of the minchah at the moment before it was brought in — a compact clause structure without a verb "to be," relying on the preposition be- ("in") to convey the state.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders habaytah ("toward the house") as εἰς τὴν οἰκίαν ("into the house"), and later habaytah (second occurrence, referring to where the gift was placed) as εἰς τὸν οἶκον — using two different Greek nouns (οἰκία, οἶκος) for the same Hebrew word bayit (H1004B), where the Hebrew repeats the identical term both times. The Vulgate renders the first habaytah as "domum suam" ("his house"), adding a possessive not explicit in the Hebrew, and omits a separate rendering of the second occurrence of "house," compressing the clause into "tenentes in manibus suis" ("holding in their hands") without repeating "toward the house."