Genesis 46:22

Summary

The verse closes the list of Rachel's descendants, stating that these are the sons born to Jacob through her, and gives a total count of the persons involved as fourteen.

Key words

• 'Eleh ("these", H0428) — demonstrative particle opening the verse, pointing back to the names just listed and forward to the summary count.
• yullad ("it was born", H3205) — pual (intensive passive) perfect, third person, used impersonally/collectively; the verb does not shift into plural form even though it refers to multiple sons.
• le ("to", H9005) — prefixed preposition attached to Ya'akov, marking Jacob as the one "to whom" the birth occurred (a dative of relation, not a direct object).
• kol ("every", H3605) — construct form beginning the phrase kol-nefesh, functioning as a collective quantifier before the noun.
• nefesh ("person", H5315J) — feminine singular noun used in a distributive sense ("every soul/person"), the standard idiom for counting individuals in genealogical lists.

What the text says

The sentence is built in two parts. First, a nominal clause introduced by 'Eleh ("these") identifies the preceding names as bene Rachel ("sons of Rachel", construct chain), followed by a relative clause with 'asher ("who") and the verb yullad. The verb is pual perfect, third person masculine singular — grammatically singular even though its logical referent (the sons) is plural. This is a feature of Biblical Hebrew where a passive verb preceding or governing a collective idea can remain in the singular, functioning almost impersonally ("it was born to Jacob" rather than "they were born").

The second part is the summary formula kol-nefesh 'arba'ah 'asar, literally "every person: fourteen." Here nefesh functions distributively, a standard formula in these genealogical counts (parallel to similar totals elsewhere in the chapter), rather than referring to a single "soul" in the ordinary sense of the word.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew text and the Vulgate agree on the number 'arba'ah 'asar ("fourteen") — Vulgate: "quatuordecim." The LXX, however, gives "δέκα ὀκτώ" ("eighteen"), a numeral that diverges from both the Hebrew and the Vulgate. Additionally, the Hebrew explicitly names Ya'akov ("Jacob") as the one to whom the sons were born, using the preposition le; the LXX's clause "οὓς ἐγέννησεν" ("whom he begot") leaves the subject implicit rather than naming Jacob directly in this clause, while the Vulgate restores the explicit name with "genuit Jacob."