Genesis 46:25

Summary

The verse lists the sons of Bilhah, identifying her as the maidservant Laban gave to his daughter Rachel, and states that she bore these to Jacob, for a total of seven persons.

Key words

• 'Elleh ("these", H0428) — demonstrative particle, used twice (opening and closing the list), framing the group of descendants being enumerated.
• netan ("he had given", H5414G) — qal perfect of the verb "to give"; the perfect (completed) aspect marks this as background information prior to the main narrative action, explaining how Bilhah came to Rachel.
• bittO ("his daughter", H1323G + H9023) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, forming "daughter-of-him," directly linking Rachel to Laban as father.
• vaTteled ("and she had borne", H3205) — qal verb in narrative (vav-consecutive) form, the wayyiqtol chain that advances the story: after the background clause about Laban's gift, the narrative resumes with Bilhah's act of bearing children.
• nefesh ("person", H5315J) — feminine singular noun used here in a collective/distributive sense with the numeral shiv'ah ("seven", H7651), counting individuals rather than using a plural form.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built around two occurrences of 'Elleh ("these", H0428), which bracket the entire verse: the first introduces "these are the sons of Bilhah," and the second reintroduces the same group as the object of the verb "she bore" (vaTteled, H3205), "she had borne these to Jacob." Between these two markers, a relative clause interrupts the flow: 'asher natan Lavan leRachel bittO ("whom Laban had given to Rachel his daughter"). This clause uses the qal perfect natan (H5414G), a completed action prior to the main storyline, explaining the origin of Bilhah's status before the narrative moves forward with the vav-consecutive verb vaTteled.

The construct chain bene Bilhah ("sons of Bilhah", H1121A + H1090A) opens the verse, identifying the list by the mother rather than by Jacob, even though the children belong to Jacob's family line, as the closing clause makes explicit. The final phrase kol-nefesh shiv'ah ("every person, seven", H3605 + H5315J + H7651) uses the singular nefesh with the numeral "seven," a common Hebrew construction for counting persons where the noun stays singular despite the plural quantity.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew states literally "these are the sons of Bilhah, whom Laban gave to Rachel his daughter, and she bore these to Jacob." The BSB translation restructures this as "these are the sons of Jacob born to Bilhah," shifting the initial construct from Bilhah to Jacob and adding "born" as an interpretive verb not present as a separate lexical item in the Hebrew clause structure. The LXX (Swete) and Vulgate follow the Hebrew order closely, beginning with "these [are the] sons of Balla/Bala," matching the bene Bilhah construction. The SBLIBRE Spanish version adds explanatory content in parentheses ("Bilhá era la sirvienta...") describing Bilhah's servant status, information not stated in this verse's Hebrew wording, which only calls her "his daughter's" (Rachel's) recipient without the term "sirvienta" ("maidservant") appearing in this specific verse.