Genesis 47:1
וַיָּבֹא יוֹסֵף וַיַּגֵּד לְפַרְעֹה וַיֹּאמֶר אָבִי וְאַחַי וְצֹאנָם וּבְקָרָם וְכָל־אֲשֶׁר לָהֶם בָּאוּ מֵאֶרֶץ כְּנָעַן וְהִנָּם בְּאֶרֶץ גֹּֽשֶׁן׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וַיָּבֹ֣א יוֹסֵף֮ וַיַּגֵּ֣ד לְפַרְעֹה֒ וַיֹּ֗אמֶר אָבִ֨י וְאַחַ֜י וְצֹאנָ֤ם וּבְקָרָם֙ וְכָל־אֲשֶׁ֣ר לָהֶ֔ם בָּ֖אוּ מֵאֶ֣רֶץ כְּנָ֑עַן וְהִנָּ֖ם בְּאֶ֥רֶץ גֹּֽשֶׁן׃
Ἐλθὼν δὲ Ἰωσὴφ ἀπήγγειλεν τῷ Φαραὼ λέγων ῾Ο πατὴρ καὶ οἱ ἀδελφοὶ καὶ τὰ κτήνη καὶ οἱ βόες αὐτῶν καὶ πάντα τὰ αὐτῶν ἦλθον ἐκ γῆς Χανάαν, καὶ ἰδού εἰσιν ἐν γῇ Γέσεμ.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Ingressus ergo Joseph nuntiavit Pharaoni, dicens: Pater meus et fratres, oves eorum et armenta, et cuncta quæ possident, venerunt de terra Chanaan: et ecce consistunt in terra Gessen.
José fue a informarle al faraón: “Mi padre y mis hermanos ya salieron de la tierra de Canaán, junto con sus ovejas, sus vacas y todo lo que tienen, y ahora se encuentran en la región de Gosén”.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y JOSÉ vino, é hizo saber á Faraón, y dijo: Mi padre y mis hermanos, y sus ovejas y sus vacas, con todo lo que tienen, han venido de la tierra de Canaán, y he aquí, están en la tierra de Gosén.
So Joseph went and told Pharaoh: “ My father and my brothers, with their flocks and herds and all they own, have come from the land of Canaan and are now in Goshen.”
✦ What the text says
Summary
Joseph goes to Pharaoh and reports that his father, brothers, and their flocks, herds, and possessions have arrived from Canaan and are currently in the land of Goshen. The verse is structured as a narrative frame (Joseph's actions) followed by a direct quotation of his announcement.
Key words
- vaYavo ("he went/came", H0935G) — qal narrative form (vayyiqtol), marking the next event in the story sequence.
- vaYagged ("he told", H5046) — hiphil (causative) narrative form: literally "he caused to be known," stronger than a simple "he said."
- aviY ("father-my", H0001G + H9020) — construct noun with 1st person suffix, "my father," part of the quoted list of subjects.
- hinNam ("behold-they", H2005 + H9038) — interjection hinneh fused with a pronominal suffix, a verbless presentative construction ("here-they-are") rather than a finite verb.
- Ba'u ("they have come", H0935G) — same root as vaYavo but here in the perfect (completed) aspect, used inside the quotation to describe the family's arrival as a finished event.
What the text says
The verse divides into a narrative frame and embedded speech. The frame uses two vayyiqtol (narrative) verbs, vaYavo ("he went", H0935G) and vaYagged ("he told", H5046), both marked for sequential past action — "and then he went... and then he told." The hiphil stem of vaYagged signals that Joseph did not merely speak but formally caused Pharaoh to know something, fitting a report to a ruler.
Inside Joseph's quoted words, the subjects are stacked in construct chains with pronominal suffixes: aviY ("my father"), achaY ("my brothers", H0251G), tzonam ("their flock", H6629G), bekaram ("their herd", H1241), each suffix showing possession without a repeated independent pronoun. The verb governing this list, Ba'u ("they have come", H0935G), is in the perfect, presenting the journey from Canaan as a completed action, in contrast to the narrative verb vaYavo built on the same root but used differently in the frame.
The final clause, veHinnam beEretz Goshen ("and behold-they in the land of Goshen"), has no finite verb in the Hebrew — hinnam combines the interjection hinneh (H2005) with the 3rd person plural suffix (H9038), functioning as a presentative pointing to their current location, dependent grammatically on the preposition be ("in", H9003) plus eretz Goshen ("land of Goshen", H0776G/H1657G).
Differences between versions
The Hebrew's verbless clause veHinnam beEretz Goshen ("and behold, they [are] in the land of Goshen") supplies no verb. The LXX adds an explicit verb, εἰσιν ("they are"), and the Vulgate goes further with consistunt ("they dwell/remain"), both making explicit what the Hebrew leaves as a bare presentative construction.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.