Genesis 47:17

Summary

The verse describes people bringing their livestock to Joseph in exchange for food, since famine conditions had exhausted their resources. Joseph provides lechem ("food/bread", H3899) in exchange for horses, flocks, herds, and donkeys, sustaining them with food for all their livestock throughout that year.

Key words

• va-yavi'u ("and they brought", H0935P) — hiphil (causative) narrative verb: the people cause the livestock to come, i.e., they bring it, not merely that it comes on its own.
• miqnehem ("their livestock", H4735) — construct noun with 3mp suffix ("their"); appears multiple times in the verse (vv. 4, 18, 23, 36) tracking the recurring category of goods being exchanged.
• va-yitten ("and he gave", H5414G) — qal narrative verb, marking Joseph as the grammatical subject who performs the giving.
• va-yenahalem ("and he refreshed/sustained them", H5095) — piel (intensive) verb with 3mp suffix "them" (H9038), indicating an intensified or sustained action of provisioning, distinct from the simple "give" earlier in the verse.
• ba-shanah ha-hiv' ("in that year", H8141 + H1931) — the feminine demonstrative hiv' ("that", H1931) agrees with the feminine noun shanah ("year"), closing the verse with a temporal marker for the whole transaction.

What the text says

The verse is built on a chain of narrative vav-forms (va-yavi'u, va-yitten, va-yenahalem), each advancing the sequence of action: first the people bring (va-yavi'u) their miqnehem ("their livestock") to Joseph; then Joseph gives (va-yitten) them lechem ("food") in return for the animals; finally he sustains (va-yenahalem) them with food for the totality of their livestock. The repetition of miqneh ("livestock", H4735) in construct form four times (with ha-tzon "the flock", ha-baqar "the herd", and finally kol miqnehem "all their livestock") creates an inventory-like structure, listing categories (horses, flocks, herds, donkeys) before summarizing them under one collective term.

The shift from the qal verb va-yitten ("he gave") to the piel verb va-yenahalem ("he sustained/refreshed them") signals a change in aspect: the first verb describes a single exchange, while the piel form conveys a more sustained or intensified provisioning, reinforced by the closing phrase ba-shanah ha-hiv' ("in that year"), which frames the entire activity as extending across a full year rather than a single transaction.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders va-yenahalem ("he sustained them", H5095) with ἐξέθρεψεν ("he nourished/reared up"), a verb emphasizing nourishment or growth, where the Hebrew piel form more broadly denotes sustaining or leading gently. The Vulgate's sustentavit ("he sustained") aligns more closely with the sense of ongoing support. Additionally, the Hebrew repeats miqneh ("livestock") as a construct noun before each animal category (ha-tzon, "the flock"; ha-baqar, "the herd"), while the LXX and Vulgate use simpler prepositional exchanges (ἀντὶ, "in exchange for"; pro, "for") without repeating an equivalent to "livestock of" before each term.