Genesis 47:9

וַיֹּאמֶר יַעֲקֹב אֶל־פַּרְעֹה יְמֵי שְׁנֵי מְגוּרַי שְׁלֹשִׁים וּמְאַת שָׁנָה מְעַט וְרָעִים הָיוּ יְמֵי שְׁנֵי חַיַּי וְלֹא הִשִּׂיגוּ אֶת־יְמֵי שְׁנֵי חַיֵּי אֲבֹתַי בִּימֵי מְגוּרֵיהֶֽם׃

✦ Hebrew interlinear

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✦ The same verse in five languages

Hebrew

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יַעֲקֹב֙ אֶל־פַּרְעֹ֔ה יְמֵי֙ שְׁנֵ֣י מְגוּרַ֔י שְׁלֹשִׁ֥ים וּמְאַ֖ת שָׁנָ֑ה מְעַ֣ט וְרָעִ֗ים הָיוּ֙ יְמֵי֙ שְׁנֵ֣י חַיַּ֔י וְלֹ֣א הִשִּׂ֗יגוּ אֶת־יְמֵי֙ שְׁנֵי֙ חַיֵּ֣י אֲבֹתַ֔י בִּימֵ֖י מְגוּרֵיהֶֽם׃

Greek (Septuagint)

καὶ εἶπεν Ἰακὼβ τῷ Φαραώ Αἱ ἡμέραι τῶν ἐτῶν τῆς ζωῆς μου ἃς παροικῶ ἑκατὸν τριάκοντα ἔτη· μικραὶ καὶ πονηραὶ γεγόνασιν αἱ ἡμέραι τῶν ἐτῶν τῆς ζωῆς μου· οὐκ ἀφἰκοντο εἰς τὰς ἥμερος τῶν ἐτῶν τῆς ζωῆς τῶν πατέρων μου, ἃς ἡμέρας παρῴκησαν.

Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0

Latin (Vulgate)

respondit: Dies peregrinationis meæ centum triginta annorum sunt, parvi et mali, et non pervenerunt usque ad dies patrum meorum quibus peregrinati sunt.

Spanish

Jacob le respondió: “Mi vida de andar peregrinando ha sido de ciento treinta años. Han sido años pocos y difíciles, y no se comparan con los años que vivieron mis antepasados en sus peregrinaciones”.

Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)

Y Jacob respondió á Faraón: Los días de los años de mi peregrinación son ciento treinta años; pocos y malos han sido los días de los años de mi vida, y no han llegado á los días de los años de la vida de mis padres en los días de su peregrinación.

English

“ My travels have lasted 130 years,” Jacob replied. “ My years have been few and hard, and they have not matched the years of the travels of my fathers.”

✦ What the text says

Summary

Jacob answers Pharaoh by stating the length of his life in years — one hundred thirty — and characterizing those years as few and difficult compared to the lifespans of his ancestors. The verse uses repeated construct chains to frame "life" through the lens of "sojourning" (temporary dwelling).

Key words

mə.gu.Ray ("my sojournings", H4033 + H9020) — plural noun in construct with a 1st person suffix; frames Jacob's entire life as a period of temporary residence rather than settled dwelling, repeated twice in the verse (also in məgureihem, "their sojournings", v. of ancestors).
məʿaṭ ("few", H4592) and raʿim ("displeasing/hard", H7451H) — a noun and an adjective, both masculine plural in form or agreement, joined by və ("and", H9002) to form a double predicate describing the years.
hayu ("they have been", H1961) — qal perfect, 3rd person plural, agreeing with "the days of the years" (yəmei šənei) as its grammatical subject; marks a completed state.
hissigu ("they have reached/attained", H5381) — hiphil (causative) perfect; the causative stem implies an active "reaching up to" or "attaining to" a measure, here negated by lo' ("not", H3808).
'et (H0853) — the direct object marker preceding "the days of the years of the lives of my fathers," signaling that this phrase is the object which the subject (Jacob's years) failed to reach.

What the text says

The verse is built almost entirely on the chained construct phrase yəmei šənei ... ḥayyai ("the days of the years of ... life"), repeated three times: once for Jacob's own sojourning years, once for his life in general, and once for his ancestors' lives. This repetition creates a layered comparison structure rather than a single flat statement. The first clause states the sum (šəloshim u-mə'at shanah, "thirty and a hundred years" = 130), then a second clause qualifies those years as məʿaṭ və-raʿim ("few and displeasing"), and a third clause, introduced by lo' with the hiphil verb hissigu, states that Jacob's years did not "reach" or "attain to" the years of his ancestors' lives. The hiphil stem of hissigu is causative in form, suggesting an active overtaking or arriving-at a benchmark, which the negation blocks entirely — Jacob's years fall short of that benchmark.

The final phrase, bi-mei məgureihem ("in the days of their sojournings", H4033 + H9028), returns to the sojourning frame from the opening of the verse, applying it now to the ancestors rather than to Jacob himself, closing the verse with the same vocabulary it began with.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the opening as "the days of the years of my life... which I sojourn" (using a relative clause with paroikō, "I sojourn"), where the Hebrew places məgurai ("my sojournings") directly in construct with "days of years," without a separate verb "to sojourn." The Vulgate uses peregrinationis meae ("of my wandering") similarly as a noun phrase, closer to the Hebrew construct structure than the LXX's relative clause.

This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.