Genesis 48:10

Summary

Genesis 48:10 describes Israel's (Jacob's) impaired eyesight due to old age, followed by Joseph bringing his sons close to him so that Jacob could kiss and embrace them. The verse combines a description of physical condition with three sequential narrative actions.

Key words

• ka.ve.Du ("they were heavy", H3513J) — qal perfect, third person plural, describing the eyes' completed state of heaviness/dimness due to age.
• yu.Khal ("he was able", H3201) — qal imperfect, expressing what Israel was not capable of doing (seeing), framed as an ongoing incapacity rather than a single completed failure.
• i.ya.Gesh ("he brought near", H5066H) — hiphil (causative) narrative verb: someone caused the sons to approach, distinct from a simple qal "come near."
• i.yi.Shak ("he kissed", H5401A) — qal narrative verb, third masculine singular, continuing the vav-consecutive chain of sequential actions.
• y.cha.Bek ("he embraced", H2263) — piel (intensive) narrative verb, marking the final action in the sequence with an intensified verbal stem compared to the simple qal forms used for "kissed."

What the text says

The verse opens with a non-narrative clause using the conjunction ve ("and", H9002) attached to 'ei.Nei ("eyes of", H5869A), a construct-form dual noun referring to Israel's paired eyes. This construct phrase, followed by the qal perfect ka.ve.Du, states a completed condition: the eyes "were heavy" mi.Zoken ("from old age", H2207), using the preposition mi to indicate cause. The negation lo' ("not", H3808) combined with the qal imperfect yu.Khal and the infinitive r.'ot ("to see", H7200G) expresses sustained inability rather than a one-time event.

The narrative then shifts into a chain of three vav-consecutive verbs, each marked by the narrative va ("and", H9001) prefix, producing the typical Biblical Hebrew sequential storytelling pattern ("and then... and then... and then"). The first, i.ya.Gesh, is in the hiphil stem, indicating that the subject caused the sons to be brought near — the grammar itself marks this as a causative action performed by someone other than Israel (the direct object marker 'o.Ta plus suffix m points to "them" as the ones being brought). The next two verbs, i.yi.Shak (qal) and y.cha.Bek (piel), both take Israel as subject, with the piel stem of the final verb marking a more intensive form of the action compared to the simple qal used for "kissed."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ka.ve.Du mi.Zoken ("they were heavy from old age") as ἐβαρυώπησαν ἀπὸ τοῦ γήρους ("were dim-sighted from old age"), interpreting the heaviness specifically as visual dimness. The Vulgate similarly reads caligabant præ nimia senectute ("were growing dim on account of excessive old age"), adding an intensifying sense ("excessive") not explicit in the Hebrew zoken ("old age", H2207) alone. Both LXX and Vulgate render yu.Khal ... r.'ot with an added qualifier — "clearly" (Vulgate: clare videre) — specifying the manner of the inability to see, which is not marked in the Hebrew infinitive construction itself.