Genesis 48:17

Summary

Joseph observes his father Jacob placing his right hand on Ephraim's head, the younger son, and this action displeases him. Joseph then takes hold of his father's hand, attempting to move it from Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head, the firstborn.

Key words

• va-Yar' ("and he saw", H7200G) — qal narrative verb marking the sequential action that opens the verse: Joseph's perception triggers what follows.
• yashit ("he will put/place", H7896H) — qal imperfect, expressing an action in progress or continuing from Jacob's perspective, embedded in the subordinate clause introduced by ki ("that", H3588A).
• va-Yera' ("and it was displeasing", H7489A) — qal narrative verb, third masculine singular, whose grammatical subject is impersonal; the construction "it was displeasing in his eyes" (be-'einav, H5869I) uses the idiom "in the eyes of" to express a subjective reaction rather than an active verb like "to be angry" with Joseph as direct subject.
• va-yitmokh ("and he grasped", H8551) — qal narrative verb describing the physical action of holding, distinct from a more forceful verb; here it indicates taking hold with the intention of moving something.
• le-hasir ("to remove", H5493G) — hiphil infinitive (causative), expressing the purpose of the grasping action: causing something to be removed/turned away.

What the text says

The verse's syntax is built on two chained clauses through the narrative vav (H9001), typical of Biblical Hebrew narrative structure: "and he saw... and it displeased... and he grasped." The initial construction va-Yar' Yosef ki ("Joseph saw that", combining H7200G and H3588A) introduces reported content — what Joseph perceived — using the imperfect yashit (H7896H), which conveys the action of placing the hand as something in progress or being observed at the moment.

The idiomatic expression va-Yera' be-'einav ("and it was displeasing in his eyes", combining H7489A and H5869I) uses the dual noun 'einayim ("eyes") in construct with the pronominal suffix "his," a common Hebrew way to express a subjective reaction without directly making the person the grammatical subject of an emotion verb. Literally, it is the situation that "does evil/is displeasing in the eyes of" someone, not the person who "becomes angry."

The final purpose clause, le-hasir 'otah me-'al rosh Ephrayim 'al rosh Menasheh ("to remove it from upon Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head"), employs the hiphil infinitive hasir (H5493G), which grammatically indicates a causative action: Joseph does not simply move the hand himself as an equivalent action but attempts to "cause the hand to move away," reinforced by the repeated preposition 'al ("on/upon", H5921A) that marks the spatial trajectory between the two heads.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the impersonal expression va-Yera' be-'einav ("it was displeasing in his eyes") as βαρὺ αὐτῷ κατεφάνη ("it appeared heavy/grave to him"), employing a different image (heaviness) instead of the ocular idiom present in the Hebrew. The Vulgate opts for graviter accepit ("he took it gravely/badly"), which similarly moves away from the "eyes" metaphor toward an expression of internal reception. Additionally, where the Hebrew simply says va-yitmokh yad-'aviv ("and he grasped his father's hand"), the LXX explicitly adds the subject "Ἰωσήφ" (Joseph), clarifying the referent that in Hebrew remains implicit in the verb's conjugation.