Genesis 48:2

Summary

The verse reports that someone informed Jacob that his son Joseph had arrived, prompting Jacob (called here "Israel") to gather his strength and sit up in bed. The passage uses an impersonal reporting verb followed by direct speech, and switches between the patriarch's two names within a single sentence.

Key words

• va-yaGed ("someone told", H5046) — hiphil (causative) narrative verb with no explicit subject stated in the Hebrew; the causative form implies "he was caused to know" / "it was told to him," rendered impersonally.
• hinneh ("here!", H2009) — interjection introducing direct speech, drawing attention to the announcement that follows; it has no direct one-word equivalent in English but signals immediacy.
• ba ("he has come", H0935G) — qal participle (masculine singular) rather than a finite past-tense verb; participles in Hebrew narrative often express an action in progress or presented as a current state ("is coming" / "has come").
• va-yitchaZek ("he strengthened himself", H2388G) — hithpael (reflexive) narrative verb; the reflexive stem indicates Jacob acted upon himself, i.e., he exerted effort to gather strength, not that strength was given to him externally.
• Yisra'El ("Israel", H3478) — proper name used here instead of "Jacob," appearing in the same verse where "Jacob" (H3290) was used moments earlier for the same person.

What the text says

The verse opens with va-yaGed ("someone told", H5046), a hiphil verb without an expressed subject — the Hebrew simply states that "one told" or "it was told" to Jacob, functioning grammatically like a passive/impersonal construction even though the form is active causative. This is followed by va-yomer ("he said", H0559), introducing the reported message with hinneh ("here!", H2009), a common device in Biblical Hebrew for presenting news vividly to the listener.

The content of the message uses the participle ba ("he has come", H0935G) rather than a finite verb, describing Joseph's arrival as an ongoing or immediate event rather than a completed past action. The narrative then shifts from "Jacob" (H3290) to "Israel" (H3478) as the subject of va-yitchaZek ("he strengthened himself", H2388G), a hithpael form emphasizing self-directed effort — the patriarch actively musters his own strength — before va-yeshev ("he sat", H3427) places him upright "on the bed" (ha-mittah, H4296).

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the impersonal va-yaGed with a true passive, apēngelē ("it was announced"), matching the Hebrew's impersonal sense more explicitly, and uses the plural participle legontes ("saying") where the Hebrew has singular va-yomer ("he said", H0559). The Vulgate similarly uses a passive, dictumque est ("and it was said"). For the participle ba ("he has come", H0935G), the LXX has the present tense erchetai ("is coming"), while the Vulgate and most English/Spanish translations render it as a completed action, "has come" (BSB) or "ha venido" (SBLIBRE).