Genesis 49:27

Summary

Genesis 49:27 is part of Jacob's blessing on his sons, characterizing Benjamin through the image of a wolf. The verse describes a pattern of predatory activity across a full day: consuming prey in the morning and dividing plunder in the evening.

Key words

• zeʾev ("wolf", H2061) — masculine singular noun used as a predicate nominative describing Benjamin's nature, without a copula (Hebrew has no "is" here; it is supplied by translators).
• yitraf ("he tears", H2963) — qal imperfect, third person masculine singular, describing an ongoing or characteristic action attached to the wolf-image.
• yoʾkhal ("he consumes", H0398) — qal imperfect, parallel in form to yitraf, marking the morning action.
• yechallek ("he divides", H2505A) — piel (intensive) imperfect, describing the evening action; the piel stem intensifies the verb compared to a simple qal division.
• shalal ("plunder", H7998) — masculine singular noun, the object divided in the evening, distinct from ʿad ("booty", H5706), the object consumed in the morning.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with Binyamin followed directly by zeʾev ("wolf") and yitraf ("he tears"), forming a compact nominal-verbal unit without an explicit linking verb — literally "Benjamin, a wolf, he tears." This structure sets up an image rather than a full narrated action, and translators supply "is" to render it as a statement of identity or character.

The following two clauses are built in parallel: ba-boqer ("in the morning") pairs with yoʾkhal ("he consumes") and ʿad ("booty"), while la-ʿerev ("to the evening") pairs with yechallek ("he divides") and shalal ("plunder"). Both verbs are imperfect, indicating repeated, characteristic, or future action rather than a single completed event. The verb yechallek is in the piel stem, which in Hebrew grammar often marks intensive or resultative action — here "dividing" plunder as a deliberate act, distinct from the qal stem verbs (yitraf, yoʾkhal) used elsewhere in the verse. The Hebrew also distinguishes the noun for what is eaten (ʿad, "booty") from what is divided (shalal, "plunder"), a nuance that most translations flatten by using similar terms ("prey"/"plunder" or "presa"/"despojos") for both.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the opening as λύκος ἅρπαξ ("ravening wolf"), combining the noun and verb zeʾev yitraf into a single adjectival phrase, rather than preserving the Hebrew's separate noun-plus-verb construction. More notably, for the evening clause the LXX has δίδωσιν τροφήν ("he gives food"), where the Hebrew states yechallek shalal ("he divides plunder") — the LXX presents an image of giving/providing food rather than distributing spoils. The Vulgate's vespere dividet spolia ("in the evening he will divide the spoils") follows the Hebrew's sense of division more closely than the LXX does.