Genesis 16:11

16:11 Then the Lord’s angel said to her,

“You are now ¹  pregnant

and are about to give birth ²  to a son.

You are to name him Ishmael, ³ 

for the Lord has heard your painful groans. ⁴ 

Genesis 17:16

17:16 I will bless her and will give you a son through her. I will bless her and she will become a mother of nations. ⁵  Kings of countries ⁶  will come from her!”

Genesis 17:19

17:19 God said, “No, Sarah your wife is going to bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. ⁷  I will confirm my covenant with him as a perpetual ⁸  covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 18:10

18:10 One of them ⁹  said, “I will surely return ¹⁰  to you when the season comes round again, ¹¹  and your wife Sarah will have a son!” ¹²  (Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, not far behind him. ¹³ 

Genesis 22:7

22:7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, ¹⁴  “My father?” “What is it, ¹⁵  my son?” he replied. “Here is the fire and the wood,” Isaac said, ¹⁶  “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

Genesis 22:13

22:13 Abraham looked up ¹⁷  and saw ¹⁸  behind him ¹⁹  a ram caught in the bushes by its horns. So he ²⁰  went over and got the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son.

Genesis 24:3

24:3 so that I may make you solemnly promise ²¹  by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of the earth: You must not acquire ²²  a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living.

Genesis 24:15

24:15 Before he had finished praying, there came Rebekah ²³  with her water jug on her shoulder. She was the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah (Milcah was the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor). ²⁴ 

Genesis 24:40

24:40 He answered, ‘The Lord, before whom I have walked, ²⁵  will send his angel with you. He will make your journey a success and you will find a wife for my son from among my relatives, from my father’s family.

Genesis 24:44

24:44 Then she will reply to me, “Drink, and I’ll draw water for your camels too.” May that woman be the one whom the Lord has chosen for my master’s son.’

Genesis 24:47

24:47 Then I asked her, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ She replied, ‘The daughter of Bethuel the son of Nahor, whom Milcah bore to Nahor.’ ²⁶  I put the ring in her nose and the bracelets on her wrists.

Genesis 29:34

29:34 She became pregnant again and had another son. She said, “Now this time my husband will show me affection, ²⁷  because I have given birth to three sons for him.” That is why he was named Levi. ²⁸ 

Genesis 37:35

37:35 All his sons and daughters stood by ²⁹  him to console him, but he refused to be consoled. “No,” he said, “I will go to the grave mourning my son.” ³⁰  So Joseph’s ³¹  father wept for him.

Genesis 38:26

38:26 Judah recognized them and said, “She is more upright ³²  than I am, because I wouldn’t give her to Shelah my son.” He did not have sexual relations with her ³³  again.

Genesis 45:9

45:9 Now go up to my father quickly ³⁴  and tell him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: “God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; do not delay!

Genesis 48:19

48:19 But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He too will become a nation and he too will become great. In spite of this, his younger brother will be even greater and his descendants will become a multitude ³⁵  of nations.”

[16:11]  ¹ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) focuses on her immediate situation: “Here you are pregnant.”

[16:11]  ² tn The active participle refers here to something that is about to happen.

[16:11]  ³ sn The name Ishmael consists of the imperfect or jussive form of the Hebrew verb with the theophoric element added as the subject. It means “God hears” or “may God hear.”

[16:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “affliction,” which must refer here to Hagar’s painful groans of anguish.

[17:16]  ⁵ tn Heb “she will become nations.”

[17:16]  ⁶ tn Heb “peoples.”

[17:19]  ⁹ tn Heb “will call his name Isaac.” The name means “he laughs,” or perhaps “may he laugh” (see the note on the word “laughed” in v. 17).

[17:19]  ¹⁰ tn Or “as an eternal.”

[18:10]  ¹³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (one of the three men introduced in v. 2) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Some English translations have specified the referent as the Lord (cf. RSV, NIV) based on vv. 1, 13, but the Hebrew text merely has “he said” at this point, referring to one of the three visitors. Aside from the introductory statement in v. 1, the incident is narrated from Abraham’s point of view, and the suspense is built up for the reader as Abraham’s elaborate banquet preparations in the preceding verses suggest he suspects these are important guests. But not until the promise of a son later in this verse does it become clear who is speaking. In v. 13 the Hebrew text explicitly mentions the Lord.

[18:10]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic, using the infinitive absolute with the imperfect tense.

[18:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “as/when the time lives” or “revives,” possibly referring to the springtime.

[18:10]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and there will be (הִנֵּה, hinneh) a son for Sarah.”

[18:10]  ¹⁷ tn This is the first of two disjunctive parenthetical clauses preparing the reader for Sarah’s response (see v. 12).

[22:7]  ¹⁷ tn The Hebrew text adds “and said.” This is redundant and has not been translated for stylistic reasons.

[22:7]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “Here I am” (cf. Gen 22:1).

[22:7]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and he said, ‘Here is the fire and the wood.’” The referent (Isaac) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Here and in the following verse the order of the introductory clauses and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[22:13]  ²¹ tn Heb “lifted his eyes.”

[22:13]  ²² tn Heb “and saw, and look.” The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”) draws attention to what Abraham saw and invites the audience to view the scene through his eyes.

[22:13]  ²³ tc The translation follows the reading of the MT; a number of Hebrew mss, the LXX, Syriac, and Samaritan Pentateuch read “one” (אֶחָד, ’ekhad) instead of “behind him” (אַחַר, ’akhar).

[22:13]  ²⁴ tn Heb “Abraham”; the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[24:3]  ²⁵ tn Following the imperative, the cohortative with the prefixed conjunction indicates purpose.

[24:3]  ²⁶ tn Heb “because you must not take.”

[24:15]  ²⁹ tn Heb “Look, Rebekah was coming out!” Using the participle introduced with הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”), the narrator dramatically transports the audience back into the event and invites them to see Rebekah through the servant’s eyes.

[24:15]  ³⁰ tn Heb “Look, Rebekah was coming out – [she] who was born to Bethuel, the son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, the brother of Abraham – and her jug [was] on her shoulder.” The order of the clauses has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[24:40]  ³³ tn The verb is the Hitpael of הָלַךְ (halakh), meaning “live one’s life” (see Gen 17:1). The statement may simply refer to serving the Lord or it may have a more positive moral connotation (“serve faithfully”).

[24:47]  ³⁷ tn Heb “whom Milcah bore to him.” The referent (Nahor) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[29:34]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “will be joined to me.”

[29:34]  ⁴² sn The name Levi (לֵוִי, levi), the precise meaning of which is debated, was appropriate because it sounds like the verb לָוָה (lavah, “to join”), used in the statement recorded earlier in the verse.

[37:35]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “arose, stood”; which here suggests that they stood by him in his time of grief.

[37:35]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “and he said, ‘Indeed I will go down to my son mourning to Sheol.’” Sheol was viewed as the place where departed spirits went after death.

[37:35]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “his”; the referent (Joseph) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[38:26]  ⁴⁹ tn Traditionally “more righteous”; cf. NCV, NRSV, NLT “more in the right.”

[38:26]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “and he did not add again to know her.” Here “know” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse.

[45:9]  ⁵³ tn Heb “hurry and go up.”

[48:19]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “fullness.”