Genesis 19:14

19:14 Then Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law who were going to marry his daughters. ¹  He said, “Quick, get out of this place because the Lord is about to destroy ²  the city!” But his sons-in-law thought he was ridiculing them. ³ 

Genesis 44:16

44:16 Judah replied, “What can we say ⁴  to my lord? What can we speak? How can we clear ourselves? ⁵  God has exposed the sin of your servants! ⁶  We are now my lord’s slaves, we and the one in whose possession the cup was found.”

Genesis 47:18

47:18 When that year was over, they came to him the next year and said to him, “We cannot hide from our ⁷  lord that the money is used up and the livestock and the animals belong to our lord. Nothing remains before our lord except our bodies and our land.

Genesis 49:26

49:26 The blessings of your father are greater

than ⁸  the blessings of the eternal mountains ⁹ 

or the desirable things of the age-old hills.

They will be on the head of Joseph

and on the brow of the prince of his brothers. ¹⁰ 

[19:14]  ¹ sn The language has to be interpreted in the light of the context and the social customs. The men are called “sons-in-law” (literally “the takers of his daughters”), but the daughters had not yet had sex with a man. It is better to translate the phrase “who were going to marry his daughters.” Since formal marriage contracts were binding, the husbands-to-be could already be called sons-in-law.

[19:14]  ² tn The Hebrew active participle expresses an imminent action.

[19:14]  ³ tn Heb “and he was like one taunting in the eyes of his sons-in-law.” These men mistakenly thought Lot was ridiculing them and their lifestyle. Their response illustrates how morally insensitive they had become.

[44:16]  ⁴ tn The imperfect verbal form here indicates the subject’s potential.

[44:16]  ⁵ tn The Hitpael form of the verb צָדֵק (tsadeq) here means “to prove ourselves just, to declare ourselves righteous, to prove our innocence.”

[44:16]  ⁶ sn God has exposed the sin of your servants. The first three questions are rhetorical; Judah is stating that there is nothing they can say to clear themselves. He therefore must conclude that they have been found guilty.

[47:18]  ⁷ tn Heb “my.” The expression “my lord” occurs twice more in this verse.

[49:26]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “have prevailed over.”

[49:26]  ¹¹ tn One could interpret the phrase הוֹרַי (horay) to mean “my progenitors” (literally, “the ones who conceived me”), but the masculine form argues against this. It is better to emend the text to הַרֲרֵי (harare, “mountains of”) because it forms a better parallel with the next clause. In this case the final yod (י) on the form is a construct plural marker, not a pronominal suffix.

[49:26]  ¹² tn For further discussion of this passage, see I. Sonne, “Genesis 49:24-26,” JBL 65 (1946): 303-6.