Genesis 28:3

28:3 May the sovereign God ¹  bless you! May he make you fruitful and give you a multitude of descendants! ²  Then you will become ³  a large nation. ⁴ 

Genesis 48:4

48:4 He said to me, ‘I am going to make you fruitful ⁵  and will multiply you. ⁶  I will make you into a group of nations, and I will give this land to your descendants ⁷  as an everlasting possession.’ ⁸ 

[28:3]  ¹ tn Heb “El Shaddai.” See the extended note on the phrase “sovereign God” in Gen 17:1.

[28:3]  ² tn Heb “and make you fruitful and multiply you.” See Gen 17:6, 20 for similar terminology.

[28:3]  ³ tn The perfect verbal form with vav (ו) consecutive here indicates consequence. The collocation הָיָה + preposition לְ (hayah + lÿ) means “become.”

[28:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “an assembly of peoples.”

[48:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “Look, I am making you fruitful.” The participle following הִנֵּה (hinneh) has the nuance of a certain and often imminent future.

[48:4]  ⁶ tn The perfect verbal form with vav consecutive carries on the certain future idea.

[48:4]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew text adds “after you,” which has not been included in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[48:4]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew word אֲחֻזָּה (’akhuzzah), translated “possession,” describes a permanent holding in the land. It is the noun form of the same verb (אָחַז, ’akhaz) that was used for the land given to them in Goshen (Gen 47:27).