Genesis 39:14

39:14 she called for her household servants and said to them, “See, my husband brought ¹  in a Hebrew man ²  to us to humiliate us. ³  He tried to have sex with me, ⁴  but I screamed loudly. ⁵ 

Genesis 48:5

48:5 “Now, as for your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, they will be mine. ⁶  Ephraim and Manasseh will be mine just as Reuben and Simeon are.

[39:14]  ¹ tn The verb has no expressed subject, and so it could be treated as a passive (“a Hebrew man was brought in”; cf. NIV). But it is clear from the context that her husband brought Joseph into the household, so Potiphar is the apparent referent here. Thus the translation supplies “my husband” as the referent of the unspecified pronominal subject of the verb (cf. NEB, NRSV).

[39:14]  ² sn A Hebrew man. Potiphar’s wife raises the ethnic issue when talking to her servants about what their boss had done.

[39:14]  ³ tn Heb “to make fun of us.” The verb translated “to humiliate us” here means to hold something up for ridicule, or to toy with something harmfully. Attempted rape would be such an activity, for it would hold the victim in contempt.

[39:14]  ⁴ tn Heb “he came to me to lie with me.” Here the expression “lie with” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse.

[39:14]  ⁵ tn Heb “and I cried out with a loud voice.”

[48:5]  ⁶ sn They will be mine. Jacob is here adopting his two grandsons Manasseh and Ephraim as his sons, and so they will have equal share with the other brothers. They will be in the place of Joseph and Levi (who will become a priestly tribe) in the settlement of the land. See I. Mendelsohn, “A Ugaritic Parallel to the Adoption of Ephraim and Manasseh,” IEJ (1959): 180-83.