Genesis 4:9

4:9 Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” ¹  And he replied, “I don’t know! Am I my brother’s guardian?” ² 

Genesis 14:13

14:13 A fugitive ³  came and told Abram the Hebrew. ⁴  Now Abram was living by the oaks ⁵  of Mamre the Amorite, the brother ⁶  of Eshcol and Aner. (All these were allied by treaty ⁷  with Abram.) ⁸ 

Genesis 20:5

20:5 Did Abraham ⁹  not say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ¹⁰  ‘He is my brother.’ I have done this with a clear conscience ¹¹  and with innocent hands!”

Genesis 27:11

27:11 “But Esau my brother is a hairy man,” Jacob protested to his mother Rebekah, “and I have smooth skin! ¹² 

Genesis 28:2

28:2 Leave immediately ¹³  for Paddan Aram! Go to the house of Bethuel, your mother’s father, and find yourself a wife there, among the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother.

Genesis 28:5

28:5 So Isaac sent Jacob on his way, and he went to Paddan Aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean and brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

Genesis 29:12

29:12 When Jacob explained ¹⁴  to Rachel that he was a relative of her father ¹⁵  and the son of Rebekah, she ran and told her father.

Genesis 31:37

31:37 When you searched through all my goods, did you find anything that belonged to you? ¹⁶  Set it here before my relatives and yours, ¹⁷  and let them settle the dispute between the two of us! ¹⁸ 

Genesis 32:11

32:11 Rescue me, ¹⁹  I pray, from the hand ²⁰  of my brother Esau, ²¹  for I am afraid he will come ²²  and attack me, as well as the mothers with their children. ²³ 

Genesis 32:17

32:17 He instructed the servant leading the first herd, ²⁴  “When my brother Esau meets you and asks, ‘To whom do you belong? ²⁵  Where are you going? Whose herds are you driving?’ ²⁶ 

Genesis 42:4

42:4 But Jacob did not send Joseph’s brother Benjamin with his brothers, ²⁷  for he said, ²⁸  “What if some accident ²⁹  happens ³⁰  to him?”

Genesis 42:6

42:6 Now Joseph was the ruler of the country, the one who sold grain to all the people of the country. ³¹  Joseph’s brothers came and bowed down ³²  before him with ³³  their faces to the ground.

Genesis 45:16

45:16 Now it was reported ³⁴  in the household of Pharaoh, “Joseph’s brothers have arrived.” It pleased ³⁵  Pharaoh and his servants.

[4:9]  ¹ sn Where is Abel your brother? Again the Lord confronts a guilty sinner with a rhetorical question (see Gen 3:9-13), asking for an explanation of what has happened.

[4:9]  ² tn Heb “The one guarding my brother [am] I?”

[14:13]  ³ tn Heb “the fugitive.” The article carries a generic force or indicates that this fugitive is definite in the mind of the speaker.

[14:13]  ⁴ sn E. A. Speiser (Genesis [AB], 103) suggests that part of this chapter came from an outside source since it refers to Abram the Hebrew. That is not impossible, given that the narrator likely utilized traditions and genealogies that had been collected and transmitted over the years. The meaning of the word “Hebrew” has proved elusive. It may be related to the verb “to cross over,” perhaps meaning “immigrant.” Or it might be derived from the name of Abram’s ancestor Eber (see Gen 11:14-16).

[14:13]  ⁵ tn Or “terebinths.”

[14:13]  ⁶ tn Or “a brother”; or “a relative”; or perhaps “an ally.”

[14:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “possessors of a treaty with.” Since it is likely that the qualifying statement refers to all three (Mamre, Eshcol, and Aner) the words “all these” have been supplied in the translation to make this clear.

[14:13]  ⁸ tn This parenthetical disjunctive clause explains how Abram came to be living in their territory, but it also explains why they must go to war with Abram.

[20:5]  ⁵ tn Heb “he”; the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[20:5]  ⁶ tn Heb “and she, even she.”

[20:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “with the integrity of my heart.”

[27:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, ‘Look, Esau my brother is a hairy man, but I am a smooth [skinned] man.’” The order of the introductory clause and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[28:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “Arise! Go!” The first of the two imperatives is adverbial and stresses the immediacy of the departure.

[29:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “declared.”

[29:12]  ¹² tn Heb “that he [was] the brother of her father.”

[31:37]  ¹³ tn Heb “what did you find from all the goods of your house?”

[31:37]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “your relatives.” The word “relatives” has not been repeated in the translation here for stylistic reasons.

[31:37]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “that they may decide between us two.”

[32:11]  ¹⁵ tn The imperative has the force of a prayer here, not a command.

[32:11]  ¹⁶ tn The “hand” here is a metonymy for “power.”

[32:11]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau.”

[32:11]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “for I am afraid of him, lest he come.”

[32:11]  ¹⁹ sn Heb “me, [the] mother upon [the] sons.” The first person pronoun “me” probably means here “me and mine,” as the following clause suggests.

[32:17]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “the first”; this has been specified as “the servant leading the first herd” in the translation for clarity.

[32:17]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “to whom are you?”

[32:17]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and to whom are these before you?”

[42:4]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “But Benjamin, the brother of Joseph, Jacob did not send with his brothers.” The disjunctive clause highlights the contrast between Benjamin and the other ten.

[42:4]  ²⁰ tn The Hebrew verb אָמַר (’amar, “to say”) could also be translated “thought” (i.e., “he said to himself”) here, giving Jacob’s reasoning rather than spoken words.

[42:4]  ²¹ tn The Hebrew noun אָסוֹן (’ason) is a rare word meaning “accident, harm.” Apart from its use in these passages it occurs in Exodus 21:22-23 of an accident to a pregnant woman. The term is a rather general one, but Jacob was no doubt thinking of his loss of Joseph.

[42:4]  ²² tn Heb “encounters.”

[42:6]  ²¹ tn The disjunctive clause either introduces a new episode in the unfolding drama or provides the reader with supplemental information necessary to understanding the story.

[42:6]  ²² sn Joseph’s brothers came and bowed down before him. Here is the beginning of the fulfillment of Joseph’s dreams (see Gen 37). But it is not the complete fulfillment, since all his brothers and his parents must come. The point of the dream, of course, was not simply to get the family to bow to Joseph, but that Joseph would be placed in a position of rule and authority to save the family and the world (41:57).

[42:6]  ²³ tn The word “faces” is an adverbial accusative, so the preposition has been supplied in the translation.

[45:16]  ²³ tn Heb “and the sound was heard.”

[45:16]  ²⁴ tn Heb “was good in the eyes of.”