Ruth 4:12

4:12 May your family ¹  become like the family of Perez ²  – whom Tamar bore to Judah – through the descendants ³  the Lord gives you by this young woman.”

Genesis 20:17--21:3

20:17 Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, as well as his wife and female slaves so that they were able to have children. 20:18 For the Lord ⁴  had caused infertility to strike every woman ⁵  in the household of Abimelech because he took ⁶  Sarah, Abraham’s wife.

The Birth of Isaac

21:1 The Lord visited ⁷  Sarah just as he had said he would and did ⁸  for Sarah what he had promised. ⁹  21:2 So Sarah became pregnant ¹⁰  and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the appointed time that God had told him. 21:3 Abraham named his son – whom Sarah bore to him – Isaac. ¹¹ 

Genesis 25:21

25:21 Isaac prayed to ¹²  the Lord on behalf of his wife because she was childless. The Lord answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.

Genesis 29:31

The Family of Jacob

29:31 When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, ¹³  he enabled her to become pregnant ¹⁴  while Rachel remained childless.

Genesis 30:2

30:2 Jacob became furious ¹⁵  with Rachel and exclaimed, “Am I in the place of God, who has kept you from having children?” ¹⁶ 

Genesis 30:22-23

30:22 Then God took note of ¹⁷  Rachel. He paid attention to her and enabled her to become pregnant. ¹⁸  30:23 She became pregnant ¹⁹  and gave birth to a son. Then she said, “God has taken away my shame.” ²⁰ 

Genesis 33:5

33:5 When Esau ²¹  looked up ²²  and saw the women and the children, he asked, “Who are these people with you?” Jacob ²³  replied, “The children whom God has graciously given ²⁴  your servant.”

Genesis 33:1

Jacob Meets Esau

33:1 Jacob looked up ²⁵  and saw that Esau was coming ²⁶  along with four hundred men. So he divided the children among Leah, Rachel, and the two female servants.

Genesis 1:27

1:27 God created humankind ²⁷  in his own image,

in the image of God he created them, ²⁸ 

male and female he created them. ²⁹ 

Ruth 2:5

2:5 Boaz asked ³⁰  his servant ³¹  in charge of the harvesters, “To whom does this young woman belong?” ³² 

Psalms 113:9

113:9 He makes the barren woman of the family ³³ 

a happy mother of children. ³⁴ 

Praise the Lord!

Psalms 127:3

127:3 Yes, ³⁵  sons ³⁶  are a gift from the Lord,

the fruit of the womb is a reward.

[4:12]  ¹ tn Heb “your house” (so NAB, NASB, NRSV).

[4:12]  ² tn Heb “and may your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah, from the offspring whom the Lord gives to you from this young woman.”

[4:12]  ³ tn Heb “from the seed” (KJV, ASV both similar); NASB, NIV “through the offspring”; NRSV “through the children.”

[20:18]  ⁴ tn In the Hebrew text the clause begins with “because.”

[20:18]  ⁵ tn Heb had completely closed up every womb.” In the Hebrew text infinitive absolute precedes the finite verb for emphasis.

[20:18]  ⁶ tn Heb “because of.” The words “he took” are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[21:1]  ⁷ sn The Hebrew verb translated “visit” (פָּקַד, paqad ) often describes divine intervention for blessing or cursing; it indicates God’s special attention to an individual or a matter, always with respect to his people’s destiny. He may visit (that is, destroy) the Amalekites; he may visit (that is, deliver) his people in Egypt. Here he visits Sarah, to allow her to have the promised child. One’s destiny is changed when the Lord “visits.” For a more detailed study of the term, see G. André, Determining the Destiny (ConBOT).

[21:1]  ⁸ tn Heb “and the Lord did.” The divine name has not been repeated here in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[21:1]  ⁹ tn Heb “spoken.”

[21:2]  ¹⁰ tn Or “she conceived.”

[21:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the one born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.” The two modifying clauses, the first introduced with an article and the second with the relative pronoun, are placed in the middle of the sentence, before the name Isaac is stated. They are meant to underscore that this was indeed an actual birth to Abraham and Sarah in fulfillment of the promise.

[25:21]  ¹² tn The Hebrew verb עָתַר (’atar), translated “prayed [to]” here, appears in the story of God’s judgment on Egypt in which Moses asked the Lord to remove the plagues. The cognate word in Arabic means “to slaughter for sacrifice,” and the word is used in Zeph 3:10 to describe worshipers who bring offerings. Perhaps some ritual accompanied Isaac’s prayer here.

[29:31]  ¹³ tn Heb “hated.” The rhetorical device of overstatement is used (note v. 30, which says simply that Jacob loved Rachel more than he did Leah) to emphasize that Rachel, as Jacob’s true love and the primary object of his affections, had an advantage over Leah.

[29:31]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “he opened up her womb.”

[30:2]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and the anger of Jacob was hot.”

[30:2]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb.”

[30:22]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “remembered.”

[30:22]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and God listened to her and opened up her womb.” Since “God” is the subject of the previous clause, the noun has been replaced by the pronoun “he” in the translation for stylistic reasons

[30:23]  ¹⁹ tn Or “conceived.”

[30:23]  ²⁰ tn Heb “my reproach.” A “reproach” is a cutting taunt or painful ridicule, but here it probably refers by metonymy to Rachel’s barren condition, which was considered shameful in this culture and was the reason why she was the object of taunting and ridicule.

[33:5]  ²¹ tn Heb “and he”; the referent (Esau) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[33:5]  ²² tn Heb “lifted up his eyes.”

[33:5]  ²³ tn Heb “and he”; the referent (Jacob) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[33:5]  ²⁴ tn The Hebrew verb means “to be gracious; to show favor”; here it carries the nuance “to give graciously.”

[33:1]  ²⁵ tn Heb “and Jacob lifted up his eyes.”

[33:1]  ²⁶ tn Or “and look, Esau was coming.” By the use of the particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”), the narrator invites the reader to view the scene through Jacob’s eyes.

[1:27]  ²⁷ tn The Hebrew text has the article prefixed to the noun (הָאָדָם, ha’adam). The article does not distinguish man from woman here (“the man” as opposed to “the woman”), but rather indicates previous reference (see v. 26, where the noun appears without the article). It has the same function as English “the aforementioned.”

[1:27]  ²⁸ tn The third person suffix on the particle אֵת (’et) is singular here, but collective.

[1:27]  ²⁹ sn The distinction of “humankind” as “male” and “female” is another point of separation in God’s creation. There is no possibility that the verse is teaching that humans were first androgynous (having both male and female physical characteristics) and afterward were separated. The mention of male and female prepares for the blessing to follow.

[2:5]  ³⁰ tn Heb “said to.” Since what follows is a question, “asked” is appropriate in this context.

[2:5]  ³¹ tn Heb “young man.” Cf. NAB “overseer”; NIV, NLT “foreman.”

[2:5]  ³² sn In this patriarchal culture Ruth would “belong” to either her father (if unmarried) or her husband (if married).

[113:9]  ³³ tn Heb “of the house.”

[113:9]  ³⁴ tn Heb “sons.”

[127:3]  ³⁵ tn or “look.”

[127:3]  ³⁶ tn Some prefer to translate this term with the gender neutral “children,” but “sons” are plainly in view here, as the following verses make clear. Daughters are certainly wonderful additions to a family, but in ancient Israelite culture sons were the “arrows” that gave a man security in his old age, for they could defend the family interests at the city gate, where the legal and economic issues of the community were settled.