Genesis36:1–19

Where the English smooths the original

• תֹּלְד֥וֹת BSB’s “This is the account” smooths tôlᵉḏōṯ (H8435), a feminine plural construct — literally “begettings / generations.” It is the technical heading-word that frames Genesis (Genesis 2:4; 5:1; 25:12), not a casual “account.”
• ה֥וּא The Hebrew has a bare pronoun hû (“he”) where BSB inserts the connective phrase “that is.” The original simply juxtaposes the two names — Esau he Edom — a terse equating clause the English necessarily expands.
• אֱדֽוֹם “Edom” (H123) is not a translation but a wordplay the English cannot carry: the name puns on ʼāḏōm, “red” (Genesis 25:30), so the verse names a nation by recalling a sin — the red pottage for which the birthright was sold.

Where the English smooths the original

• לָקַ֥ח lāqaḥ (H3947, “took”) is the same verb used for taking a wife and for taking plunder; Barnes argues the “his” shows it here means “took [with him]” in the removal, not the marrying. The English “took his wives” leaves the ambiguity invisible.
• מִבְּנ֣וֹת “from the daughters of Canaan” renders mibbᵉnôṯ — literally “from-daughters-of.” The phrase is a verdict, not a map: in Genesis these are the very women Isaac and Rebekah grieved over (Genesis 26:35; 27:46).
• בַּת־ The repeated baṯ (“daughter”) is rendered once “daughter” and once “granddaughter.” Hebrew bat spans both; the same elasticity (Gill: “usual in Scripture to call grandchildren children”) is what generates the famous Hivite/Horite tangle of this verse.

Where the English smooths the original

• בָּשְׂמַ֥ת Bāśᵉmaṯ (H1315, “fragrant”) names Esau’s Ishmaelite wife here, but she is “Mahalath” in Genesis 28:9 — a divergence Ellicott calls “of very ancient date.” The English name conceals a known crux in the manuscripts.
• אֲח֥וֹת ʼăḥôṯ (“sister”) is the fixed identifier — “sister of Nebaioth” — that pins this wife to Ishmael’s house (Genesis 25:13). JFB use exactly this constancy to argue Basemath = Mahalath.

Where the English smooths the original

• וַתֵּ֧לֶד wattêleḏ (H3205) is a waw-consecutive imperfect — the live narrative tense “and-she-bore” — while Basemath’s “gave birth” in the same verse is the plain perfect yālᵉḏāh. The English flattens two different verb-forms into one register.
• אֱלִיפָ֑ז “Eliphaz” (H464) is a theophoric name — the Pulpit gives “The Strength of God” (Gesenius). The translation carries the sound but not the confession of God buried in an Edomite name; it later belongs to one of Job’s friends (Job 2:11).
• רְעוּאֵֽל “Reuel” (H7467) likewise means “Friend of God” (Pulpit) and is the name of Moses’ father-in-law (Exodus 2:18) — an irony untranslatable in the bare proper noun.

Where the English smooths the original

• יֻלְּדוּ־ yullᵉḏû is a Qal-passive perfect — “were-born” — from the same root yālaḏ as “gave birth” above. The English “were born” is faithful but loses the deliberate shift to the passive that closes the birth-list.
• אֵ֚לֶּה ʼêlleh (“these”) is the summary demonstrative that brackets a list — the same word that opens v. 1. The English “These were the sons” reads as a fresh sentence, but in Hebrew it is the structural clasp closing the unit.
• בְּאֶ֥רֶץ “in the land of Canaan” (bᵉ’ereṣ kᵉnāʻan) is emphatic placement: every son was born in the land of promise before Esau forfeits it. The Pulpit notes this “all his family were born before he left the Holy Land.”

Where the English smooths the original

• נַפְשׁ֣וֹת “the people of his household” renders nap̄šôṯ — literally “souls” (Gill: “the word for ‘persons’ signifies ‘souls’”). Hebrew counts living members of a house as nephesh, breathing-creatures, not abstract “people.”
• וַיֵּ֣לֶךְ wayyêleḵ — “and-he-went/walked” (from hālaḵ). BSB’s “he moved” is interpretive; the verb is the plain verb of walking, the same root that names the whole patriarchal pilgrimage.
• מִפְּנֵ֖י “far away from” smooths mippᵉnê — literally “from the face of” (Ellicott: “into a land away from the face”). Some read it “on account of” his brother — either way the idiom is a face turned away, not mere distance.

Where the English smooths the original

• רָ֖ב rāḇ (H7227, “great/abundant”) is the plain adjective of multitude; “too great” supplies the comparative the Hebrew only implies by the following min-clause. The wealth itself, not a fault, is what divides them — the same logic as Abraham and Lot (Genesis 13:6).
• מְגֽוּרֵיהֶם֙ “where they stayed” renders mᵉḡûrêhem — literally “their sojournings” (Pulpit: “of their wanderings”). It is a covenant word: Canaan is the “land of sojourning” (Genesis 28:4; 37:1), not yet possessed — the very point of the whole chapter.

Where the English smooths the original

• וַיֵּ֤שֶׁב wayyêšeḇ (H3427) is “and-he-settled / sat down,” the verb of permanent dwelling — the same root that, as an infinitive in v. 7 (“to dwell”), they could not do together. The settling here answers the not-dwelling there.
• בְּהַ֣ר “in the area of Mount” expands bᵉhar — literally “in the mountain of” Seir. Cambridge insists Seir is “a region, not a mountain”; the construct har means hill-country, the whole massif.
• אֱדֽוֹם The closing gloss hû ʼĔḏōm repeats v. 1’s equation. Poole reads the repetition as the Holy Ghost’s “contempt or reproach” — the red name fixed on the man who sold his birthright.

Where the English smooths the original

• תֹּלְד֥וֹת The heading-word tôlᵉḏōṯ (H8435) returns — Barnes notes the repetition “does not necessarily indicate diversity of authorship.” The English “the account” cannot show that this is the same structural seam as v. 1, now restated for the Seir phase.
• אֲבִ֣י “the father of the Edomites” renders ʼăḇî ʼĔḏōm — literally “father of Edom” (Ellicott). Hebrew makes Esau father of the nation by naming him father of its eponym; the plural “Edomites” is an English unfolding of one word.

Where the English smooths the original

• שְׁמ֣וֹת “the names” renders šᵉmôṯ (H8034) — the same plural that titles the book of Exodus (“These are the names…”). Benson: only “the names of Esau’s sons and grandsons are recorded: not their history” — the bare list is itself the theological point.
• אֵ֖לֶּה ʼêlleh (“these”) opens the sub-list, mirroring v. 9’s heading; the English “These are” reads as routine but in Hebrew is the same clasp-word that organizes the entire chapter into nested panels.

Where the English smooths the original

• וַיִּהְי֖וּ “were” renders wayyihyû — a waw-consecutive of hāyāh, “and-they-came-to-be.” The English copula “were” loses the active sense; Hebrew narrates the sons into existence rather than merely listing them.
• תֵּימָ֣ן “Teman” (H8487) is at once a son, a clan, and a place: Cambridge notes têmān means “south… what is on the right hand, facing east,” and that the district was famed for “wise men” (Jeremiah 49:7). The proper noun hides a compass-point.

Where the English smooths the original

• פִילֶ֗גֶשׁ “a concubine” renders pîleḡeš (H6370) — a secondary wife of lesser rank (cf. Genesis 16:3; 25:6). The English carries the status but not the loaded narrative weight: a concubine’s son will become Israel’s archetypal enemy.
• עֲמָלֵ֑ק “Amalek” (H6002) is no neutral name. Ellicott weighs Balaam’s “the beginning of nations” (Numbers 24:20) against this lowly origin; from this grandson springs the people Israel is commanded to “utterly destroy” (Gill; 1 Samuel 15). The name will become a byword for unprovoked enmity against the redeemed — the LORD swearing “war with Amalek from generation to generation” (Exodus 17:16; Deuteronomy 25:17–19) — so that the bare proper noun here plants, mid-list, the seed of a feud that runs the length of the Old Testament down to Haman the Agagite (Esther 3:1).

Where the English smooths the original

• אֵ֣לֶּ֣ה The verse is framed by ʼêlleh … ʼêlleh (“these … these”), the open-and-close clasp of a panel. English “These are … They are” varies the wording where Hebrew repeats it, hiding the deliberate symmetry of the list-form.
• בְּנֵ֥י “the grandsons” renders bᵉnê — literally “sons” (of Basemath). Hebrew ben reaches to grandsons; the English specifies the generation the original leaves to the reader, the same flex seen with bat in v. 2.

Where the English smooths the original

• וַתֵּ֣לֶד wattêleḏ (H3205) — the live narrative “and-she-bore” returns here for Oholibamah, the only wife given the bearing-verb in the chief-section; her sons rank as chiefs themselves (v. 18), and the verb foregrounds her motherhood.
• בַת־ The doubled baṯ — “daughter… and granddaughter” — replays the tangle of v. 2. Gill notes the Samaritan/Septuagint read “son of Zibeon,” not daughter; the English choice of “daughter…granddaughter” quietly takes a side in a textual dispute.

Where the English smooths the original

• אַלּוּפֵ֣י “chiefs” renders ’allûp̄ê (H441) — the KJV’s “dukes” that Cambridge corrects to “chiefs.” Ellicott derives it from eleph, “a thousand” — a phylarch over a clan. The word is distinctively Edomite (Exodus 15:15), so the title itself marks these as Esau’s, not Israel’s, leaders.
• בְּכ֣וֹר “the firstborn” is bᵉḵôr (H1060) — the very rank Esau himself despised and sold (Genesis 25). The irony stands unmarked in English: the man who threw away his birthright now has a recorded firstborn heading the chief-list.

Where the English smooths the original

• קֹ֛רַח “Korah” (H7141) is widely judged intrusive here — Ellicott: “The Samaritan Pentateuch rightly omits this name”; Cambridge: “out of place… come in from Genesis 36:18.” The English prints a name the textual witnesses dispute, with no visible flag.
• אַלּ֣וּף ’allûp̄ (H441) here stands without the plural construct ending of v. 15 — each name gets its own singular “chief.” The drumbeat repetition of the title is a Hebrew list-rhythm the smooth English softens into ordinary apposition.

Where the English smooths the original

• אַלּוּפֵ֤י “the chiefs” (’allûp̄ê, H441) caps the Reuel panel; JFB explain the rank as that of “sheiks or emirs of the modern East… chieftains of highland clans” — the comparison the bare English title cannot supply.
• אֱד֔וֹם “in the land of Edom” (H123) is repeated panel by panel (vv. 16, 17, 21). The refrain locates each clan; English reads it as routine, but the repetition is the surveyor’s stamp marking out the political map of the land (cf. v. 43).

Where the English smooths the original

• אַלּוּפֵ֞י Here the ’allûp̄ê (H441) are Oholibamah’s sons, not her grandsons as with the other wives. Ellicott reads the difference as rank by marriage: she “belonged to the dominant family of Seir,” so her sons command in her right — an asymmetry invisible in the uniform English “chiefs.”
• קֹ֑רַח “Korah” (H7141) is the genuine chief here — the same name that intruded into v. 16. The English repeats “Korah” identically in both verses, masking that one is original and one a scribal echo (Cambridge, Barnes).

Where the English smooths the original

• ה֥וּא The bare pronoun hû (“he”) closes the genealogy with the same one-word equation that opened it (v. 1) and stood at v. 8 — Esau he Edom. The English “that is” expands an envelope-structure: the section is sealed by the name it began with.
• אַלּוּפֵיהֶ֖ם “their chiefs” renders ’allûp̄êhem (H441 + suffix) — the title that has tolled through vv. 15–18 now gathered into a single possessive summary. The closing word fuses persons and rulers: Esau’s sons are their chiefs.