Genesis 34:9

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Make marriages with us. Give your daughters to us, and take our daughters for yourselves.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Highlights

1 first appearance in the Hebrew Bible

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Word by word

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וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ

châthan

H2859

“and · marry”

Conjunction + Verb, Hithpael, Imperative, 2nd Person, Masculine, Plural

Appears 33× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears here

Full BDB Definition

Origin: a primitive root

TWOT: 781b

to become a son-in-law, make oneself a daughter's husband - (Qal) wife's father, wife's mother, father-in-law, mother-in-law (participle) - (Hithpael) to make oneself a daughter's husband

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

9: words
5: distinct lemmas
Pentateuch: section

First appearance in Scripture

This word makes its first canonical appearance in the Hebrew Bible here:

וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ to marry H2859

Shared distinctive vocabulary

וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ to marry H2859 occurs in 32 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

3 verbs
2 nouns
2 prepositions
2 particles

Verb forms

וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ Hithpael · Imperative
תִּתְּנוּ Qal · Imperfect
תִּקְח֥וּ Qal · Imperfect

Repetition

A word recurs within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

בְּנֹֽתֵיכֶם֙ daughter H1323 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 15 words from the Hebrew and 15 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — the same length.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 9 Hebrew tokens and 15 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Genesis 34:9 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Deuteronomy 7:3 neither shall you make marriages with them; your daughter you shall not give to his son, nor his daughter shall you take to your son.
Genesis 6:2 that God's sons saw that men's daughters were beautiful, and they took for themselves wives of all that they chose.
Genesis 19:14 Lot went out, and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were pledged to marry his daughters, and said, "Get up! Get out of this place, for Yahweh will destroy the city." But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be joking.
Genesis 24:3 I will make you swear by Yahweh, the God of heaven and the God of the earth, that you shall not take a wife for my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I live.
Genesis 26:34–35 When Esau was forty years old, he took as wife Judith, the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath, the daughter of Elon the Hittite.
Genesis 27:46 Rebekah said to Isaac, "I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth. If Jacob takes a wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these, of the daughters of the land, what good will my life do me?"

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Genesis 34:9 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ אֹתָ֑נוּ בְּנֹֽתֵיכֶם֙ תִּתְּנוּ לָ֔נוּ וְאֶת בְּנֹתֵ֖ינוּ תִּקְח֥וּ לָכֶֽם

Make marriages with us. Give your daughters to us, and take our daughters for yourselves.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Genesis 34:9 Septuagint · lemma form

ἐπιγαμβρεύω ἐγώ ὁ θυγάτηρ σύ δίδωμι ἐγώ καί ὁ θυγάτηρ ἐγώ λαμβάνω ὁ υἱός σύ

and intermarry with us. Give us your daughters, and take our daughters for your sons.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Onkelos Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וְתִתְחַתְּנוּן בָּנָא בְּנָתֵיכוֹן תִּתְּנוּן לָנָא וְיָת בְּנָתָנָא תִּסְבוּן לְכוֹן

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Onkelos — Aramaic: “Onkelos Genesis” (public domain); “Onkelos Exodus” (public domain); “Onkelos Leviticus” (public domain); “Onkelos Numbers” (public domain); “Onkelos Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “J.W. Etheridge. The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan Ben Uzziel on the Pentateuch. London: Longmans, Green, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וְתִתְעַרְבוּן בְּחִיתּוּנָא עִמָנָא בְּנַתְכוֹן תִּתְּנוּן לָנָא וְיַת בְּנָתָנָא תִּסְבוּן לְכוֹן

and conjoin yourselves by marriage with us. Give your daughters to us, and take our daughters to you;

Targum Pseudo-Jonathan — Aramaic: “Targum Jonathan on Genesis” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Exodus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Leviticus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Numbers” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “The Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel, trans. J. W. Etheridge, London, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Genesis 34:9 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

Gen 34:9 And make ye marriages with us, [and] give your daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you.

Ver. 9. And make ye marriages with us.] The world thinks we may do as they; and what need we be so scrupulous and straitlaced? But saints must "walk accurately" {a} {Eph 5:15} by line, and by rule; not as unwise, but as wise; having their feet where other men’s heads are: for "the way of the wise is on high," saith Solomon; he goes a higher way to work than others; he may not buckle and stoop to their base courses. Singular things are conferred upon him; singular things are expected from him. An Israelite dare not yoke himself with any Sichemish heifer, that bears not the yoke of Jesus Christ. Those that "stood with the Lamb," had "not defiled themselves with women," &c. {Rev 14:4} Nec aliunde noscibiles, saith Tertullian of those primitive Christians, quam de emendatione vitiorum pristinorum. {b} They were distinguished from all others by their holy behaviour.

{a} Aκριβως, παρα το εις ακρον βαινειν.

{b} Tertul., Ad Scapulam.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

9. make ye marriages with us] Hamor’s proposition is to the effect that the Israelites and the Shechemites should be amalgamated on the basis of (1) intermarriage, (2) trading rights, (3) rights of occupation of land. For the detestation of intermarriage with the Canaanites, see Deu_7:3; Jos_23:12; Ezr_9:2.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

And make ye marriages with us,.... There was no objection on their side, it lay on the other; Abraham's servant was charged by him not to take a wife of the Canaanites to his son Isaac; and the same charge was given Jacob by Isaac, Gen 24:3; and therefore Jacob would never agree that his children should marry any of that nation; and marriages with them were afterwards forbidden by the law of Moses, Deu 7:3,

and give your daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you; for though at present there were no other daughters in Jacob's family, yet there might be hereafter; and the request is, that for the future there might be intermarriages between them, as would be practicable in a course of time.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Radak

Rabbi David Kimhi (Radak)

והתחתנו אותנו, the word אותנו here means the same as if the Torah had written either עמנו or בנו, “with us.”

Radak on the Tanakh — English translations: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “Eliyahu Munk, HaChut Hameshulash” (CC BY 4.0); “Rabbi Mike Feuer, Jerusalem Anthology” (CC BY 4.0); and “R. David Kimhi on the first book of Psalms, Translated by R.G. Finch, London, 1919” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Genesis, in the Pentateuch, opens this verse with 9 words (5 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is châthan (“to marry”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word châthan carries the sense “to marry.” How does it shape the verse?
The word “to marry” first appears here in Scripture. What is being introduced at this debut?
Exodus 3:1 shares the word «to marry» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
“daughter” occurs 2× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «וְהִֽתְחַתְּנ֖וּ» is Hithpael Imperative. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Trapp's Complete Commentary and The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

1 word makes its first canonical appearance in Scripture here.
This verse counts 9 Hebrew ↔ 15 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 5 words in this verse.
“daughter” occurs 2× in this single verse.
5 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 9 words in this verse.