Paragraph 24:3–7

24:3a

But: The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as But introduces the next event in the storyline. Translate this word with a natural connector in your language.

I took your father Abraham from beyond the Euphrates: Yahweh led Abraham away from his former country, which was on the east side of the Euphrates River. This place was mentioned in verse 2.

I: God is speaking here. The person who said I is God, not Joshua.

Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:

Then I brought Abraham your ancestor from the east side of the Euphrates River
-or-
But I led your ancestor Abraham away from that land

24:3b

and led him through all the land of Canaan: It may be more natural in many languages to begin a new sentence here.

and I multiplied his descendants: The clause I multiplied his descendants indicates that Yahweh enabled Abraham to have many descendants.

Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:

I led him through the entire land of Canaan and multiplied his descendants
-or-
I brought him into all the land of Canaan and gave him many children and grandchildren

24:3c

I gave him Isaac: The clause I gave him Isaac indicates that Yahweh was the one who enabled Abraham to become the father of Isaac.

Here is another way to translate this part of the verse:

I gave Abraham his son Isaac

© 2001, 2011, 2020, 2022, 2023 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.