Genesis 37:3 - How much did Jacob love his daughters?
Jacob, aka Israel, is famous for having sons. Like, really famous. So famous that Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote a song about it, although he also wrote a whole musical about cats, so Jacob probably shouldn’t let it go to his head.
The most famous of Jacob’s famous sons is Joseph, and this is how he is introduced:
“Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children...”
Just how dysfunctional was this family, anyway? But first, the chart!
| Translation/Language: | Date: | Phrase: | Approach: |
|---|---|---|---|
| Original Hebrew text | banayw | ||
| Popular translations: | |||
| King James Version (KJV) | 1611 | children | Inclusive |
| American Standard Version (ASV) | 1901 | children | Inclusive |
| The Living Bible (TLB) | 1971 | children | Inclusive |
| New King James Version (NKJV) | 1982 | sons | Male |
| New International Version – 1984* | 1984 | sons | Male |
| New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) | 1989 | children | Inclusive |
| Good News Translation (GNT/GNB/TEV) | 1992 | sons | Male |
| Contemporary English Version (CEV) | 1995 | sons | Male |
| New Living Translation (NLT) | 1996 | children | Inclusive |
| New International Version (NIV) | 2011 | sons | Male |
| Common English Bible (CEB) | 2011 | sons | Male |
| English Standard Version (ESV) | 2016 | sons | Male |
| Christian Standard Bible (CSB) | 2017 | sons | Male |
| The Message (MSG) | 2018 | sons | Male |
| New American Standard Bible (NASB) | 2020 | sons | Male |
| NRSV Updated Edition (NRSVUE) | 2021 | children | Inclusive |
| Specialty translations: | |||
| God’s Word (GW) | 1995 | sons | Male |
| New Century Version (NCV) | 2005 | sons | Male |
| The Inclusive Bible (TIB) | 2009 | the others | Inclusive |
| Expanded Bible (EXB) | 2011 | sons | Male |
| Names of God (NOG) | 2011 | sons | Male |
| New English Translation (NET) | 2017 | sons | Male |
The answer, of course, is that Jacob’s family is probably saved from being the most dysfunctional family in the Bible only because Cain and Abel set a really high bar.
Once again, the word in the original language (Hebrew this time) can refer to children in general, and it can refer more specifically to only the male children (sons). Which did the writer intend?
Jacob is most famous for having sons, but he did also have daughters, plural. Though only one of them, Dinah, is ever named, they are mentioned together in at least a couple of places, including Genesis 46:6-7, when the whole family moves to Egypt:
They also took their livestock and the goods that they had acquired in the land of Canaan, and they came into Egypt, Jacob and all his offspring with him, his sons, and his sons’ sons with him, his daughters, and his sons’ daughters; all his offspring he brought with him into Egypt.
So, since Jacob had daughters, the writer could have meant “children”. Or, since the story is going to be about Jacob’s relationship with his brothers, the writer could have had only Jacob’s sons in mind.
I can’t say that it is wrong to choose “sons” in this case. It is not a mistranslation to choose “sons”. I prefer the inclusive choice, because when there is no evidence to settle the matter either way, why would you choose to leave people out?
This is a weird one, because Jacob’s daughters probably would prefer to have been left out. They probably would have preferred to have a father who loved all his children equally! But, choosing the less inclusive word (“sons” instead of “children”) in cases where the context doesn’t demand it is sloppy, and it’s a bad habit. And, there is already precious little of Jacob’s daughters recorded in the Bible at all; why take away from what little of them remains?
The chart for this one is interesting because the old-fashioned (and generally sexist) King James Version chooses the inclusive translation, but many much more modern translations do not.