The King James Version translates Genesis 29:17 as follows: "Leah was tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well favoured." The New International Version has, "Leah had weak eyes," while the New American Bible reads, "Leah had lovely eyes." What did the Hebrew original mean to say?
Revised: 14-May-13The King James Version translates Genesis 29:17 as follows: “Leah was tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well favoured.” The New International Version has, “Leah had weak[4] eyes”; while the New American Bible reads, “Leah had lovely eyes.” The Hebrew text reads, literally, “And the eyes of Leah were tender, and [i.e., but] Rachel was beautiful of stature and beautiful of appearance.”
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“Little Girl in Turquoise Sea (age five)” photographed by D Sharon Pruitt. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
David N. Bivin is founder and editor emeritus of Jerusalem Perspective. A native of Cleveland, Oklahoma, U.S.A., Bivin has lived in Israel since 1963, when he came to Jerusalem on a Rotary Foundation Fellowship to do postgraduate work at the Hebrew University. He studied at the… [Read more about author]
