Thread by @JoelBaden

#Genesis 46:8-27

The list of Jacob’s descendants

Here we have the record of who all went to Egypt with Jacob, 70 people in total according to the concluding verse. Which you’d think would be straightforward enough. But God forbid it ever be so easy.

First, there’s the obvious little insertion of the phrase “but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan,” which is a reference to the J story of Gen 38, and which is clearly secondary here because why would they be in a list of who went to Egypt if they’d died? And they’re counted!

Second, Joseph and his sons Manasseh and Ephraim are listed, despite being in Egypt (as the list admits), and not only are they listed they’re also counted. But also not - at the end of the list we’re told it’s 66 who went down, not counting Joseph and his sons.

That 66 must not include Jacob, who with Joseph and his two sons makes up 70. But the enumerations in the list get us to 70 without Jacob. So who should get chopped? Maybe Dinah, who otherwise doesn’t appear in P, and seems added on here? Unclear.

According to this list, Perez and Zelah are Judah’s sons; in Gen 38 they’re his grandsons. Some of the people listed are Jacob’s great-grandsons, but why it should only be Perez and Beriah (Asher’s son) who have children of their own is unclear. (Time is very weird here.)

And even if we’ve worked all that out, then there’s the Greek version, which puts the final number at 75, makes up for the difference by saying that Joseph had 9 kids in Egypt, not two, but only lists 7 for Joseph, and gives Benjamin an extra two, including a fourth generation!

One could get lost in the maze of names and numbers and variants here. And clearly scribes did get lost. This is one of the better examples of multiple text editions of the Pentateuch, one with 70 and one with 75. If I’m not mistaken, the Dead Sea Scrolls preserve both editions.

Just another handy reminder that there’s no such thing as *the* Bible. It’s translations, versions, and editions all the way down.