What Does Genesis 47:5 Mean in the King James?
And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren are come unto thee:
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The family arrives at Joseph, whose name is rooted in “adding,” so their coming reads as life added back into relationship.
THE MEANING
Distance can give way to presence: what has been far comes within reach, and those arriving are named through kinship. The verse lets nearness itself become the change you can see.
THE ROOT
יוֹסֵף
Yosef
GROWS FROM
יסף
y-s-f
To add, increase, or continue; Yosef carries the sense “he adds” or “may he add.”
English presents Joseph as a name, while its Hebrew seed holds the action of adding. His father and brothers come into his presence, and their gathering resonates with something added back into relationship.
ALSO GROWS
yasaph: To add, increase, or continue
יָסַף
The verb shares the seed carried in Yosef’s name, joining increase with continuation.
tosefet: Addition, supplement
תּוֹסֶפֶת
This branch names what is added to what is already present, echoing the family’s arrival around Joseph.
בָּאוּ
ba'u
GROWS FROM
בוא
b-w-ʾ
To come, enter, or arrive
“come” in this verse is ba'u. The Hebrew verb carries the sense of entering as well as arriving: the family crosses into Joseph’s presence. The same root extends to תְּבוּאָה (tevu’ah, produce or yield), giving “coming in” a wider sense of what arrives and is received.
ALSO GROWS
mavo: Entrance, entry
מָבוֹא
This branch makes the verb’s threshold sense visible: those who come also enter a place.
tevu'ah: Produce, yield
תְּבוּאָה
This word uses the same root for what comes in as a harvest, widening the image of arrival beyond travel.
THE PATTERN
Movement toward one another turns distance into gathering.
And thou shalt dwell in the land of Goshen, and thou shalt be near unto me, thou, and thy children, and thy children’s children, and thy flocks, and thy herds, and all that thou hast:The Lord GOD which gathereth the outcasts of Israel saith, Yet will I gather others to him, beside those that are gathered unto him.And not for that nation only, but that also he should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad.THE THREAD
And she called his name Joseph; and said, The LORD shall add to me another son.This verse gives Joseph’s name its own root-story: Yosef (יוֹסֵף) carries the sense “he adds.” Genesis 47:5 brings his father and brothers into his presence, so the family’s gathering resonates with addition, another joining to what is already there.
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