Genesis 27:1
Now Isaac was old, and his eyes were dim, and he could not see: and he called Esau, his elder son, and said to him: My son? And he answered: Here I am.
Open Genesis 27:1 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Senuit autem Isaac, et caligaverunt oculi ejus, et videre non poterat : vocavitque Esau filium suum majorem, et dixit ei : Fili mi ? Qui respondit : Adsum.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- Ἐγένετο δὲ μετὰ τὸ γηρᾶσαι Ἰσαὰκ καὶ ἠμβλύνθησαν οἱ ὀφθαλμοὶ αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὁρᾷν, καὶ ἐκάλεσεν Ἠσαὺ τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν πρεσβύτερον καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Υἱέ μου. καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ἰδοὺ ἐγώ.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיְהִי֙ כִּֽי זָקֵ֣ן יִצְחָ֔ק וַתִּכְהֶ֥יןָ עֵינָ֖יו מֵרְאֹ֑ת וַיִּקְרָ֞א אֶת עֵשָׂ֣ו בְּנ֣וֹ הַגָּדֹ֗ל וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֵלָיו֙ בְּנִ֔י וַיֹּ֥אמֶר אֵלָ֖יו הִנֵּֽנִי
Haydock's commentary
Old: 137 years, when falling sickly and blind, at least for a time, he wished to bless Esau, who was 77 years old. (Tirinus)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Hippolytus The Refutation of All Heresies, Chapter XI
Now, he says, the stars are the gods of destruction, which impose upon existent things the necessity of alterable generation. These, he says, Moses denominated serpents of the wilderness, which gnaw and utterly ruin those who imagined that they had crossed the Red Sea. To those, then, he says, who of the children of Israel were bitten in the wilderness, Moses exhibited the real and perfect serpent; and they who believed on this serpent were not bitten in the wilderness, that is, (were not assailed) by (evil) powers. No one therefore, he says, is there who is able to save and deliver those that come forth from Egypt, that is, from the body and from this world, unless alone the serpent that is perfect and replete with fulness. Upon this (serpent), he says, he who fixes his hope is not destroyed by the snakes of the wilderness, that is, by the gods of generation. …
St Augustine Book X, Chapter XXXIV
52. O Thou Light, which Tobias saw, when, his eyes being closed, he taught his son the way of life; himself going before with the feet of charity, never going astray. Or that which Isaac saw, when his fleshly “eyes were dim, so that he could not see” by reason of old age; it was permitted him, not knowingly to bless his sons, but in blessing them to know them. Or that which Jacob saw, when he too, blind through great age, with an enlightened heart, in the persons of his own sons, threw light upon the races of the future people, presignified in them; and laid his hands, mystically crossed, upon his grandchildren by Joseph, not as their father, looking outwardly, corrected them, but as he himself distinguished them. This is the light, the only one, and all those who see and love it are one. …
Theodoret Dialogues. The “Eranistes” or “Polymorphus” of the Blessed Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus, The Impassible
Orth. Because the body which suffered was His body. But let us look at the matter thus; when we hear the divine Scripture saying “And it came to pass when Isaac was old his eyes were dim so that he could not see,” whither is our mind carried and on what does it rest, on Isaac’s soul or on his body?