Genesis 35:16-18
16 They traveled on from Bethel, and when Ephrath was still some distance away, ▼▼ Heb “and there was still a stretch of the land to go to Ephrath.”
Rachel went into labor ▼▼ Normally the verb would be translated “she gave birth,” but because that obviously had not happened yet, it is better to translate the verb as ingressive, “began to give birth” (cf. NIV) or “went into labor.”
– and her labor was hard. 17When her labor was at its hardest, ▼▼ The construction uses a Hiphil infinitive, which E. A. Speiser classifies as an elative Hiphil. The contrast is with the previous Piel: there “she had hard labor,” and here, “her labor was at its hardest.” Failure to see this, Speiser notes, has led to redundant translations and misunderstandings (Genesis [AB], 273).
the midwife said to her, “Don’t be afraid, for you are having another son.” ▼ 18With her dying breath, ▼▼ Heb “in the going out of her life, for she was dying.” Rachel named the child with her dying breath.
she named him Ben-Oni. ▼ But his father called him Benjamin instead. ▼▼ The disjunctive clause is contrastive.
▼▼ His father called him Benjamin. There was a preference for giving children good or positive names in the ancient world, and “son of my suffering” would not do (see the incident in 1 Chr 4:9–10), because it would be a reminder of the death of Rachel (in this connection, see also D. Daube, “The Night of Death,” HTR 61 [1968]: 629-32). So Jacob named him Benjamin, which means “son of the [or “my”] right hand.” The name Benjamin appears in the Mari texts. There have been attempts to connect this name to the resident tribe listed at Mari, “sons of the south” (since the term “right hand” can also mean “south” in Hebrew), but this assumes a different reading of the story. See J. Muilenburg, “The Birth of Benjamin,” JBL 75 (1956): 194-201.
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