Kejadian 41:34

41:34 Pharaoh should do ¹  this – he should appoint ²  officials ³  throughout the land to collect one-fifth of the produce of the land of Egypt ⁴  during the seven years of abundance.

Keluaran 7:23

7:23 And Pharaoh turned and went into his house. He did not pay any attention to this. ⁵ 

[41:34]  ¹ tn The imperfect verbal form has an obligatory nuance here. The Samaritan Pentateuch has a jussive form here, “and let [Pharaoh] do.”

[41:34]  ² tn Heb “and let him appoint.” The jussive form expresses Joseph’s advice to Pharaoh.

[41:34]  ³ tn Heb “appointees.” The noun is a cognate accusative of the preceding verb. Since “appoint appointees” would be redundant in English, the term “officials” was used in the translation instead.

[41:34]  ⁴ tn Heb “and he shall collect a fifth of the land of Egypt.” The language is figurative (metonymy); it means what the land produces, i.e., the harvest.

[7:23]  ⁵ tn The text has וְלֹא־שָׁת לִבּוֹ גַּם־לָזֹאת (vÿlo’-shat libbo gam-lazo’t), which literally says, “and he did not set his heart also to this.” To “set the heart” to something would mean “to consider it.” This Hebrew idiom means that he did not pay attention to it, or take it to heart (cf. 2 Sam 13:20; Ps 48:13; 62:10; Prov 22:17; 24:32). Since Pharaoh had not been affected by this, he did not consider it or its implications further.