The flocks bred in front of the rods and so the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted: notice that Good News Translation and others make the whole of verse 39 a result. For flocks bred see Good News Translation verse 38, “the animals mated.” In front of the rods may need to be expressed as “where they could see the striped branches.” Brought forth means gave birth to. This is often a different expression than that used for human beings. For striped, speckled, and spotted see the terms used in verses 32 and 35.

A significant number of translations take flocks in this verse to refer only to the goats, in contrast to the reference to the sheep in the next verse. So New Jerusalem Bible has “The goats thus mated in front of the shoots, and the goats produced….” Speiser is very similar; and Good News Translation and Revised English Bible also make this verse refer only to the goats. While this is not absolutely required by the Hebrew, it suits the context very well.

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .