Genesis 46:27; Exodus 1:5

Threescore and Fifteen Souls

Numbers changed

Quoted by the apostles in Acts 7:14, in the older Greek wording

Side by Side

The Older Text

Septuagint, translated before Messiah

But Joseph was in Egypt. And all the souls born of Jacob were seventy-five.

The Later Text

Masoretic, finished about 1,000 years after the cross

And all the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls: for Joseph was in Egypt already.

Quoted in Acts 7:14

Stephen before the council

Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.

Your KJV reads: seventy in Genesis and Exodus, and seventy-five in Acts.

See what changed and why ↓

What Your Bible Says

Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.
Acts 7:14 KJV

Stephen stood before the council in Jerusalem and retold Israel’s history from Abraham on. When he came to the move into Egypt, he said seventy-five souls.

The council was full of men who knew the Scriptures well. They were cut to the heart by his sermon and stoned him for it (Acts 7:54–58), but the record shows no one disputing his count.

What the Jewish Bible Says

And all the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls: for Joseph was in Egypt already.
Exodus 1:5 KJV

Genesis 46:27 says the same: “all the souls of the house of Jacob, which came into Egypt, were threescore and ten.” Seventy, not seventy-five.

What Changed

Five souls. The Greek of Genesis 46 names Joseph’s grandsons and great-grandsons born in Egypt: Machir and Galaad from Manasseh’s line, and three more from Ephraim’s. Count them in, and the house of Jacob is seventy-five. Leave them out, and it is seventy.

Critics have used the gap for centuries to say Stephen, and so the New Testament, got the number wrong.

Which One Is Right?

The Greek Bible reads seventy-five in both Genesis 46:27 and Exodus 1:5.

A Hebrew scroll of Exodus from the Dead Sea caves, copied before Messiah, reads seventy-five. The number was in the Hebrew, not only the Greek.

Stephen gives seventy-five, speaking to men who knew the Torah well.

The Masoretic text reads seventy.

Purpose of the Change

No clear motive can be shown, since both counts were known before Messiah. The effect of keeping only seventy is that Stephen, the first man killed for Yahushua, appears to have miscounted.

The Bottom Line

Stephen did not miscount. He read the number in the Bible of his day, and a Hebrew scroll reads it too.

The seventy-five became more than anyone can count: “a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb” (Revelation 7:9).

Dig Deeper The evidence, for anyone who wants it

Who Is Counted

Genesis 46:26 counts sixty-six who came with Jacob. Add Jacob, Joseph, and Joseph’s two sons, and the total is seventy. The Greek adds five of Joseph’s descendants born in Egypt, named in its Genesis 46:20, and reaches seventy-five. Both are ways of counting one family. Neither number is a mistake.

The Scrolls

Two Hebrew scrolls from Cave 4 at Qumran read seventy-five in Exodus 1:5. One of them, a scroll holding Genesis and Exodus together, was copied before Messiah. A third, written in the old Hebrew script, reads seventy. The Dead Sea community knew both numbers.

Deuteronomy Says Seventy

Deuteronomy 10:22 reads seventy, in the Hebrew and in the Greek: “With seventy souls your fathers went down into Egypt.” The Greek Bible itself carries both counts. Stephen chose the fuller one, the one that included Joseph’s line born in Egypt.

Two, Not Three

Moments after this sermon Stephen “saw the glory of God, and Yahushua standing on the right hand of God” (Acts 7:55). He saw two: Elohim, and the Son standing beside Him. He did not see one God in three persons. He saw the Father and the Son at His right hand.

An Honest Note

This is less a forgery than a choice of counting. The Masoretic seventy is old and the Greek of Deuteronomy agrees with it. The point of this page is narrow: Stephen’s seventy-five has solid witnesses in the Hebrew, and the charge that he blundered does not stand.