Deuteronomy 5:15

Summary

The verse instructs the addressee to remember having been a slave in Egypt, and that Yehovah his God brought him out from there "with a strong hand and an outstretched arm." Because of this, Yehovah his God has commanded him to observe the sabbath day.

Key words

• za.khar.Ta ("you will remember", H2142) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the narrative chain begun by the vav; grammatically tied to what precedes it as part of an ongoing instruction sequence.
• yo.Tzi.'a ("he brought out", H3318H) — hiphil (causative) narrative form: Yehovah is the causal agent who makes the exodus happen, not merely one who "leaves."
• cha.za.Kah ("strong", H2389) — feminine singular adjective modifying Yad ("hand", H3027H), agreeing in gender with the feminine noun it describes.
• ne.tu.Yah ("outstretched", H5186) — qal passive participle, feminine singular, describing z.Ro.a' ("arm", H2220); as a passive participle it presents the arm as being in a stretched-out state, not performing an action itself.
• tzi.ve.kha ("he has commanded you", H6680) — piel (intensive) perfect: the intensive stem marks this as a formal, authoritative act of command, distinct from a simple statement.

What the text says

The sentence is built as a chain of sequential verb forms connected by vav: za.khar.Ta ("you will remember") introduces a subordinate clause marked by Ki ("that", H3588A), which states the past condition — 'E.ved ha.Yi.ta ("a slave you were", H5650 + H1961) — using a plain qal perfect describing a completed state. The narrative then shifts to the causative yo.Tzi.'a.kha ("he brought you out", H3318H), where Yehovah is grammatically the subject acting upon the addressee (marked by the second-person suffix -kha, H9031). The means of the deliverance is expressed by two prepositional phrases: be.Yad cha.za.Kah ("by a strong hand", H3027H + H2389) and u.vi.z.Ro.a' ne.tu.Yah ("and by an outstretched arm", H2220 + H5186), each a noun-adjective/participle pair in the feminine singular, paired by conjunction.

The concluding clause opens with 'al-Ken ("therefore", H5921A + H3651C), an adverbial marker of consequence, followed by tzi.ve.kha ("he has commanded you", H6680) in the piel — an intensive stem indicating deliberate, authoritative instruction. The infinitive la.'a.Sot ("to observe", H6213A) expresses purpose or content of the command, governing the object phrase 'et-yom ha.sha.Bat ("the day of the sabbath", H3117G + H7676), where yom stands in construct relation to ha.sha.Bat.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders yad chazakah ("strong hand") as "χειρὶ κραταιᾷ" and zeroa' netuyah ("outstretched arm") as "βραχίονι ὑψηλῷ" ("high/lofty arm" rather than "outstretched"), and adds "καὶ ἁγιάζειν αὐτήν" ("and to sanctify it") after "to keep the sabbath," an addition not present in the Hebrew text given. The Vulgate follows the Hebrew structure closely, rendering zeroa' netuyah as "brachio extento" ("outstretched arm"), matching the Hebrew participle's sense more directly than the LXX's "ὑψηλῷ."