Deuteronomy 1:16

Summary

Moses recounts that at that time he gave a command to the judges appointed over the people, instructing them on how to handle disputes among their fellow Israelites. The command centers on careful hearing of cases and judging with righteousness, applied equally to a native and to a resident foreigner.

Key words

• 'atzaveh ("I commanded", H6680) — piel narrative form, first person, marking the intensive/causative nuance of giving formal instruction, continuing the narrative sequence begun with the vav.
• shoftei ("judges", H8199) — qal participle, masculine plural construct, literally "the ones judging of," linking to the suffix "your" to mean "your judges."
• shamoa' ("hear", H8085) — qal infinitive absolute, used alone to intensify the verbal idea of hearing/listening, giving emphasis before any finite verb follows.
• shefatetem ("you will judge", H8199) — qal sequential perfect, second person plural, continuing the chain of instructions as a resulting action after hearing.
• tzedek ("righteousness", H6664) — masculine singular noun functioning adverbially, describing the manner of judging ("judge righteousness" = judge righteously).
• ger ("sojourner", H1616) — masculine singular construct with pronominal suffix "his," naming the resident foreigner included in the scope of judgment.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative vav on 'atzaveh ("and I commanded"), continuing the first-person account of Moses. The object is shoftei-khem ("your judges"), built from the participle shoftei ("judges of") plus the suffix -khem ("your"), so the phrase functions as a definite noun phrase rather than a full clause — "the judges belonging to you." The time reference ba-'et ha-hiv' ("at that time") uses the demonstrative pronoun hiv' ("she/that") agreeing with the feminine noun 'et ("time").

The content of the command follows le-'mor ("saying"), introduced by the infinitive construct of 'amar. Within the reported speech, the verb shamoa' appears as an infinitive absolute, a grammatical form that in Biblical Hebrew intensifies or emphasizes the action of the finite or implied verb it accompanies — here stressing the act of hearing disputes "between your brothers" (bein-'acheikhem). This is followed by the sequential perfect shefatetem, "and you shall judge," which continues the sequence of required actions, expressed with the accusative-like noun tzedek ("righteousness") used adverbially to specify the required quality of judgment.

The scope of judgment is defined through three repeated bein ("between") constructions: between 'ish ("a man/anyone"), his 'achiv ("his brother"), and his gero ("his sojourner"), the last built from ger plus the third-person suffix -o ("his"). The repetition of bein creates a triadic structure emphasizing equal treatment across these categories in Hebrew, without a separate coordinating word for "or."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders shamoa' — the infinitive absolute in Hebrew — as an imperative, diakouete ("hear thoroughly/carefully"), turning the emphatic construction into a direct command form rather than preserving the infinitive-plus-finite-verb structure. The Vulgate similarly uses the imperative audite ("hear/listen to them"), collapsing the infinitive absolute's intensifying function into a plain command. Where the Hebrew places tzedek ("righteousness") as a noun modifying the verb adverbially, the Vulgate expresses this with the clause quod justum est judicate ("judge what is just"), and the LXX uses the adverb dikaiōs ("justly"), both conveying the sense through different grammatical means than the Hebrew's bare noun construction.