Deuteronomy 12:2
אַבֵּד תְּאַבְּדוּן אֶֽת־כָּל־הַמְּקֹמוֹת אֲשֶׁר עָֽבְדוּ־שָׁם הַגּוֹיִם אֲשֶׁר אַתֶּם יֹרְשִׁים אֹתָם אֶת־אֱלֹהֵיהֶם עַל־הֶהָרִים הָֽרָמִים וְעַל־הַגְּבָעוֹת וְתַחַת כָּל־עֵץ רַעֲנָן׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
אַבֵּ֣ד תְּ֠אַבְּדוּן אֶֽת־כָּל־הַמְּקֹמ֞וֹת אֲשֶׁ֧ר עָֽבְדוּ־שָׁ֣ם הַגּוֹיִ֗ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר אַתֶּ֛ם יֹרְשִׁ֥ים אֹתָ֖ם אֶת־אֱלֹהֵיהֶ֑ם עַל־הֶהָרִ֤ים הָֽרָמִים֙ וְעַל־הַגְּבָע֔וֹת וְתַ֖חַת כָּל־עֵ֥ץ רַעֲנָן׃
ἀπωλίᾳ ἀπολεῖτε πάντας τοὺς τόπους ἐν οἷς ἐλάτρευσαν ἐκεῖ τοῖς θεοῖς αὐτῶν, οὓς ὑμεῖς κληρονομεῖτε αὐτούς, ἐπὶ τῶν ὀρέων τῶν ὑψηλῶν καὶ ἐπὶ τῶν θινῶν καὶ ὑποκάτω δένδρου δασέος·
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Subvertite omnia loca, in quibus coluerunt gentes, quas possessuri estis, deos suos super montes excelsos, et colles, et subter omne lignum frondosum.
Destruirán todos los lugares en los que las naciones que desposeerán sirvieron a sus dioses: en los montes altos, en las colinas y debajo de todo árbol verde.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Destruiréis enteramente todos los lugares donde las gentes que vosotros heredareis sirvieron á sus dioses, sobre los montes altos, y sobre los collados, y debajo de todo árbol espeso:
Destroy completely all the places where the nations you are dispossessing have served their gods— atop the high mountains, on the hills, and under every green tree.
✦ What the text says
Summary
Deuteronomy 12:2 commands the emphatic destruction of every site where the nations previously worshipped their gods — locations specified as mountains, hills, and under green trees. The command uses an intensive Hebrew verbal construction to stress totality and certainty of the destruction.
Key words
- 'a.Bed ("certainly ", H0006) — infinitive absolute of the piel stem, paired with the finite verb to intensify the command ("you shall surely destroy").
- Te.'a.be.du ("you will destroy", H0006) — piel imperfect, 2nd person masculine plural, carrying a paragogic nun that adds emphasis to the plural command.
- me.ko.Mot ("places", H4725) — feminine plural noun in construct with "all," marking the totality of sites in view.
- 'a.ve.du ("they have served", H5647) — qal perfect, describing the nations' worship as a completed past action prior to Israel's arrival.
- yo.re.Shim ("[are] about to dispossess", H3423) — qal participle, masculine plural, expressing an action in progress or imminent, describing Israel's current relationship to the land.
What the text says
The sentence opens with the doubled verbal form 'a.Bed + Te.'a.be.du, an infinitive absolute followed by an imperfect of the same root (H0006, piel stem). This construction in Biblical Hebrew grammar functions to intensify or confirm the finite verb's action — here rendered by English versions as "destroy completely" or "utterly destroy." The paragogic nun on Te.'a.be.du adds further emphasis to the plural address.
The object of destruction is kol-ha-me.ko.Mot ("all the places," H3605 + H4725), qualified by a relative clause: 'a.Sher 'a.ve.du-sham ha.go.Yim — "where the nations served there" (H5647, qal perfect, completed action). The nations themselves are further identified by a second relative clause using the participle yo.re.Shim (H3423), which describes Israel's dispossession of them as an ongoing or imminent process rather than a finished one — a nuance the perfect tense of the first clause does not carry.
The locations are then specified spatially: 'al-ha.ha.Rim ha.ra.Mim ("on the high mountains," H2022 + H7311, the latter a qal participle meaning "the ones being high"), 'al-ha.ge.va.'ot ("on the hills," H1389), and ta.chat kol-'etz ra.'a.nan ("under every luxuriant tree," H6086 + H7488, an adjective describing the tree's lush condition).
Differences between versions
The LXX renders the infinitive-plus-imperfect construction as ἀπωλίᾳ ἀπολεῖτε (dative noun + future verb), preserving the emphatic doubling. The Vulgate instead uses a single imperative, Subvertite, without a parallel intensifying structure. For yo.re.Shim, the Vulgate's possessuri estis ("you are about to possess") mirrors the Hebrew participle's forward-looking nuance, while the LXX's present tense κληρονομεῖτε ("you inherit") does not. For ra.'a.nan ("luxuriant"), the LXX has δασέος ("thick, leafy") and the Vulgate frondosum ("leafy"), both differing slightly in emphasis from the Hebrew's focus on vigor or greenness.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.