Deuteronomy 12:3

וְנִתַּצְתֶּם אֶת־מִזְבּחֹתָם וְשִׁבַּרְתֶּם אֶת־מַצֵּבֹתָם וַאֲשֵֽׁרֵיהֶם תִּשְׂרְפוּן בָּאֵשׁ וּפְסִילֵי אֱלֹֽהֵיהֶם תְּגַדֵּעוּן וְאִבַּדְתֶּם אֶת־שְׁמָם מִן־הַמָּקוֹם הַהֽוּא׃

✦ Hebrew interlinear

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✦ The same verse in five languages

Hebrew

וְנִתַּצְתֶּ֣ם אֶת־מִזְבּחֹתָ֗ם וְשִׁבַּרְתֶּם֙ אֶת־מַצֵּ֣בֹתָ֔ם וַאֲשֵֽׁרֵיהֶם֙ תִּשְׂרְפ֣וּן בָּאֵ֔שׁ וּפְסִילֵ֥י אֱלֹֽהֵיהֶ֖ם תְּגַדֵּע֑וּן וְאִבַּדְתֶּ֣ם אֶת־שְׁמָ֔ם מִן־הַמָּק֖וֹם הַהֽוּא׃

Greek (Septuagint)

καὶ κατασκάψατε τοὺς βωμοὺς αὐτῶν, καὶ συντρίψετε τὰς στήλας αὐτῶν, καὶ τὰ ἄλση αὐτῶν ἐκκόφετε, καὶ τὰ γλυπτὰ τῶν θεῶν αὐτῶν κατακούσατε πυρί. καὶ ἀπολεῖται τὸ ὄνομα αὐτῶν ἐκ τοῦ τόπου ἐκείνου.

Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0

Latin (Vulgate)

Dissipate aras eorum, et confringite statuas: lucos igne comburite, et idola comminuite: disperdite nomina eorum de locis illis.

Spanish

Derribarán sus altares, harán pedazos sus columnas y quemarán con fuego sus postes de Asera. Cortarán las imágenes grabadas de sus dioses. Borrarán su nombre de ese lugar.

Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)

Y derribaréis sus altares, y quebraréis sus imágenes, y sus bosques consumiréis con fuego: y destruiréis las esculturas de sus dioses, y extirparéis el nombre de ellas de aquel lugar.

English

Tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, burn up their Asherah poles, cut down the idols of their gods, and wipe out their names from every place.

✦ What the text says

Summary

The verse instructs the destruction of Canaanite cultic objects — altars, sacred pillars, Asherah poles, and carved images of the local gods — and states that "their name" is to be eliminated from "that place." The action moves from physical demolition to the erasure of identity tied to a specific location.

Key words

nitatztem ("you will break down", H5422) — piel sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine plural; the piel stem intensifies the action (not just "break" but forcefully "tear down"), and the sequential perfect links it to a chain of consecutive commands.
mizbechotam ("altars", H4196) — feminine plural construct with the suffix "their" (H9028); construct form marks it as "altars of [them]."
asherei ("Asherah poles", H0842) — masculine plural construct, a cultic term denoting wooden objects associated with the deity Asherah, here possessed by "them."
tegade'un ("you will cut down", H1438) — piel imperfect with paragogic nun (H9013), an archaic/emphatic verb ending that adds rhetorical weight to the command.
shemam ("their name", H8034) — masculine singular construct with suffix; singular "name" (not plural "names"), governed by the verb 'ibadtem ("you will destroy", H0006).

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a chain of sequential perfects (ve-nitatztem, ve-shibartem, ve-'ibadtem) interspersed with two imperfects carrying the emphatic paragogic nun (tisrefun, tegade'un). This alternation in verb form does not change the basic sense of continuous future action within the series, but the paragogic nun on tisrefun ("you will burn", H8313) and tegade'un ("you will cut down", H1438) marks those two verbs with an archaic emphatic ending not present on the surrounding perfects, giving them a slightly heightened rhetorical profile within the list.

Each cultic object — mizbechotam ("their altars", H4196), matzevotam ("their sacred pillars", H4676), asherehem ("their Asherah poles", H0842), and pesilei elohehem ("the images of their gods", H6456 + H0430J) — is marked with the third-person plural possessive suffix "their" (H9028), tying every item to the previous inhabitants of the land rather than to Israel. The final clause shifts from destroying objects to destroying shemam ("their name", H8034), a singular noun despite the plural referents, followed by min-hamaqom hahu ("from that place", H4480A + H4725 + H1931) — a prepositional phrase anchoring the erasure to a specific, previously indicated location rather than to all locations generally.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew reads min-hamaqom hahu ("from that place," singular), matching the Vulgate's de locis illis only loosely — the Vulgate actually pluralizes to "from those places" (locis illis), diverging from the Hebrew singular hamaqom ("the place", H4725). The BSB renders the same phrase as "from every place," generalizing beyond the Hebrew's singular demonstrative "that place." The LXX's ἐκ τοῦ τόπου ἐκείνου ("from that place") matches the Hebrew singular more closely than either the Vulgate or the BSB.

This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.