Deuteronomy 16:4

Summary

Deuteronomy 16:4 continues the Passover/Unleavened Bread instructions, prohibiting the presence of leaven anywhere in the territory for seven days, and prohibiting any meat from the first evening's sacrifice from remaining overnight until morning.

Key words

• ye.ra.'Eh ("it will be seen", H7200G) — niphal (passive) imperfect: leaven is not to "be seen," a passive construction meaning it should not be present/visible anywhere.
• se.'Or ("leaven", H7603) — masculine singular noun, the substance whose presence is forbidden.
• ge.vul.Kha ("your territory", H1366H + H9021) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, defining the spatial extent ("all your border/territory") where the prohibition applies.
• ya.Lin ("it will remain overnight", H3885A) — qal imperfect, describing the meat's forbidden state of lingering through the night.
• tiz.Bach ("you will sacrifice", H2076) — qal imperfect, second person, specifying the addressee's action of sacrificing the meat in question.

What the text says

The verse divides into two parallel prohibitions, each introduced by ve.lo' ("and not", H9002 + H3808) followed by an imperfect verb. The first clause states that se.'Or ("leaven", H7603) lo' ye.ra.'Eh ("will not be seen", H7200G) — using a niphal (passive) form, so the grammatical subject is the leaven itself, which is not to appear or be visible, rather than a command addressed directly to a human agent. This prohibition is spatially bounded by be.khol-ge.vul.Kha ("in all your territory", H3605 + H1366H + H9021), a construct chain meaning "in all the border/territory of you," and temporally bounded by shiv.'At ya.Mim ("seven days", H7651 + H3117G), a construct phrase meaning "seven of days."

The second clause shifts to a qal (active) imperfect, ya.Lin ("it will remain overnight", H3885A), with min-ha.Ba.sar ("from the meat", H4480A + H1320) as its subject — the meat itself is what must not "lodge" or remain through the night. This meat is further specified by a relative clause, 'a.Sher tiz.Bach ("which you will sacrifice", H0834A + H2076), using a second-person qal imperfect that directly addresses the reader/hearer as the one performing the sacrificial act. The timing is marked precisely: ba.'E.rev ("in the evening", H6153), ba.Yom ha.ri.Shon ("on the first day", H3117G + H7223G), la.Bo.ker ("to the morning", H1242) — tracing the temporal arc from evening sacrifice to the following morning during which the meat may not remain.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the first verb as ophthēsetai ("will be seen"), matching the Hebrew niphal passive sense of ye.ra.'Eh. The Vulgate uses apparebit ("will appear"), a similarly passive/intransitive rendering. For the second clause, the LXX and Vulgate both add explicit possessive/demonstrative elements not present as separate lexical items in the Hebrew (LXX tōn kreōn hōn; Vulgate de carnibus ejus), though these reflect the relative clause structure already implicit in the Hebrew 'a.Sher ("which", H0834A).