Deuteronomy 19:13

Summary

The verse instructs that no pity should be shown toward the guilty party in a case involving the killing of an innocent person, and commands the removal of "innocent blood" from Israel, with the stated consequence that this will bring good to the one who acts.

Key words

• ta.Chos ("it will look with pity", H2347) — qal imperfect, describing an ongoing or future non-action of the "eye" (compassion withheld).
• 'ei.ne.kha ("your eye", H5869A + H9021) — construct noun with pronominal suffix; the "eye" functions as the grammatical subject of the verb of pity, a common Hebrew idiom for compassion or its absence.
• vi.'ar.Ta ("you will remove", H1197I) — piel sequential perfect; the piel stem intensifies the action ("purge/burn away" rather than a simple removal), and the sequential perfect continues the logical chain from the previous negative clause.
• dam-ha.Naki ("blood of the innocent", H1818 + H5355A) — construct chain: "blood" governs "the innocent," meaning the blood belonging to/associated with the innocent person.
• Tov ("it will be good", H2895) — qal sequential perfect, marking the final result clause of the sequence.

What the text says

The sentence is built as a chain of three clauses linked by the sequential structure typical of Hebrew legal instruction. The first clause, lo'-ta.Chos 'ei.ne.kha 'a.Lav ("your eye will not pity him"), uses the idiom of the "eye" as the subject of the verb ta.Chos ("to look with pity", H2347), a construction where the body part stands for the internal disposition of the person — literally "your eye will not show compassion upon him." This is followed by u.vi.'ar.Ta dam-ha.Naki mi.Yis.ra.'El ("and you will remove the blood of the innocent from Israel"), where the piel verb vi.'ar.Ta (H1197I) carries a more forceful sense than a plain removal — it is the same root used elsewhere for "burning" or "clearing away," here applied to the abstract "blood of the innocent" as something to be eliminated from the community's midst.

The final clause, ve.Tov La.kh ("and it will be good for you"), closes the sequence with a stated outcome tied grammatically to the preceding actions through the vav-sequential perfect chain — each verb (vi.'ar.Ta, Tov) continues the narrative logic begun by the initial prohibition.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders vi.'ar.Ta ("you will remove/purge", H1197I) with katharieis ("you will cleanse/purify"), introducing a purificatory nuance not explicit in the Hebrew piel form, which more directly connotes forceful removal. The Vulgate's auferes ("you will take away") aligns closer to a simple removal, without the intensifying nuance of the Hebrew piel or the purity language of the LXX.