Deuteronomy 30:18

Summary

Moses tells the people that he is declaring to them on this day that they will certainly perish and will not have long life in the land they are about to enter across the Jordan. The verse uses an emphatic construction to underline the certainty of the warning about their fate in the land they are entering to possess.

Key words

• hiGadti ("I tell", H5046) — hiphil perfect, 1st person: a completed, causative act of declaration ("I have declared/I hereby declare").
• 'aVod ("certainly [to perish]", H0006) — infinitive absolute paired with the following finite verb, a construction that intensifies the verbal idea rather than adding new content.
• to'eDu ("you will perish", H0006) — qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine plural, carrying a paragogic nun (H9013) which adds emphasis to the plural ending.
• ta'ariKhun ("you will prolong", H0748) — hiphil imperfect plural, also with paragogic nun, describing the negated action of lengthening days.
• 'oVer ("[is] crossing", H5674A) — qal participle, singular, describing the addressee ('atTah, "you", H0859A) as currently in the act of crossing, switching to singular address.

What the text says

The sentence opens with hiGadti ("I tell", H5046) in the perfect, marking the declaration as an accomplished speech-act — Moses is not merely about to speak but treats the statement as already delivered "today" (hayYom, H3117L). The clause introduced by ki ("that", H3588A) contains the doubled construction 'aVod toe'Du — infinitive absolute plus finite imperfect from the same root H0006 ("to perish") — a common Hebrew device that intensifies certainty, roughly "you will surely perish," which cannot be fully reproduced by a single English or Spanish verb. Both this verb and the following ta'ariKhun ("you will prolong", H0748) carry a paragogic nun ending, an emphatic plural form.

Grammatically, the passage shifts number: lakhem ("to you", plural, from la + khem, H9036) and the perishing/prolonging verbs are plural, addressing the community, while 'atTah ("you", H0859A) and the participle 'oVer ("crossing", H5674A) are singular, addressing Israel as a collective unit crossing the Jordan. The land is marked by the relative 'asher ("where", H0834A), and the purpose of crossing is expressed through two infinitives, lavo ("to go", H0935G) and le rishTah ("to possess it", H3423H with suffix H9034 "it/her," referring to ha'adaMah, "the land", feminine).

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the infinitive-absolute intensification with a dative-plus-verb pairing, ἀπωλίᾳ ἀπολεῖσθε ("with destruction you will be destroyed"), preserving the emphatic doubling seen in the Hebrew 'aVod toe'Du. The Vulgate instead uses a plain subjunctive, pereas ("you may perish"), without doubling, and further diverges by rendering "you will not prolong days" as parvo tempore moreris ("you will dwell a short time"), a paraphrase rather than a direct equivalent of lo ta'ariKhun yaMim ("you will not prolong days", H0748/H3117L). The Vulgate also collapses the Hebrew's alternation between plural and singular address into a consistent singular ("tibi... pereas... moreris... ingredieris"), where the Hebrew and LXX both preserve some plural forms alongside the singular 'atTah / σοι.