Deuteronomy 31:10

Summary

Deuteronomy 31:10 records a command given by Moses specifying a temporal marker: it identifies a recurring occasion tied to a seven-year cycle, the year of remission, and the festival of booths. The verse sets up the timing for an instruction that continues in the following verses.

Key words

• va-y'tzav ("and he commanded", H6680) — piel narrative form, indicating an intensive or causative command; the narrative vav links this action directly to the preceding sequence of events.
• ketz ("end of", H7093) — masculine singular noun in construct state, meaning it must be joined to what follows ("end of seven years") rather than standing alone.
• mo'ed ("appointed time of", H4150G) — masculine singular construct noun, marking a fixed or designated occasion, here linked to "the year of the remission."
• sh'nat ("year of", H8141) — feminine singular construct noun, grammatically bound to ha-sh'mitah ("the remission", H8059), forming the phrase "year of the remission."
• chag ("festival of", H2282) — masculine singular construct noun, bound to ha-sukot ("the booths", H5521), producing "festival of the booths."

What the text says

The verse opens with a narrative-sequence verb, va-y'tzav ("and he commanded", H6680), in the piel stem, which carries an intensive nuance compared to the simple qal form. The subject is Mosheh ("Moses", H4872), and the object is marked by the untranslated object marker 'et (H0853) with the pronominal suffix -am ("them", H9038), indicating the recipients of the command. The infinitive le-'mor ("to say", H0559) introduces the content of what was commanded.

The temporal framework is built through a chain of construct-state nouns, each meaning "X of Y." Mi-ketz ("from the end of", H7093) governs sheva shanim ("seven years", H7651 + H8141), giving "from the end of seven years." This is followed by be-mo'ed ("at the appointed time of", H4150G), which governs sh'nat ha-sh'mitah ("the year of the remission", H8141 + H8059), and finally be-chag ("at the festival of", H2282), governing ha-sukot ("the booths", H5521). This construct chain structure — noun after noun in dependency — is a common way in Biblical Hebrew to build compound time expressions, and it results in a layered specification: end of seven years → appointed time within the remission year → specifically the festival of booths.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the phrase "at the end of seven years" as Metà hepta étē ("after seven years"), omitting an explicit equivalent for mi-ketz ("from the end of", H7093) and instead using a simple "after" construction. The Vulgate's Post septem annos ("after seven years") follows a similar pattern to the LXX, both simplifying the Hebrew construct chain beginning with "end of" into a more general "after" temporal marker, whereas the Hebrew explicitly marks the terminus (ketz) of the seven-year span rather than treating it as an undifferentiated duration.