Deuteronomy 31:4
וְעָשָׂה יְהוָה לָהֶם כַּאֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה לְסִיחוֹן וּלְעוֹג מַלְכֵי הָאֱמֹרִי וּלְאַרְצָם אֲשֶׁר הִשְׁמִיד אֹתָֽם׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וְעָשָׂ֤ה יְהוָה֙ לָהֶ֔ם כַּאֲשֶׁ֣ר עָשָׂ֗ה לְסִיח֥וֹן וּלְע֛וֹג מַלְכֵ֥י הָאֱמֹרִ֖י וּלְאַרְצָ֑ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר הִשְׁמִ֖יד אֹתָֽם׃
καὶ ποιήσει Κύριος ὁ θεός σου αὐτοῖς καθὰ ἐποίησεν Σηὼν καὶ Ὤγ, τοῖς δυσὶ βασιλεῦσιν τῶν Ἀμορραίων οἳ ἦσαν πέραν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου, καὶ τῇ γῇ αὐτῶν, καθότι ἐξωλέθρευσεν αὐτοὺς
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Facietque Dominus eis sicut fecit Sehon et Og regibus Amorrhæorum, et terræ eorum, delebitque eos.
El Señor hará con ellos lo que hizo con Sehón y con Og, los reyes de los amorreos, y con su tierra, cuando los destruyó.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y hará Jehová con ellos como hizo con Sehón y con Og, reyes de los Amorrheos, y con su tierra, que los destruyó.
And the LORD will do to them as He did to Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, when He destroyed them along with their land.
✦ What the text says
Summary
The verse states that Yehovah will act toward "them" (the nations Israel is about to face) in the same manner he acted toward Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, and their land — namely, by destroying them. The verse functions as a comparison anchored in past events used to describe a future action.
Key words
- 'a.Sah ("he will do", H6213A) — qal sequential perfect; continuing a narrative chain, this form projects the action into the future ("he will do") despite being morphologically a perfect.
- 'a.Sah ("he did", H6213A) — same root, but here a simple qal perfect describing a completed past action (what happened to Sihon and Og), contrasting with its first occurrence in the verse.
- mal.Khei ("kings of", H4428G) — masculine plural construct, linking directly to "the Amorite" as the possessed noun phrase.
- hish.Mid ("he destroyed", H8045) — hiphil (causative) perfect; the causative stem marks this as an action Yehovah caused to happen, not one that merely occurred.
- 'a.Sher ("whom/that", H0834A) — relative particle introducing the clause that specifies what Yehovah did to Sihon, Og, and the Amorites.
What the text says
The Hebrew sentence is built on a repetition of the root 'asah (H6213A) in two different grammatical forms: the first, joined with the narrative vav (ve., H9001), is a sequential perfect that carries future force within the discourse — "and he will do" — while the second is a plain perfect describing what already happened to Sihon and Og — "as he did." This grammatical pairing creates the comparison: a future action patterned on a past one, without needing a separate word for "just as" beyond ka'asher (H0834D).
The object of the destruction is expressed twice: first through the direct object marker 'otam (H0853) attached to hishmid (H8045), and the referents — Sihon, Og, the kings of the Amorite (ha'Emori, H0567, singular gentilic used collectively), and "their land" ('artzam, H0776G) — are laid out as a construct chain. The hiphil form of hishmid underscores that the destruction was a caused event, attributing agency explicitly to Yehovah rather than describing a simple occurrence.
Differences between versions
The LXX adds "ὁ θεός σου" ("your God") after "Κύριος," a phrase not present in the Hebrew text as given, which reads only Yehovah (H3068G). The LXX also inserts a geographical clause, "οἳ ἦσαν πέραν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου" ("who were beyond the Jordan"), which has no counterpart in the Hebrew wording supplied here.
The Vulgate renders the final clause "delebitque eos" ("and he will destroy them"), using a future tense, whereas the Hebrew hishmid (H8045) is a perfect form describing a completed past action ("he destroyed"). The Hebrew and BSB treat this clause as retrospective, explaining what already happened to Sihon and Og, while the Vulgate's future tense reframes it as still pending.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.