Deuteronomy 34:7

Summary

The verse states Moses' age at death — one hundred and twenty years — and adds two physical observations: his eyesight had not weakened and his physical vigor had not departed. The sentence combines a chronological notice with a description of unusual physical condition at the time of death.

Key words

• ben ("[was] a son of", H1121L) — construct form used idiomatically to express age, literally "a son of one hundred and twenty years."
• be-moto ("when he died", H4191 + H9043) — infinitive construct with preposition be ("when/in") plus 3rd person masculine suffix, forming a temporal clause: "in his dying."
• khahatah ("it had grown dim", H3543A) — qal perfect, feminine, agreeing with 'eino ("his eye"); the perfect indicates a completed state, here negated by lo' ("not", H3808).
• nas ("it had fled", H5127) — qal perfect, masculine, agreeing with lekho ("his vigor"); paired with the second lo' to negate departure of vigor.
• lekho ("vigor", H3893) — construct noun with 3rd person suffix, referring to physical strength or freshness.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with u-Mosheh ("and Moses") as subject, followed by the construct phrase ben-me'ah ve-'esrim shanah ("son of one hundred and twenty years"), a standard Hebrew idiom for stating age using the noun ben ("son of") in construct with the number of years. The temporal clause be-moto ("in his dying" / "when he died") uses an infinitive construct with a pronominal suffix rather than a finite verb, a common Hebrew way to mark simultaneity ("at the time of his dying").

The second half of the verse contains two parallel negated perfect-tense clauses, each with subject-verb agreement in gender: lo'-khahatah 'eino ("his eye had not grown dim") — feminine verb agreeing with feminine 'ayin ("eye") — and ve-lo' nas lekho ("and his vigor had not fled") — masculine verb agreeing with masculine lekho ("vigor"). Both clauses use the perfect aspect to describe a completed, negated state persisting up to the moment of death: the dimming and fleeing did not occur. The construct chain 'eino ("his eye") and lekho ("his vigor," with the final he spelled unusually as lekhoh in the consonantal text) each carry a 3rd person masculine singular suffix referring back to Moses.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate renders lekho ("vigor", H3893) as "dentes illius moti sunt" ("his teeth were not moved"), differing from the Hebrew's reference to general vigor or freshness and from the LXX's ἐφθάρησαν ("were not corrupted/destroyed"), which also does not specify teeth. The LXX preserves the two-part negation structure (eyes, vigor/corruption) similar to the Hebrew's two clauses, though it uses passive verb forms (ἠμαυρώθησαν, "were dimmed"; ἐφθάρησαν, "were destroyed") rather than the Hebrew's active perfect verbs.