Deuteronomy 34:8

Summary

The verse reports that the people of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab for thirty days, and describes the completion of that fixed period of mourning. The Hebrew structure emphasizes both the act of weeping and the formal closure of the mourning period through a double narrative sequence.

Key words

• va-yivKu ("and they wept for", H1058) — qal narrative verb form, marking a sequential past action that begins the verse's action.
• vene ("[the] people of", H1121G) — construct plural noun linking "sons/people" to the following name Israel, forming the compound subject "the people of Israel."
• 'et ("", H0853) — direct object marker with no independent meaning, indicating that Moses is the object of the weeping.
• 'arVot ("[the] desert plains of", H6160I) — construct noun naming a geographic feature, tied to Moab as its specific location.
• yitteMu ("they were completed", H8552) — second qal narrative verb, marking the sequential closure of the time period described.
• yeMei ("[the] days of", H3117G) — construct plural noun beginning a chain of three linked nouns (days–weeping–mourning) that culminate in Moses' name.

What the text says

The verse divides into two narrative clauses joined by the va ("and", H9001) narrative vav construction, each introduced by a wayyiqtol verb form (va-yivKu, "and they wept for", H1058; va-yitteMu, "and they were completed", H8552). This construction marks sequential action typical of Hebrew narrative prose: first the weeping happens, then the specified period concludes.

The first clause names the subject vene Yisra'El ("[the] people of Israel", H1121G + H3478) and its object Moshe ("Moses", H4872) marked by the untranslated direct object particle 'et (H0853). The location is given through a construct phrase, 'arVot Mo'Av ("[the] desert plains of Moab", H6160I + H4124I), followed by the duration sheloShim Yom ("thirty day[s]", H7970 + H3117G).

The second clause uses a chain of three construct nouns — yeMei veKhi 'Evel Moshe ("[the] days of [the] weeping of [the] mourning of Moses", H3117G + H1065 + H0060 + H4872) — stacking genitive relationships that in English require prepositions ("the days of weeping of mourning for Moses"). This chained construct structure ties duration (days), emotional expression (weeping), and formal ritual state (mourning) all directly to Moses as the final term, without any linking preposition in the Hebrew itself.

Differences between versions

The LXX adds geographic detail absent from the Hebrew and Vulgate: ἐπὶ τοῦ Ἰορδάνου κατὰ Ἰερειχώ ("by the Jordan, opposite Jericho"), specifying the location of the plains of Moab more precisely than the Hebrew 'arVot Mo'Av alone. The Vulgate's lugentium ("of those mourning," a participle) shifts the construct chain slightly, framing the mourning as an action of the mourners themselves rather than as a compounded noun chain describing Moses' mourning period as in the Hebrew.