Deuteronomy 9:19

Summary

The speaker (Moses, in context) explains that he was afraid because of the intensity of Yehovah's anger against the people, an anger great enough to destroy them. The verse closes by noting that Yehovah listened to him on that occasion as well.

Key words

• ya.Go.re.ti ("I was afraid", H3025) — qal perfect, first person singular, marking a completed state of fear experienced by the speaker.
• 'Af ("anger", H0639G) and che.Mah ("rage", H2534) — two nouns joined by the conjunction ve ("and", H9002), both governed by the construct phrase pe.Nei ("the face of", H6440L), intensifying the description of divine wrath through pairing.
• ka.Tzaf ("he was angry", H7107) — qal perfect, third person singular, introduced by the relative particle 'a.Sher ("which", H0834A), specifying whose anger is meant.
• hash.Mid ("destroy", H8045) — hiphil infinitive (causative), expressing the purpose or result toward which the anger was directed: "to destroy."
• i.yish.Ma' ("he listened", H8085G) — qal narrative form (vav-consecutive), marking the sequential turning point of the account: after the fear, the listening occurs.

What the text says

The verse opens with the subordinating particle ki ("for", H3588A), which links this statement causally to what precedes it, explaining the reason for the speaker's fear. The fear itself is expressed with the perfect verb ya.Go.re.ti ("I was afraid", H3025), followed by the compound construct phrase mi-pe.Nei ha-'Af ve-ha-che.Mah — literally "from the face of the anger and the rage" — where two nearly synonymous nouns, 'Af (H0639G) and che.Mah (H2534), are joined by the conjunction ve to create a doubled expression of intensity, both nouns carrying the definite article ha (H9009).

The relative clause introduced by 'a.Sher (H0834A) specifies that this anger belongs to Yehovah (H3068G), who "was angry" (ka.Tzaf, H7107) against the people, marked by the preposition 'a.lei plus suffix (H5921A + H9036), "towards you." The purpose of that anger is given through the hiphil infinitive hash.Mid ("to destroy", H8045), with the direct object marker 'et (H0853) plus suffix indicating "you" as the object of destruction.

The second half of the verse is joined by the narrative vav (H9001) attached to yish.Ma' ("he listened", H8085G), shifting the sentence into sequential narration: "and then Yehovah listened to me." The phrase gam ba-Pa'am ha-Hiv' ("also at that time", H1571 + H6471 + H1931) uses the demonstrative pronoun Hiv' ("that", H1931) with the article to specify a particular occasion, reinforcing that this listening happened on that specific instance, implying repetition of such events (gam, "also").

Differences between versions

The LXX renders 'Af and che.Mah as ὀργὴν ("wrath") and θυμόν ("anger"), preserving the two-noun structure but with different Greek lexical choices than a literal "anger/rage" pairing. The Vulgate condenses this into indignationem et iram ("indignation and anger"), maintaining the double expression. The LXX also renders the tetragrammaton as κύριος ("Lord"), consistent with its general practice, while the Hebrew text has Yehovah (H3068G) explicitly in both occurrences within the verse.