Exodus 12:11

Summary

Exodus 12:11 gives instructions for how the Passover meal is to be eaten: with loins girded, sandals on the feet, and staff in hand, eaten in haste. The verse closes by naming this meal pesach ("passover", H6453) for YHWH (H3068G).

Key words

• kakhah ("thus", H3602) — adverb opening the verse, pointing forward to the manner of eating described in what follows.
• to'khelu ("you will eat", H0398) — qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine plural, expressing an ongoing/future instruction rather than a single completed act.
• chagurim ("girded", H2296) — qal passive participle, masculine plural, describing a state (being girded) rather than an action being performed at a specific moment.
• chippazon ("haste", H2649) — masculine singular noun, used with the preposition be ("in") to express the manner of the eating.
• pesach ("[is] a passover", H6453) — used here as a title/predicate noun, identified further as belonging la-YHWH ("to Yehovah", H3068G).

What the text says

The verse opens with the adverb kakhah ("thus", H3602) followed by the imperfect verb to'khelu ("you will eat", H0398), setting up a general instruction for the manner of eating. The following clauses — "loins girded" (matneikhem chagurim), "sandals on your feet," "staff in your hand" — are built without finite verbs: the participle chagurim (H2296) and the possessive noun phrases describe a state of readiness rather than commanding discrete actions. This nominal/participial construction lets the description of posture stand as a circumstantial description attached to the main instruction to eat.

The narrative then shifts with va-'akhaltem ("and you will eat", H0398), a sequential (waw-consecutive) perfect that continues the instruction begun by to'khelu, now specifying that the eating is to happen bechippazon ("in haste", H2649). The final clause, pesach hu la-YHWH, is a nominal predicate sentence: the independent pronoun hu ("he/it", H1931) links the noun pesach (H6453) to the eating just described, and the prepositional phrase la-YHWH attaches the meal to the divine name.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew describes the girded loins, sandals, and staff through a participle and construct noun phrases without finite verbs, presenting them as a state accompanying the eating. The Vulgate renders this with finite future/imperative verbs — accingetis ("you will gird"), habebitis ("you will have") — turning the Hebrew's descriptive state into explicit commands. The LXX, using periezosmenai ("having been girded"), stays closer to the participial, stative form of the Hebrew. Additionally, the Vulgate adds an explanatory gloss not present in the Hebrew or LXX: Phase (id est, transitus), explicitly glossing pesach as "transitus" ("passing over"), an interpretive addition absent from the Hebrew text itself, which simply uses the noun pesach (H6453) as a title.