Exodus 14:5
וַיֻּגַּד לְמֶלֶךְ מִצְרַיִם כִּי בָרַח הָעָם וַיֵּהָפֵךְ לְבַב פַּרְעֹה וַעֲבָדָיו אֶל־הָעָם וַיֹּֽאמרוּ מַה־זֹּאת עָשִׂינוּ כִּֽי־שִׁלַּחְנוּ אֶת־יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵעָבְדֵֽנוּ׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וַיֻּגַּד֙ לְמֶ֣לֶךְ מִצְרַ֔יִם כִּ֥י בָרַ֖ח הָעָ֑ם וַ֠יֵּהָפֵךְ לְבַ֨ב פַּרְעֹ֤ה וַעֲבָדָיו֙ אֶל־הָעָ֔ם וַיֹּֽאמרוּ֙ מַה־זֹּ֣את עָשִׂ֔ינוּ כִּֽי־שִׁלַּ֥חְנוּ אֶת־יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל מֵעָבְדֵֽנוּ׃
καὶ ἀνηγγέλη τῷ βασιλεῖ τῶν Αἰγυπτίων ὅτι πέφευγεν ὁ λαός· καὶ μετεστράφη ἡ καρδία Φαραὼ καὶ ἡ καρδία τῶν θεραπόντων αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τὸν λαόν, καὶ εἶπαν Τί τοῦτο ἐποιήσαμεν τοῦ ἐξαποστἑλͅαι τοὺς υἱοὺς Ἰσραὴλ τοῦ μὴ δουλεύειν ἡμῖν ;
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Et nuntiatum est regi Ægyptiorum quod fugisset populus: immutatumque est cor Pharaonis et servorum ejus super populo, et dixerunt: Quid voluimus facere ut dimitteremus Israël, ne serviret nobis?
Cuando le avisaron al rey de Egipto que el pueblo había huido, el faraón y sus funcionarios cambiaron de parecer y dijeron: “¿Qué hemos hecho? ¡Dejamos ir a los israelitas y perdimos a nuestros esclavos!”
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y fué dado aviso al rey de Egipto cómo el pueblo se huía: y el corazón de Faraón y de sus siervos se volvió contra el pueblo, y dijeron: ¿ Cómo hemos hecho esto de haber dejado ir á Israel, para que no nos sirva?
When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said, “ What have we done? We have released Israel from serving us.”
✦ What the text says
Summary
The verse reports that the king of Egypt was informed that the people (Israel) had fled. In response, Pharaoh's heart and the heart of his servants turned against the people, and they voiced regret at having let Israel go from their service.
Key words
- yugad ("it was told", H5046) — hophal, a causative-passive form: the report reaches the king without naming who told him.
- barach ("it had fled", H1272) — qal perfect, marking the fleeing as a completed action prior to the report, embedded in a ki ("that", H3588A) clause.
- yehafekh ("it was changed/turned", H2015) — niphal (passive/reflexive) of the verb "to turn/overturn": the heart's turning happens to Pharaoh, not as his direct active deed.
- levav ("heart of", H3824) — construct form, linking directly to Par'oh ("Pharaoh", H6547J), so grammatically only one "heart" is named though it governs both Pharaoh and his servants via the following va- ("and", H9002).
- me'avdenu ("from serving us", H5647G + H9035) — qal infinitive with 1st person plural suffix, expressing purpose/result: Israel's departure is framed as removal "from serving us."
What the text says
The verse opens with a narrative chain using va- + verb (vayyugad, vayyehafekh, vayyo'meru), the standard wayyiqtol pattern that moves the story forward in sequence: report → change of heart → speech. The first clause places the verb yugad in the hophal stem, meaning the king is the recipient of an action whose agent is left unspecified — the text states only that "it was told to the king," not who told him.
The subordinate clause introduced by ki ("that", H3588A) explains the content of the report: barach ha-'am ("the people had fled"), using the qal perfect barach to mark this as an already-completed event at the time of the telling.
The second main clause uses yehafekh, a niphal form of the root H2015, which is grammatically passive/reflexive — "the heart was turned" rather than "Pharaoh turned his heart." The construct chain levav Par'oh ("heart of Pharaoh") is directly followed by va-'avadav ("and his servants"), so the single noun levav is understood as shared by both Pharaoh and his officials, though only one occurrence of "heart" appears in the Hebrew.
The closing speech begins with the interrogative mah zot 'asinu ("what is this we have done"), followed by a second ki clause giving the reason: shillachnu ("we sent away", piel perfect, H7971H) et-Yisra'el using the direct object marker 'et, and closing with the infinitive construct me-'avdenu ("from our serving/from serving us"), which expresses the purpose or consequence lost — the service Israel had been rendering.
Differences between versions
The LXX renders the single Hebrew levav ("heart") as two occurrences, ἡ καρδία Φαραὼ καὶ ἡ καρδία τῶν θεραπόντων ("the heart of Pharaoh and the heart of his servants"), duplicating the noun where the Hebrew construct chain shares one. The Vulgate follows the Hebrew more closely with a single cor ("heart"). The final clause differs across versions in syntax: the Hebrew's infinitive me-'avdenu ("from serving us") appears in the LXX as τοῦ μὴ δουλεύειν ἡμῖν ("so as not to serve us"), and in the Vulgate as ne serviret nobis ("so that it would not serve us"), both making explicit a negative/purpose sense that the Hebrew infinitive construction leaves more compact.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.