Exodus 14:9

Summary

The verse describes Egypt pursuing and overtaking the Israelites while they were encamped by the sea, near Pi-hahiroth, opposite Baal-zephon. It further specifies that the pursuing force consisted of all of Pharaoh's horses, chariotry, horsemen, and army.

Key words

• va-yirdefu ("and they pursued", H7291) — qal narrative verb, third person masculine plural, marking the first sequential action of the sentence.
• va-yasigu ("and they overtook", H5381) — hiphil (causative) narrative verb, indicating Egypt caused itself to reach/catch up to the Israelites, the second sequential action.
• chonim ("encamped", H2583) — qal participle, masculine plural, describing the ongoing state of the Israelites at the moment they were overtaken, not a completed action.
• rekhev ("chariotry of", H7393) — masculine singular construct, linking to par'oh ("Pharaoh", H6547) to form "chariotry of Pharaoh."
• farashav ("his horsemen", H6571) — masculine plural construct with pronominal suffix o ("his", H9023), tying the horsemen back to Pharaoh.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built on two sequential narrative verbs: va-yirdefu ("and they pursued", H7291) and va-yasigu ("and they overtook", H5381), both introduced by the narrative va (H9001) that chains the actions in sequence — Egypt first pursues, then overtakes. The subject of both verbs is Mitzrayim ("Egypt", H4713), a collective singular used with plural verb forms, referring to the Egyptian force as a whole. The object is marked by otam ("them", H0853 + H9038), referring to the Israelites, though they are not named again by their own designation in this verse.

After the second verb, chonim ("encamped", H2583) appears as a participle rather than a finite verb, describing the state in which the Israelites were found — already encamped by the sea (al ha-yam, "at the sea", H5921A + H3220) — at the moment of being overtaken. This participial construction shows that the encampment was a static condition observed by the pursuers, not a new action reported in sequence.

The remainder of the verse is a chain of construct phrases without a finite verb: kol-sus rekhev Par'oh u-farashav ve-cheylo ("every horse of the chariotry of Pharaoh, and his horsemen, and his army"), all governed grammatically by their relation to Par'oh ("Pharaoh", H6547) through construct chains and the pronominal suffix o ("his", H9023) attached to farashav and cheylo. This list functions as an appositional expansion clarifying the composition of the pursuing force introduced by Mitzrayim. The location is fixed by two prepositional phrases: al Pi ha-Chirot ("at Pi-hahiroth", H5921A) and li-fnei Ba'al Tzefon ("before Baal-zephon", H9005 + H6440G), both place names left untranslated as proper nouns.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders chonim ("encamped", H2583, a participle describing a state) with the verb εὕροσαν... παρεμβεβληκότας ("they found... having encamped"), adding "found" (εὕροσαν) as an explicit main verb not present in the Hebrew, where the finding is implied by va-yasigu ("and they overtook"). The Vulgate similarly uses repererunt ("they found") for this same function. The Hebrew Mitzrayim ("Egypt", H4713) is rendered by the LXX as οἱ Αἰγύπτιοι ("the Egyptians," a plural noun) and by the Vulgate as Ægyptii, making explicit the plural sense already carried by the plural verb forms in Hebrew.