Exodus 15:1

Summary

The verse introduces the song of Moses and the Israelites after the crossing of the sea, stating that they sang this song to Yehovah. The song itself opens with the singer's resolve to sing because Yehovah is highly exalted, and it names the event being celebrated: the throwing of horse and rider into the sea.

Key words

• ya.shir ("he sang", H7891) — Qal imperfect, a verb form marking ongoing or future action; here it introduces the narrative act of singing despite referring to a completed past event.
• shi.rah ("song", H7892B) — feminine singular noun with the definite article ha (H9009) and demonstrative zot ("this", H2063), forming "this song," the object marked by 'et (H0853).
• ga.'Oh ga.'Ah ("certainly exalted / he is exalted", H1342) — an absolute infinitive (ga'oh) paired with a Qal perfect (ga'ah) of the same root; this doubling is a Hebrew intensifying construction, underscoring the certainty or completeness of the action.
• sus ve.rokhe.vO ("horse and its rider", H5483M + H7392 + H9023) — rokhev is a Qal participle in construct with the suffix -o ("his/its"), literally "the one riding it," paired with sus to form a fixed phrase.
• ra.Mah ("he has thrown", H7411A) — Qal perfect, marking a completed action; no explicit subject is stated in this clause, so the agent must be inferred from context.

What the text says

The verse divides into a narrative frame (v.1a-b) and the beginning of direct speech (v.1c). The narrative frame uses 'az ("then", H0227A) plus the imperfect yashir, a common Hebrew construction for introducing past narrative song. The subject is compound: Mosheh and bene Yisra'el ("sons/people of Israel", construct form H1121G), joined by the conjunction u- (H9002). The song's content is marked as a direct object with 'et, and ha-shirah ha-zot ("this song") is directed la-YHWH ("to Yehovah", preposition la + H3068G).

The quoted song opens with 'ashirah ("I will sing", cohortative-type form of H7891) restating the singer's intent in first person, followed by the causal particle ki ("for", H3588A) introducing the reason: the doubled root construction ga'oh ga'ah, which intensifies the stative verb "to be exalted." The final clause names sus ve-rokhevo as the object of the action described by ramah, without an explicit subject stated in the Hebrew of this clause itself.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders la-YHWH in the narrative frame (v.1b) as τῷ θεῷ ("to God") rather than "to the Lord," while in the quoted song (v.1c) it shifts to τῷ κυρίῳ ("to the Lord"); the Hebrew uses YHWH consistently in both places, and the Vulgate uses Domino consistently as well. The LXX also renders the emphatic ga'oh ga'ah construction as a passive, ἐνδόξως ... δεδόξασται ("gloriously he has been glorified"), whereas the Hebrew verb ga'ah is active/stative ("he is exalted"), and the Vulgate similarly reads "gloriose ... magnificatus est" (passive).