Exodus 18:5

Summary

Exodus 18:5 narrates that Jethro, described as the father-in-law of Moses, comes to Moses in the wilderness together with Moses' sons and wife. The verse specifies the location as the place where Moses was encamped, at "the mountain of God."

Key words

• va.Vo' ("he came", H0935G) — qal narrative verb form; establishes the main narrative action, "and then he came," with the subject following.
• chóten ("father-in-law of", H2859A) — qal participle in construct state, meaning "the one who is father-in-law of [Moses]"; grammatically functions as a title attached to Jethro's name.
• asher ("where/that", H0834A) — relative particle introducing a clause that specifies the location further ("where he was encamped").
• choneh ("encamped", H2583) — qal participle, describing an ongoing state ("the one who is encamping") rather than a completed action.
• Elohim ("God", H0430G) — noun in plural morphological form; here functions in construct with har ("mountain of", H2022G) as "mountain of God/gods."

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with the narrative verb va.Vo' ("and he came," H0935G), followed by the subject: Jethro, identified by the construct participle chóten Mosheh ("father-in-law of Moses," H2859A + H4872). Two additional elements are joined by the conjunction va ("and," H9002): "his sons" (va.Nav, H1121A + suffix) and "his wife" (ishTo, H0802H + suffix). Grammatically, these three — Jethro, the sons, and the wife — form a compound subject of the single verb "came," though Jethro's name appears first and carries the verb morphologically (third person masculine singular).

The destination is marked twice with the preposition 'el ("to/into," H0413): first "to Moses" ('el-Mosheh), then "into the wilderness" ('el-hamidbar). The relative clause introduced by asher ("where," H0834A) adds detail using the participle choneh ("encamped," H2583), which in Hebrew participial syntax expresses a continuous or habitual state — "where he was in a state of encamping" — rather than a single completed event. The final phrase, har ha'Elohim ("mountain of the God," H2022G + H0430G), places the construct noun har ("mountain of") before the plural-form noun Elohim, a plural morphology that here refers to a singular referent, as reflected in its construct pairing with a singular-referenced location.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the main verb as exēlthen ("he went out") where the Hebrew has va.Vo' ("he came," H0935G) — a divergence in directional verb choice. The Vulgate's Venit ("he came") matches the directionality of the Hebrew verb. Additionally, some translations (e.g., BSB) restructure the compound subject, presenting "Jethro" as the primary subject with wife and sons "along with" him, whereas the Hebrew syntax lists Jethro, sons, and wife as three coordinated elements under the same verb.