Exodus 21:31

Summary

Exodus 21:31 states that if the goring animal (the subject carried over from the preceding verses) gores a son or a daughter, the same legal rule already described will be applied to the owner. The verse functions as a coda extending the preceding case law to victims who are minors.

Key words

• yiggach ("it will gore", H5055) — qal imperfect, third person masculine singular; used twice, once with "son" and once with "daughter" as grammatical objects, though the verb's subject (the goring animal) is not repeated in this verse but assumed from the prior context.
• ben ("a son", H1121A) — masculine singular noun, functioning as the object of the first yiggach.
• bat ("a daughter", H1323G) — feminine singular noun, object of the second yiggach, paired with ben to cover both sexes of minor victims.
• ka-mishpat ha-zeh ("according to this judgment", H9004 + H4941G + H9009 + H2088) — a prepositional phrase with demonstrative "this," pointing back to a ruling already stated earlier in the passage rather than introducing a new one.
• ye'aseh ("it will be done", H6213A) — niphal imperfect, a passive/impersonal form: the verse does not name who performs the action, only that "it will be done to him" (lo, H9033, pronominal suffix "him").

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as two parallel short clauses joined by 'ov ("or", H0176A): "or a son it-gores, or a daughter it-gores." Each clause has the same verb, yiggach, but a different object (ben / bat), producing a balanced, formulaic structure typical of case law. Notably, no explicit subject ("ox" or similar) appears in this verse — the verb's implied agent is understood from the surrounding legal material earlier in the chapter, not restated here.

The second half of the verse shifts to a passive construction: ka-mishpat ha-zeh yē'āśeh lō ("according to this judgment it will be done to him"). The niphal form ye'aseh removes the acting subject from view — the text does not specify who applies the judgment, only that the outcome will occur. The demonstrative ha-zeh ("this") signals that the "judgment" is not newly defined here but refers back to a standard already established previously.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate makes the instrument explicit with "cornu" ("horn"), specifying how the goring occurs, a detail not lexically present in this Hebrew verse itself. The BSB and other translations supply "the ox" as the subject of "gores," making explicit what the Hebrew leaves implicit through the unstated verbal subject. The LXX renders the same impersonal construction with ποιήσουσιν ("they will do"), a third-person plural active form, where the Hebrew ye'aseh is a passive/niphal form without a stated agent.