Exodus 22:24
וְחָרָה אַפִּי וְהָרַגְתִּי אֶתְכֶם בֶּחָרֶב וְהָיוּ נְשֵׁיכֶם אַלְמָנוֹת וּבְנֵיכֶם יְתֹמִֽים׃ פ
✦ Hebrew interlinear
Tap a word to see its entry
✦ The same verse in five languages
וְחָרָ֣ה אַפִּ֔י וְהָרַגְתִּ֥י אֶתְכֶ֖ם בֶּחָ֑רֶב וְהָי֤וּ נְשֵׁיכֶם֙ אַלְמָנ֔וֹת וּבְנֵיכֶ֖ם יְתֹמִֽים׃ פ
καὶ ὀργισθήσομαι θυμῷ καὶ ἀποκτενῶ ὑμᾶς μαχαίρᾳ, καὶ ἔσονται αἱ γυναῖκες ὑμῶν χῆραι καὶ τὰ παιδία ὑμῶν ὀρφανά.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
et indignabitur furor meus, percutiamque vos gladio, et erunt uxores vestræ viduæ, et filii vestri pupilli.
mi enojo se encenderá y los mataré a ustedes a filo de espada. Entonces serán sus esposas las que se quedarán viudas, y sus hijos los que se quedarán huérfanos.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y mi furor se encenderá, y os mataré á cuchillo, y vuestras mujeres serán viudas, y huérfanos vuestros hijos.
My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword; then your wives will become widows and your children will be fatherless.
✦ What the text says
Summary
The verse declares a consequence of divine anger: it will "burn," resulting in death by sword, and consequently the wives and children of those addressed will become widows and orphans. The sentence is a chain of three sequential consequences following an unstated prior condition.
Key words
- cha.Rah ("it will burn", H2734) — qal sequential perfect; the verb of "burning" describing the kindling of anger, continuing a prior narrative sequence (implying "if... then this will happen").
- 'a.P ("anger", H0639G) — masculine singular construct, "anger of," bound to the following suffix -i ("my"), forming "my anger/nose" (the anatomical term for nose/face is used idiomatically for anger).
- ha.rag.Ti ("I will kill", H2026) — qal sequential perfect, first-person, continuing the chain begun by cha.Rah; grammatically parallel, showing the anger's stated result is action taken by the speaker.
- nesh.ei ("wives", H0802H) — construct plural, "wives of," bound to -khem ("your"), producing "your wives."
- ye.to.Mim ("fatherless ones", H3490) — plural absolute noun, the final predicate noun describing the resulting state of the sons.
What the text says
The Hebrew presents three clauses joined by the narrative/sequential vav (וְ, H9001), each carrying a sequential perfect verb (cha.Rah, ha.rag.Ti, ha.Yu). This construction chains cause and effect: first the anger "burns" (cha.Rah, H2734), then "I will kill" (ha.rag.Ti, H2026) follows as a direct continuation, and finally "they will be" (ha.Yu, H1961) introduces the resulting state of the wives and children. The verb sequence itself encodes result rather than mere addition — each perfect form builds on the prior action within a single logical progression.
The phrase chorah appi ("my anger will burn," lit. "anger of me will burn") uses 'aph (H0639G), a noun whose literal meaning is "nose" or "face," here functioning idiomatically for anger — a nuance not visible in translations that render it simply as "anger" or "furor."
The two parallel construct chains nesh.ei-khem ("wives of you") and venei-khem ("sons of you") mirror each other structurally, each followed by a plural predicate noun: 'almanot ("widows," H0490) and yetomim ("fatherless ones," H3490). This grammatical parallelism reinforces the paired outcome — the death of the men produces two symmetrical categories of survivors.
Differences between versions
The LXX renders chorah appi ("my anger will burn") as ὀργισθήσομαι θυμῷ ("I will be angered with wrath"), shifting the Hebrew's idiom of "burning" into a passive verb of "being angered" plus an instrumental noun for wrath, losing the "nose/face" imagery embedded in 'aph (H0639G). The Vulgate's indignabitur furor meus ("my fury will be indignant") similarly abstracts the verb differently from the Hebrew's "burning," using "furor" as the subject rather than "anger of my face."
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.