Exodus 25:22

Summary

Exodus 25:22 states that God will meet with Moses "there" — above the kapporet (atonement cover) between the two cherubim on the ark of the testimony — and from that place will speak to him, giving him all the commands to be relayed to the Israelites. The verse links the physical location just described (the ark and cherubim) to the mechanism of ongoing divine communication.

Key words

• no.'ad.Ti ("I will meet", H3259) — niphal (reflexive/reciprocal) sequential perfect; the niphal stem of יעד conveys a mutual appointed encounter, not merely "seeing" or "visiting."
• di.bar.Ti ("I will speak", H1696) — piel (intensive) sequential perfect; parallels no.'ad.Ti in form, continuing the same narrative chain of future actions.
• ka.Po.ret ("atonement cover", H3727) — feminine singular noun; the object over which the speaking occurs, marked by me.'Al ("from above", H9006+H5921A).
• ke.ru.Vim ("cherubim", H3742) — masculine plural; located via mi.Bein ("from between", H9006+H0996), forming a paired spatial description with the kapporet.
• 'a.tza.Veh ("I will command", H6680) — piel imperfect, shifting verbal aspect from the completed/sequential perfects above to an open, iterative future action.

What the text says

The verse opens with two verbs in sequential perfect (we-qatal) form — no.'ad.Ti and di.bar.Ti — both first person, continuing a chain of future actions begun earlier in the passage describing the ark's construction. The niphal stem of no.'ad.Ti marks the meeting as reciprocal or appointed, distinct from a simple visit. The location is doubly specified: me.'Al ha.ka.Po.ret ("from above the atonement-cover") gives a vertical vantage point, while mi.Bein she.Nei ha.ke.ru.Vim ("from between the two cherubim") gives a horizontal one — both governed by the preposition min (H9006), suggesting that the divine voice proceeds outward from that specific space. A relative clause, 'a.Sher 'al-'a.Ron ha.'e.Dut ("which are upon the ark of the testimony"), reidentifies the cherubim's position relative to the ark.

The final clause pivots to the imperfect 'a.tza.Veh ("I will command"), marking a shift from the completed, one-time framing of the meeting/speaking to an open-ended, repeated activity of issuing commands "to the sons of Israel" ('el-be.Nei Yis.ra.'El).

Differences between versions

The Vulgate renders no.'ad.Ti as "praecipiam" ("I will give orders/command") rather than reflecting the niphal sense of meeting/appointment found in the Hebrew no.'ad.Ti (H3259); it treats the first verb as anticipating the commanding function elaborated later in the verse. The Septuagint text supplied here corresponds instead to the following verse's content (the golden table), so no direct comparison with the Hebrew of Exodus 25:22 can be drawn from the data given.