Exodus 25:28

Summary

The verse instructs that poles be made from acacia wood, overlaid with gold, so that the table (mentioned earlier in the chapter) can be carried by means of these poles. The three verbs form a sequence: making, overlaying, and the resulting capacity to carry.

Key words

• ba.Dim ("poles", H0905G) — masculine plural noun, the object being fashioned; refers to carrying-poles rather than ordinary rods.
• 'a.Tzei ("wood/woods of", H6086G) — construct plural, linking directly to shi.Tim to specify the material as acacia.
• tzi.pi.Ta ("you will overlay", H6823) — piel sequential perfect, denoting a thorough or intensive covering action (the piel stem often intensifies the verbal action compared to a simple qal form).
• ni.sa'- ("it will be carried", H5375H) — niphal sequential perfect, a passive/reflexive form: the subject (the table) undergoes the action of being carried rather than performing it.
• va-...-m ("by/in them", H9003 + H9038) — preposition with pronominal suffix, specifying the poles as the means by which the carrying occurs.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a chain of three sequential perfect verbs, each continuing the narrative instruction begun earlier in the chapter: 'a.Si.ta ("you will make"), tzi.pi.Ta ("you will overlay"), and ni.sa' ("it will be carried"). This chain structure ties the action of making poles and covering them in gold directly to their eventual function, expressed by the niphal verb ni.sa'. The niphal stem here marks a shift in grammatical subject-focus: the table becomes the entity that "is carried," with the poles as the instrument, marked by the prepositional phrase va-...-m ("by them" / "with them").

The construct phrase 'a.Tzei shi.Tim ("wood of acacia") specifies the material of the poles, matching material used elsewhere in the Exodus tabernacle instructions. The direct object markers ('et) before "poles" and before "table" clarify grammatically which nouns receive the verbal actions, though they carry no independent lexical meaning.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew text (TAHOT) speaks of poles (ba.Dim) made of acacia wood, overlaid with gold, for carrying the table. The Vulgate (VULCLEM) renders this closely: "vectes" ("poles/bars") of "lignis setim" ("acacia wood"), overlaid ("circumdabis auro") for "subvehendam mensam" ("carrying the table"), matching the Hebrew structure and content.

The LXX text provided (LXXSWETE), however, diverges substantially in content: it lists items such as "τὰ τρύβλια" ("the dishes"), "τὰς θυίσκας" ("the bowls"), "τὰ σπόνδια" ("the libation vessels"), and "τοὺς κυάθους" ("the cups"), made of "χρυσίου καθαροῦ" ("pure gold"), rather than poles for carrying the table. This LXX rendering corresponds to different vessel-related content than the Hebrew verse's focus on carrying-poles.