Exodus 26:8

Summary

The verse gives the dimensions of a single tent-curtain: its length is thirty cubits and its breadth four cubits, and it specifies that this same measurement (middah 'achat) applies to all eleven curtains that make up the set.

Key words

• 'Orekh ("length of", H0753) — a masculine singular noun in construct state, opening the clause as "the length of…", governing the following noun.
• y'ri'ah ("curtain", H3407) — feminine singular noun, appears twice (with the article ha, H9009) to identify "the curtain, the one [curtain]", i.e., each individual sheet before the total count is given.
• ba'ammah ("by the cubit", H0520A + H9003) — noun with prepositional article, repeated for both length and breadth, marking the unit of measure distributively for each dimension.
• middah 'achat ("one measure", H4060A + H0259) — feminine singular noun plus numeral "one", stating that a single standard applies uniformly.
• 'ash'tei-'esreh ("eleven", H6249 + H6240) — a construct compound numeral ("one of ten" = eleven) governing y'ri'ot ("curtains", H3407, plural), the total count of curtains sharing this measure.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as two parallel construct-measurement clauses. The first, 'orekh hay'ri'ah ha'achat ("the length of the curtain, the one"), uses the article twice — once on y'ri'ah and once on the numeral 'achat ("one") — to single out one curtain as the reference unit before stating its length, sheloshim ba'ammah ("thirty by the cubit"). The second clause repeats the same construction for rochav ("breadth", H7341): arba' ba'ammah ("four by the cubit"). The repetition of ba'ammah after each numeral shows the cubit functioning as a distributive unit attached to each dimension separately, a structure that a translation collapsing both numbers into one sentence ("thirty cubits long and four cubits wide") does not preserve as two independent measurement clauses.

The final clause, middah 'achat le'ash'tei 'esreh y'ri'ot ("one measure belongs to eleven curtains"), uses the preposition le (H9005) to express possession/assignment — the measure "belongs to" or "is for" the eleven curtains — rather than a verb of equality. The numeral 'ash'tei-'esreh is itself a construct chain ("one of ten"), the standard Hebrew way of forming "eleven."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the closing clause as τὸ αὐτὸ μέτρον ἔσται ("the same measure shall be") with a future verb ἔσται, where the Hebrew has no verb, only the noun middah ("measure") with the preposition le. The Vulgate similarly supplies "erit" ("will be") for the same clause, matching the LXX's added verb rather than the verbless Hebrew construction.