Exodus 27:20

Summary

Exodus 27:20 records a command addressed to Moses ("you") to instruct the Israelites to supply pure, pressed olive oil for the lampstand, so that a lamp may be kept burning continually.

Key words

• te.tza.Veh ("you will command", H6680) — piel imperfect, second person masculine singular. The piel stem gives the verb an intensive/directive force ("to command, charge"), and the imperfect marks it as an instruction oriented toward future/ongoing execution.
• yik.Chu ("they may bring", H3947J) — qal imperfect with a preceding ve ("and"), third person masculine plural. Following the command verb, this form expresses purpose or consequence: the people are to act as a result of Moses' command ("that they may bring/take").
• za.yit ("olive", H2132H) in construct with She.men ("oil of", H8081) — the construct chain shemen zayit, literally "oil of olive," specifies the type of oil rather than oil in general.
• zakh ("pure", H2134) and ka.Tit ("pressed", H3795) — two adjectives/qualifiers modifying the oil, describing both its clarity/purity and its method of extraction (pressed/crushed).
• ha.'a.Lot ("lift up", H5927I) — hiphil infinitive construct, causative stem. Paired with le ("to"), it expresses purpose: "in order to cause to go up," i.e., to kindle or maintain the flame of the lamp.

What the text says

The verse opens with the independent pronoun 'a.Tah ("you", H0859A) placed before the verb te.tza.Veh, which in Hebrew syntax gives emphasis to the addressee — the instruction is directed specifically and personally to "you" (Moses, based on the wider context of the divine speech). The object of the command is marked by 'et (H0853, untranslated direct object marker) followed by be.Nei Yis.ra.'El, "the people of Israel," itself a construct chain meaning literally "sons of Israel."

The clause continues with ve.yik.Chu, a vav-consecutive-style imperfect that expresses the result or purpose of the command: the people are to "bring" or "take" something toward Moses ('e.Lei.kha, "to you"). What they bring is specified through a chain of nouns and adjectives: shemen zayit zakh katit, "oil of olive, pure, pressed" — a sequence of qualifiers stacked after the construct noun shemen ("oil of," H8081), each adding a distinct qualification (clarity, then processing method).

The final clause states the purpose of the oil: la.mma'or, "for the light" (with the definite article attached via la), and le.ha'alot ner tamid, using the hiphil infinitive ha'alot ("to cause to go up/kindle") governing the construct pair ner tamid, "a lamp of continuity" — rendered idiomatically as "a lamp continually" or "a perpetual lamp."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders shemen zayit ("oil of olive") as ἔλαιον ἐξ ἐλαίων ἄτρυγον, "oil from olives, without lees/sediment," adding the qualifier ἄτρυγον which has no direct one-to-one match among the Hebrew adjectives zakh or katit, though it may correspond conceptually to purity. The LXX also renders ha'alot ("to cause to go up") with καίω ("to burn/kindle"), a semantic shift from "lifting up" the flame to "burning" it. The Vulgate's purissimum ("very pure") corresponds to zakh, while piloque contusum ("crushed with a pestle") renders katit with an added instrumental detail (the pestle) not explicit in the Hebrew adjective itself.