Exodus 29:39

Summary

The verse instructs that one lamb be offered in the morning and a second lamb be offered between the two evenings. It specifies the daily timing of two lamb offerings using ordinal terms ("the one" and "the second") and precise temporal markers.

Key words

• Ke.ves ("lamb", H3532) — masculine singular noun, repeated twice to designate each of the two animals separately.
• ta.'a.Seh ("you will offer", H6213I) — qal imperfect, second person masculine singular; the verb literally means "to do/make" but functions here as "to offer, to prepare (a sacrifice)"; repeated for each lamb, indicating two distinct actions.
• Bo.ker ("morning", H1242) — masculine singular noun, marking the time of the first offering, preceded by the preposition-article combination va. ("in the").
• 'ar.Ba.yim ("evenings", H6153) — masculine dual noun, literally "the two evenings," used in the construct phrase bein ha'arbayim ("between the evenings") to mark the time of the second offering.
• 'e.Chad ("one", H0259) and she.Ni ("second", H8145) — the cardinal and ordinal numbers distinguishing the first lamb from the second within the sentence.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built in two parallel clauses, each following the pattern: direct object marker + definite lamb (distinguished by "one" or "second") + verb ta.'a.Seh + time expression. The direct object marker 'et- (H0853) has no independent meaning; it signals that "the lamb" is the object of the verb ta.'a.Seh. This repetition of the verb form in both clauses (rather than a single verb governing both objects) gives each offering its own distinct grammatical action, even though the verb itself is identical.

The time phrase for the second offering, bein ha'arbayim ("between the evenings"), uses the dual form 'ar.Ba.yim, literally "the two evenings." The dual number suggests the Hebrew conceives of "evening" as bounded by two points, with the offering occurring in the interval between them. This contrasts with the simpler prepositional phrase va-Boker ("in the morning"), which uses a plain singular noun without dual structure.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders bein ha'arbayim ("between the evenings") as τὸ δειλινόν ("the afternoon/evening time"), a single temporal expression that does not reflect the dual form present in the Hebrew 'ar.Ba.yim. The Vulgate similarly simplifies this to vespere ("in the evening"), also losing the dual "two evenings" structure. Modern translations (BSB "at twilight," RV1909 "a la caída de la tarde") follow this same simplification, rendering the Hebrew dual as a single evening moment rather than preserving the "between two evenings" phrasing found in the source text.