Exodus 3:22

Summary

The verse describes women asking their neighbors and household guests for silver and gold articles and clothing, which the Israelites will then place on their sons and daughters. The passage closes with a statement that this action constitutes "plundering" Egypt.

Key words

• sha.'a.Lah ("she will ask", H7592) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the narrative chain begun with the preceding verses; the subject is the generic 'i.Shah ("[each] woman", H0802G).
• ga.Rat ("[the] [female] sojourner of", H1481A) — qal participle in construct form, describing a woman temporarily residing (literally "sojourning") in the house, distinct from the permanent she.khen.Ta ("[female] neighbor", H7934).
• ke.lei ("articles of", H3627) — masculine plural construct, paired twice (with Khe.sef, "silver", H3701G and za.Hav, "gold", H2091), forming a fixed pair "articles of silver and articles of gold."
• sam.Tem ("you will put [them]", H7760H) — qal sequential perfect, second person masculine plural, shifting the grammatical subject from the individual women to the collective "you" (the Israelites) who will place the items on their children.
• ni.tzal.Tem ("you will plunder", H5337) — piel (intensive) sequential perfect, second person masculine plural, marking the culminating action of the sequence with an intensified verbal stem.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a chain of sequential perfects (ve- + perfect), a construction that in narrative Hebrew conveys a series of future actions following logically from what precedes. The chain moves through three stages: first, 'i.Shah ("woman") asks me.she.khen.Tah ("from her neighbor") and mi.ga.Rat bei.Tah ("from the sojourner of her house") for ke.lei Khe.sef, khe.Lei za.Hav, and se.ma.Lot ("clothes"); second, the plural "you" (sam.Tem) places these items on "your sons" (be.nei.Khem) and "your daughters" (be.No.tei.Khem); third, the same plural subject performs the action described by ni.tzal.Tem.

The grammatical distinction between she.khen.Ta ("neighbor," a settled resident) and ga.Rat ("sojourner," a participle indicating one dwelling temporarily) marks two categories of women in Egyptian households from whom items are requested. The direct object marker 'et (H0853) before Mitz.Ra.yim ("Egypt") signals that Egypt itself — not merely its people or possessions — is the grammatical object of the final verb, though the noun functions here as a stand-in for the Egyptians collectively.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ga.Rat bei.Tah ("sojourner of her house") with συσκήνου αὐτῆς ("her tent-companion" or "her fellow-lodger"), a term emphasizing shared dwelling rather than temporary status. The Vulgate's hospita ("guest," "female host") similarly frames this figure as someone hosted in or hosting within the household, without conveying the participial "sojourning" nuance present in the Hebrew ga.Rat. The LXX's final clause, σκυλεύσατε τοὺς Αἰγυπτίους ("plunder the Egyptians," accusative plural of the people), differs from the Hebrew's direct object 'et-Mitz.Ra.yim ("Egypt," the place-name), which the Vulgate follows more closely with spoliabitis Aegyptum.