Exodus 30:19

Summary

The verse states that Aaron and his sons will wash their hands and feet using water from a specific source (referred to as "it" / "from it"). The action is presented as part of a continuing sequence of ritual instructions, with Aaron and his sons as the grammatical subjects performing the washing.

Key words

• ra.cha.Tzu ("they will wash", H7364) — qal verb in sequential perfect form; this construction continues a chain of prior instructions, indicating an action that follows logically/temporally from what precedes it in the passage.
• mi.Me.nu ("from it", H4480A + H9033) — preposition with 3rd person masculine singular suffix, indicating the source (water) from which Aaron and his sons wash; the antecedent of "it" is not given within this verse's word list.
• ye.dei.hem ("their hands", H3027G + H9028) — noun in dual construct form (indicating a natural pair, i.e., two hands) with 3rd person masculine plural suffix "their."
• rag.lei.hem ("their feet", H7272 + H9028) — feminine noun in dual construct form with the same plural suffix, paralleling ye.dei.hem in structure.
• 'et- (H0853) — the direct object marker, appearing twice (before "hands" and before "feet"), marking each body part as the direct object of the washing action; it has no independent gloss in translation.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with the narrative vav prefixed to ra.cha.Tzu ("and they will wash"), a qal sequential perfect construction. This grammatical form signals that the washing action is part of an ongoing sequence — it follows previous actions described in the surrounding narrative and does not stand as an isolated command. The subjects are named explicitly: 'a.ha.Ron ("Aaron", H0175) joined by the conjunction u- to va.Nav ("his sons", H1121A), showing that both Aaron and his sons perform the same action together.

The phrase mi.Me.nu ("from it") uses a preposition plus 3rd person singular suffix, pointing back to a previously mentioned source — in this word list, only "it" is indicated, without the antecedent noun (likely water, based on context in versions). The object of the washing is expressed through two parallel construct phrases: yedei-hem ("hands-of-them") and raglei-hem ("feet-of-them"), each marked by the untranslated direct object particle 'et. Both nouns appear in the dual form, marking hands and feet as natural pairs, and both carry the same 3rd person masculine plural suffix -hem ("their"), maintaining grammatical concord with the plural subject "Aaron and his sons."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the source explicitly as ὕδατι ("with water"), making explicit what the Hebrew mi.Me.nu ("from it") leaves as a pronominal reference. The Vulgate uses in ea ("in it," feminine), also anticipating a feminine antecedent (consistent with a noun like "basin" in the wider context), while the Hebrew suffix -nu is masculine/neuter in this construction. The BSB and SBLIBRE modern translations both specify "water" outright, resolving the pronoun that the Hebrew text leaves implicit within this verse alone.