Exodus 30:24

Summary

Exodus 30:24 continues a list of aromatic ingredients for a sacred oil, specifying a quantity of qiddah ("cassia") measured by the sanctuary standard, followed by a hin-measure of olive oil. The verse consists of two quantity-plus-substance phrases, both governed by the same construct pattern seen elsewhere in the recipe.

Key words

• qiddah ("cassia", H6916) — feminine singular noun naming the aromatic substance being measured; no verb accompanies it, as the sentence is elliptical, continuing a listing structure begun earlier in the chapter.
• chamesh ("five", H2568) — cardinal number in construct form, linking to me'ot to form the compound numeral "five hundred."
• me'ot ("hundreds", H3967) — feminine plural of "hundred," combined with chamesh to express the total quantity of shekels.
• sheqel ("shekel of", H8255) — masculine singular construct noun, meaning it is bound to the following word haqqodesh, producing the phrase "shekel of the holy place."
• shemen zayit ("oil of olive", H8081 + H2132) — construct chain where shemen ("oil of") is bound to zayit ("olive"), meaning literally "oil of olive," i.e., olive oil.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence has no main verb; it is a continuation of a list format used throughout Exodus 30:23–24, where each spice is followed by its required quantity. The phrase chamesh me'ot be-sheqel ha-qodesh ("five hundred by the shekel of the holy place") uses the construct number chamesh bound to me'ot to form "five hundred," followed by the preposition be ("by") governing the construct phrase sheqel ha-qodesh, literally "the shekel of the holiness/holy place." This construct phrase specifies the weight standard used for measuring the cassia, distinguishing it from other possible weight systems in use at the time the text describes.

The second clause, ve-shemen zayit hin, uses another construct chain, shemen zayit ("oil of olive"), followed by hin, a measure noun standing in apposition to indicate volume rather than weight. Unlike the cassia clause, no numeral modifies hin, implying a single unit rather than a specified count — the Hebrew simply states "olive oil, a hin," letting the noun hin function as the measurement term itself.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders qiddah ("cassia", H6916) as ἴρεως ("of iris"), differing from the Hebrew term for cassia. The LXX also phrases the olive oil clause as ἔλαιον ἐξ ἐλαίων ("oil from olives") rather than the Hebrew's direct construct "oil of olive," and it omits any word directly corresponding to hin as a distinct unit, instead transliterating it as "εἵν." The Vulgate’s casiae... quingentos siclos... olei de olivetis mensuram hin closely mirrors the Hebrew’s measurement structure, using mensuram ("measure") to render hin explicitly as a unit of measure.