Exodus 31:6

Summary

The verse continues God's speech to Moses, announcing the appointment of Oholiab son of Ahisamach (from the tribe of Dan) to assist Bezalel, and stating that skill has been placed in the heart of every skilled craftsman so that they may carry out everything commanded.

Key words

• natati ("I have appointed / I have put", H5414) — qal perfect, first person, used twice in this verse (once for the appointment of Oholiab, once for the giving of chokhmah), marking both actions as completed from the speaker's perspective.
• chakham-lev ("skillful of heart", H2450 + H3820A) — construct chain literally "wise/skilled of heart," describing the craftsmen as a category rather than naming individuals.
• chokhmah ("skill", H2451) — feminine singular noun, the object given by God, distinct from the verb natati that governs it.
• tzivvitikha ("I have commanded you", H6680 + H9031) — piel perfect with second-person suffix, an intensive verbal stem marking the directive nature of the command already issued to Moses.
• 'et (H0853) — the direct object marker, appearing before both "Oholiab" and "all that," a grammatical particle with no independent meaning, showing which nouns function as objects of the verbs.

What the text says

The verse opens with va'ani hinneh ("and I, behold"), combining the independent pronoun 'ani ("I", H0589) with the interjection hinneh ("here!", H2009). This construction places emphasis on the speaker before the verb natati appears, a common pattern in Biblical Hebrew for marking a shift in focus or introducing new information within a speech. The repetition of natati structures the verse into two parallel actions by the same speaker: first, the appointment of Oholiab as being "with" Bezalel ('ito, "with him", H0854 + H9033), and second, the placement of chokhmah ("skill") into the heart of every chakham-lev ("skillful of heart"). Both actions use the same completed verbal form, syntactically equating the naming of an assistant with the endowment of general craftsmanship ability.

The sentence then shifts with ve'asu ("and they will make", H6213H), a sequential perfect that continues the narrative chain and expresses a future-oriented consequence following from the preceding perfects — the craftsmen "will make" what has been commanded, using the piel verb tzivvitikha ("I have commanded you"), whose intensive stem marks the directive as an emphatic, formal command already delivered to Moses (second-person suffix -kha, H9031).

Differences between versions

The LXX renders Ahisamach as Ἀχισαμάχ and Oholiab as Ἐλιάβ, differing from the Hebrew 'Oholi'av (H0171). The LXX also translates chakham-lev ("skillful of heart") as συνετῷ καρδίᾳ ("understanding in heart"), using a term related to comprehension rather than craftsmanship skill. The Vulgate renders chokhmah as "sapientiam" ("wisdom"), a term with broader semantic range than the Hebrew chokhmah, which in this context refers specifically to technical skill.