Exodus 32:30

Summary

Exodus 32:30 records Moses' address to Israel the day after the golden calf episode. He states plainly that the people have committed a serious sin, then announces his intention to ascend to Yehovah, expressing uncertainty about whether atonement for that sin can be achieved.

Key words

• chataTem ("you have sinned", H2398) — qal perfect, 2nd person masculine plural: marks the sin as a completed act attributed directly to the addressees.
• chata'ah gedolah ("a great sin", H2401 + H1419A) — feminine noun with feminine adjective in agreement, quantifying the severity of what was done.
• 'e'eleh ("I will go up", H5927G) — qal imperfect, 1st person singular: expresses Moses' intended future/ongoing action of ascending.
• 'ulai ("perhaps", H0194) — adverb of uncertainty placed before the following verb, framing the outcome as unresolved.
• 'akhapperah ("I will atone", H3722A) — piel stem, an intensive form distinct from the simple (qal) action, tied to the preceding 'ulai to express a hoped-for result.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative formula vayehi mimochorat ("and it was from the next day"), followed by vayomer ("and he said"), both narrative-vav constructions that simply advance the story from one event to the next. Moses' speech begins with the independent pronoun 'atem ("you", H0859D) placed before the verb chataTem, a construction that foregrounds the addressees before stating their completed action — "you, you have sinned." The noun-adjective pair chata'ah gedolah then intensifies the statement by naming the offense as "a great sin," using a feminine singular noun and matching adjective.

The second half of the verse shifts from description of the past to Moses' own intended action, marked by ve'attah ("and now"). The imperfect 'e'eleh presents this as a future or ongoing act of ascending toward Yehovah (H3068G). The adverb 'ulai ("perhaps") then qualifies what follows: the piel verb 'akhapperah, built on an intensive stem distinct from a simple qal action, expressing an act of atonement whose success is not asserted as certain but only sought. The construct phrase be'ad chattat-khem ("for the sin of you") closes the verse, attaching the sin explicitly to the people through the pronominal suffix -khem ("your", H9026).

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the Hebrew 'ulai...'akhapperah sequence with a purpose clause, ἵνα ἐξιλάσωμαι ("so that I may propitiate"), converting the Hebrew's loosely joined "perhaps + verb" into a grammatically subordinated goal. The Vulgate expands this further with "si quomodo quivero eum deprecari" ("if perhaps I shall be able to entreat him"), adding an explicit notion of capability not present in the Hebrew adverb 'ulai alone, and rendering 'akhapperah as "deprecari" ("to entreat") rather than as an act of atonement.