Exodus 34:25

Summary

The verse gives two ritual prohibitions concerning sacrificial procedure: blood from a sacrifice must not be offered together with anything leavened, and no part of the Passover festival sacrifice may be left until the following morning.

Key words

• tishchat ("you must slaughter", H7819A) — qal imperfect 2ms; preceded by lo' ("not", H3808) it functions as a prohibition rather than a simple future statement.
• chametz ("leaven", H2557A) — the item that must not coexist with the sacrificial blood at the moment of offering.
• dam-zivchi — dam ("blood of", H1818) in construct with zivchi ("my sacrifice", H2077 + H9020), forming the phrase "the blood of my sacrifice"; the 1cs suffix marks the sacrifice as belonging to the speaker.
• yalin ("it will remain overnight", H3885A) — qal imperfect 3ms, negated by lo', describing what must not happen to the festival offering.
• zevach chag happasach — a double construct chain: zevach ("sacrifice of", H2077) governs chag ("festival of", H2282), which governs happasach ("the passover", H6453), yielding "the sacrifice of the festival of the passover."

What the text says

The verse is built from two parallel negative clauses, each opening with lo' plus a qal imperfect verb, a common construction for cultic prohibition in this text type. The first clause centers on the preposition 'al (H5921A) linking chametz ("leaven") to the act of slaughtering: the blood of the sacrifice is not to be handled "with" or "over" leaven, tying the timing or setting of the blood-rite to the absence of leavened substance nearby. The construct phrase dam-zivchi ties the blood specifically to "my sacrifice," with the first-person suffix indicating the sacrifice belongs to the one speaking.

The second clause shifts subject to zevach ("sacrifice") itself, which is the grammatical subject of yalin ("it will remain overnight"). The temporal phrase labboqer ("to the morning") specifies the limit: nothing of this offering may persist past sunrise. The offering is further specified through the double construct chain zevach chag happasach, stacking three nouns to narrow the sacrifice down to "the sacrifice of the festival of the passover" specifically, distinguishing it from sacrifices in general.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew dam-zivchi ("blood of my sacrifice") is rendered in the LXX as αἷμα θυμιαμάτων μου, "blood of my incense-offerings," using θυμίαμα ("incense") rather than a term for a general sacrificial victim. The Vulgate's sanguinem hostiae meae ("blood of my victim/sacrifice") aligns more closely with the Hebrew zevach. Modern translations (BSB, RV1909, SBLIBRE) follow the Hebrew sense of "sacrifice" rather than "incense."