Exodus 34:28

Summary

The verse narrates that "he" (unnamed in the Hebrew, understood as Moses from context) remained with Yehovah ("Yehovah", H3068G) for forty days and nights without eating or drinking, and that "he" wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten words.

Key words

• va-y.hi ("and he was", H9001+H1961) — narrative vav + qal verb; opens the clause with an unspecified third-person subject, requiring context to identify who "he" is.
• lechem lo' 'akhal ("food he did not eat", H3899H/H3808/H0398) — the negated qal perfect 'akhal ("he ate") marks a completed, total negation covering the whole forty-day period, not a repeated or partial one.
• va-yikhtov ("and he wrote", H9001+H3789) — another qal narrative verb with unstated subject, grammatically parallel to va-y.hi, so the identity of the writer depends on the reader supplying the referent from the wider narrative.
• div-rei ha-berit ("words of the covenant", H1697G+H1285) — construct chain: "words" is in construct state, meaning "the words belonging to/of the covenant."
• 'aseret ha-devarim ("the ten of the words", H6235+H1697G) — a second construct phrase, literally "ten of the words," appositional to the covenant words just mentioned.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built entirely on unmarked third-person singular verbs — y.hi ("he was", H1961), 'akhal ("he ate", H0398), shatah ("he drank", H8354), yikhtov ("he wrote", H3789) — none of which carries an explicit subject noun. The referent "he" must be supplied from the preceding narrative context, since Hebrew verb morphology alone only encodes person, gender, and number, not a proper name. The clause structure alternates negated statements (lechem lo' 'akhal, "food he did not eat"; mayim lo' shatah, "water he did not drink") with the narrative vav-forms that carry the storyline forward (va-y.hi, va-yikhtov).

The final part of the verse uses two chained construct-state nouns: div-rei ha-berit ("words of the covenant", H1697G/H1285) and 'aseret ha-devarim ("the ten of the words", H6235/H1697G). Both phrases share the noun devarim ("words", H1697G), first specified as belonging to "the covenant" (ha-berit, H1285) and then quantified as "ten" ('aseret, H6235). Grammatically the second phrase re-states and numbers the same "words" already introduced, rather than naming a separate object.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew leaves the subject of the whole verse unnamed (only implied by verb agreement), while the LXX explicitly inserts Μωυσῆς ("Moses"), naming the subject that the Hebrew verb forms leave grammatically unspecified. The Vulgate, like the Hebrew, keeps the subject unstated ("Fuit ergo ibi cum Domino..."), relying on context alone. The LXX also renders the closing phrase as τοὺς δέκα λόγους ("the ten words/sayings"), while the Vulgate reads "verba fœderis decem" ("ten words of the covenant"), merging the two Hebrew construct phrases (div-rei ha-berit and 'aseret ha-devarim) into a single expression rather than presenting them as parallel restatements as in the Hebrew.