Exodus 36:6

Summary

Moses issues a command that is relayed as a public proclamation throughout the camp, prohibiting men and women from continuing to prepare material for the sanctuary offering. As a result, the people stop bringing contributions.

Key words

• va-y'tzav ("and he commanded", H6680) — piel narrative form of the verb, giving intensive/causative force to "command"; the vav-consecutive marks it as the next event in the story.
• ya'aviru ("they caused to pass", H5674A) — hiphil (causative) narrative form: literally "they made [a voice] pass through," idiomatic for making a public announcement.
• qol ("a voice/proclamation", H6963J) — masculine singular noun, the object that is "passed through" the camp; functions as "proclamation" rather than a literal sound.
• ya'asu ("they make", H6213I) — qal jussive: expresses a prohibition/command ("let them not make"), not a simple future statement.
• yikkale' ("it was restrained", H3607) — niphal (passive) narrative form: the people are the passive recipients of the restraining action, no agent is named in the Hebrew clause itself.

What the text says

The verse opens with two narrative (vav-consecutive) verbs in sequence: va-y'tzav ("and he commanded", H6680), with Moses as subject, followed by va-yya'aviru ("and they caused to pass", H5674A), whose subject shifts to an unnamed "they" — presumably assistants or officials who execute the order. The construction "ya'aviru qol" (H5674A + H6963J), "they caused a voice/proclamation to pass," is an idiom for a public announcement moving through the camp (ba-machaneh, H4264), introduced by the infinitive lemor ("saying", H0559), which opens direct speech.

The quoted command itself uses 'ish ve-'ishah ("a man and a woman", H0376G + H0802G) as the paired subject, followed by the negated jussive 'al ya'asu (H0408 + H6213I), "let them not make," rather than a simple negative future — this grammatical mood frames it as an authoritative directive within reported speech. The phrase li-trumat ha-qodesh ("for the contribution of the holy place", H8641 + H6944G) uses a construct chain, tying the "work" (melakhah, H4399) directly to its purpose, the sacred contribution.

The final clause returns to third-person narrative with va-yikkale' ("and it was restrained", H3607), a niphal (passive) verb: the people (ha-'am, H5971A) are grammatically the ones acted upon, with the restraining agent left unspecified in the Hebrew. This is followed by the infinitive me-havi' ("from bringing", H0935P), indicating cessation of the action of bringing.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ya'aviru qol ("they caused a voice to pass") as ekēryxen ("he proclaimed"), keeping Moses as the singular subject of the proclamation, whereas the Hebrew shifts to a plural "they" for that verb. The Vulgate similarly attributes the proclamation to Moses alone (Jussit... Moyses praeconis voce cantari), not distinguishing the two-verb structure (command, then relay) present in the Hebrew.