Exodus 4:26

Summary

The verse reports that "he withdrew" from a person, after which "she" spoke, identifying someone as a "bridegroom of blood" in connection with "the circumcisions." The Hebrew text does not name the subjects explicitly, relying on context from the preceding verses (the circumcision episode) to identify "him" and "she."

Key words

• yirref ("he withdrew", H7503) — qal verb, narrative sequence marker (vav + prefix conjugation), indicating a completed action that follows directly from what precedes; the grammatical subject is only "he," unnamed in this clause.
• mimmennu ("from him", H4480A + suffix) — preposition with 3rd person masculine singular suffix; the referent "him" is not restated as a noun, so identification depends on the surrounding narrative.
• chatan ("bridegroom of", H2860) — masculine singular noun in construct state, meaning it must be joined to the following noun (damim) to complete its sense: "bridegroom of blood(s)."
• damim ("bloods", H1818) — masculine plural noun; the plural form of "blood" in Hebrew often carries an intensive or abstract sense (e.g., bloodshed, blood-guilt) rather than a simple count of multiple bloods.
• la-mulot ("to/for the circumcisions", H9005 + H4139) — feminine plural noun with prefixed preposition lamed ("to," "for," "because of"); the plural form mulot is notable since the narrative context (outside this verse) speaks of a single circumcision act.

What the text says

The clause structure is tightly compressed: a narrative verb (yirref) with a prepositional phrase (mimmennu) forms the first statement, followed by the adverb az ("then") introducing a second verb (amerah, "she said") that leads into direct speech. Neither the subject of yirref ("he") nor the speaker ("she") is named by a noun in this verse; both are indicated only by verb conjugation (masculine singular, feminine singular) and must be supplied from the wider narrative. The direct speech itself is a two-word construct phrase, chatan damim, "bridegroom of blood(s)," followed by the explanatory prepositional phrase la-mulot, "because of the circumcisions." The plural form of mulot is grammatically notable, since it uses a plural noun where a singular event might be expected based on outside narrative content, though the data given here does not resolve why the plural is used.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate ("dimisit eum") and BSB ("the LORD let him alone") supply an explicit subject ("the LORD") not present as a noun in the Hebrew, which uses only the verb form yirref. The SBLIBRE ("Dios lo dejó vivir," "God let him live") adds the notion of "living," which is not represented by any Hebrew word in this verse. The Vulgate and RV1909 render la-mulot with a singular noun ("circumcisionem," "circuncisión"), where the Hebrew mulot is plural.