Exodus 4:7

Summary

Following the sign of the leprous hand, this verse narrates the reversal: God commands Moses to put his hand back into his garment, Moses does so, and when he withdraws it, it has returned to its normal condition, like the rest of his flesh.

Key words

• ha.Shev ("return", H7725G) — hiphil (causative) imperative, second masculine singular: a direct command to cause the hand to go back, not merely "go back" but "make it return."
• chei.Ke.kha ("your bosom", H2436H + H9021) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, indicating the fold of the garment against the body where the hand is placed; repeated three times (vv. 7's chei.Ke.kha, chei.Ko, chei.Ko) tracking the hand's movement in and out.
• i.yo.tzi.'A ("he brought out", H3318H) — hiphil narrative form, third masculine singular with feminine object suffix -ah ("it", H9034) referring back to yad ("hand"), which is grammatically feminine in this clause chain.
• Sha.vah ("it had turned back", H7725H) — qal perfect, third feminine singular, describing a completed state prior to the moment of observation: the flesh had already returned before Moses looked.
• ki ("like", H9004) attached to v.sa.R.o ("his flesh", H1320 + H9021) — construct with suffix, forming the comparison "like his flesh" (i.e., like the rest of his skin).

What the text says

The verse is built as a chain of four narrative-vav clauses (va-yomer, va-yashev, va-yotzi'ah, ve-hinneh-shavah), each advancing the action in sequence: speech, action, withdrawal, and observed result. The root shuv ("to return", H7725) appears three times in different stems — first as a hiphil imperative (hashev, "cause to return/put back"), then as a hiphil narrative (va-yashev, "he put it back"), and finally as a qal perfect (shavah, "it had returned/turned back") describing the flesh's own state. This repetition of the same root across different grammatical forms creates a wordplay: the causative action of returning the hand into the garment is echoed by the flesh's own return to its former condition.

The particle hinneh ("there!", H2009) introduces the moment of discovery, marking a shift from narrated action to Moses' (and the reader's) direct perception. The qal perfect shavah indicates that the change had already occurred by the time it was seen — the text does not narrate the healing itself, only its completed result upon withdrawal.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ha.Shev with the aorist imperative Εἰσένεγκον ("bring in") rather than a term meaning "return," shifting the verb's semantic field from "return/restore" to "bring/carry in." The Vulgate's Retrahe ("draw back") for the same word similarly frames the action as withdrawal rather than restoration, and the Vulgate lacks a direct equivalent for hinneh, presenting the flesh's change (similis carni reliquae) without the marker of sudden perception present in the Hebrew hinneh.