Exodus 40:10

Summary

Exodus 40:10 instructs Moses to anoint the altar of burnt offering together with all its utensils, and then to consecrate that altar, resulting in its status as qodesh qadashim ("holiness of holinesses", H6944G) — the highest degree of the noun "holiness" expressed through a construct doubling.

Key words

• ma.shach.Ta ("you will anoint", H4886) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the chain of instructions begun earlier in the chapter; the form itself carries "and you shall..." without needing a separate conjunction for tense-sequence.
• miz.Bach ("altar of", H4196) — masculine singular construct, linking directly to ha.'o.Lah ("the burnt offering", H5930A) to specify which altar is meant.
• ke.La + suffix -ו ("its articles/utensils", H3627) — masculine plural construct with a 3rd person masculine singular suffix, meaning "its utensils," referring back to the altar.
• ki.dash.Ta ("you will consecrate", H6942G) — piel sequential perfect; the piel stem intensifies the action beyond simple qal, marking a formal, effective act of setting apart.
• Ko.desh Ka.da.Shim ("holiness of holinesses", H6944G) — a masculine singular noun in construct with its own plural form, a Hebrew construction used to express a superlative degree ("most holy").

What the text says

The verse is built from three sequential perfect verbs — ma.shach.Ta ("you will anoint"), ki.dash.Ta ("you will consecrate"), and ha.Yah ("it will be") — each introduced by the narrative vav that continues a chain of commands rather than starting a new independent clause. This grammatical chaining ties the verse tightly to the instructions surrounding it in Exodus 40, presenting anointing, consecration, and resulting status as one continuous procedural sequence rather than three separate events.

The object of anointing is specified through a construct chain: miz.Bach ha.'o.Lah ("altar of the burnt offering") followed by kol ke.La.v ("all its utensils"), both marked with the direct object marker 'et (H0853), which has no independent meaning but signals that these nouns are the grammatical objects of ma.shach.Ta. The final clause, ve.ha.Yah ha.miz.Be.ach Ko.desh Ka.da.Shim, uses the construct-plus-plural pattern (Ko.desh Ka.da.Shim) to express the altar's resulting state in the strongest available construct form of "holiness," rather than by using an adjective.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate text provided ("altare holocausti et omnia vasa ejus") reproduces only the first clause of the Hebrew verse — the altar of burnt offering and its utensils — without rendering the consecration clause or the qodesh qadashim phrase found in the Hebrew. The Septuagint text supplied for this reference (Ἀαρὼν καὶ τοὺς υἱοὺς αὐτοῦ...λούσεις αὐτοὺς ὕδατι, "Aaron and his sons...you shall wash them with water") does not correspond to the content of the Hebrew verse at all; it describes bringing Aaron and his sons to the tabernacle entrance and washing them with water, material that in the Hebrew numbering belongs elsewhere in Exodus 40.