Exodus 40:27

Summary

Exodus 40:27 states that Moses burned fragrant incense on the altar (referred to by the pronominal suffix "it"), acting in accordance with a command that Yehovah had previously given him. The verse closes a sequence of ritual actions performed in the tabernacle.

Key words

• yaqter ("he made smoke", H6999A) — hiphil (causative) form: the subject causes something to go up in smoke, i.e., burns incense.
• qetoret ("incense of", H7004) — feminine singular noun in construct state, linking directly to the next word.
• sammim ("spices/perfumes", H5561) — masculine plural noun, completing the construct chain as "incense of spices."
• tzivvah ("he had commanded", H6680) — piel perfect: an intensive verb stem marking a completed action prior to the main narrative moment.
• 'et (direct object marker, H0853) — untranslated particle marking Mosheh ("Moses", H4872) as the object of the command.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative vav (item 1), continuing the chain of sequential actions that structures Exodus 40. The verb yaqter (H6999A) is in the hiphil stem, meaning the subject (Moses, understood from context) causes smoke to rise — the standard verbal expression for burning incense rather than a general "burning." The phrase qetoret sammim (H7004 + H5561) is a construct chain, literally "incense of spices," describing the specific substance placed on the altar; the noun sammim is plural, indicating a compound of aromatic ingredients rather than a single substance.

The clause ka'asher tzivvah Yehovah 'et-Mosheh ("as Yehovah had commanded Moses") uses the piel perfect tzivvah (H6680), marking the command as an action completed before the moment of execution described in the main verb. This comparative clause, introduced by ka'asher (H0834D), functions as a recurring refrain throughout Exodus 40, tying each ritual act back to a prior divine instruction. The direct object marker 'et (H0853) before Mosheh has no independent meaning in translation; it simply marks Moses as the grammatical object of tzivvah.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew text specifies that what was burned was qetoret sammim, "incense of spices." The Vulgate text supplied here instead mentions "altare holocausti... offerens in eo holocaustum, et sacrificia" ("altar of burnt offering... offering on it burnt offering and sacrifices"), which describes a burnt-offering altar and offerings rather than incense. The LXX (Swete) text supplied here describes Moses setting up the court around the tabernacle and altar and completing all the works, content that does not correspond to the incense-burning action found in the Hebrew. These differences indicate that the Greek and Latin texts as given here are not aligned to the same verse division as the Masoretic Hebrew at this point in Exodus 40.