Exodus 7:14

Summary

The verse opens a new divine speech to Moses, stating that Pharaoh's heart is "heavy" and that he has refused to send the people away. It is a narrative report of Yehovah's assessment of Pharaoh's disposition after the preceding sign.

Key words

• ka.Ved ("heavy", H3515) — masculine singular adjective, predicate describing the state of the lev ("heart") without a copular verb; Hebrew allows the nominal sentence "heavy [is] the heart of Pharaoh" without "to be."
• lev ("heart of", H3820A) — construct noun linking directly to par'oh, forming the phrase "heart of Pharaoh"; the construct state ties the two nouns into a single unit meaning "Pharaoh's heart."
• me.'En ("he has refused", H3985) — piel perfect, third person masculine singular. The perfect aspect marks a completed action: the refusal is presented as an accomplished fact, not an ongoing process.
• sha.Lach ("let go", H7971H) — piel infinitive (construct), governed by the preposition le. ("to", H9005), forming the purpose/complement clause "to let go" — literally "to send away."
• ha.'Am ("the people", H5971A) — masculine singular noun with definite article, the object of the sending action.

What the text says

The verse is built as two short clauses joined by narrative sequence. The first clause, va-i.Yo.mer Yehovah 'el-Moshe ("and Yehovah said to Moses"), uses the standard narrative vav plus qal verb to advance the story sequence. The content of the speech follows immediately, introduced without a quotation formula beyond the verb "said."

The core statement is a nominal sentence: ka.Ved lev par'oh — "heavy [is] the heart of Pharaoh." Hebrew here has no linking verb; the adjective ka.Ved stands directly before the construct phrase lev par'oh, producing a description rather than an action. This differs from a verbal construction that would show a process of hardening; instead, the state is presented as a simple fact using adjective + noun.

The second clause, me.'En le-shalach ha-'am ("he has refused to let the people go"), pairs a piel perfect verb (me.'En) with a piel infinitive (sha.Lach) governed by the preposition le. This construction expresses purpose or complement: the refusal is specifically about the act of sending. The perfect aspect of me.'En frames the refusal as a completed, settled fact at the moment of speech, not as something currently unfolding.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the nominal Hebrew clause with a verb, bebarētai ("has been weighed down"), a perfect passive form, converting the adjectival predicate ka.Ved into a verbal one. The Vulgate similarly uses ingravatum est ("has been made heavy"), a passive perfect verb, where the Hebrew has no verb at all in that clause. Both Greek and Latin thus supply a verbal action absent from the Hebrew's adjective-plus-noun construction, though the meaning conveyed is comparable.