Genesis 1:4
וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים אֶת־הָאוֹר כִּי־טוֹב וַיַּבְדֵּל אֱלֹהִים בֵּין הָאוֹר וּבֵין הַחֹֽשֶׁךְ׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וַיַּ֧רְא אֱלֹהִ֛ים אֶת־הָא֖וֹר כִּי־ט֑וֹב וַיַּבְדֵּ֣ל אֱלֹהִ֔ים בֵּ֥ין הָא֖וֹר וּבֵ֥ין הַחֹֽשֶׁךְ׃
καὶ ἴδεν ὁ θεὸς τὸ φῶς ὅτι καλόν· καὶ διεχώρισεν ὁ θεὸς ἀνὰ μέσον τοῦ φωτὸς καὶ ἀνὰ μέσον τοῦ σκότους.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Et vidit Deus lucem quod esset bona: et divisit lucem a tenebris.
Y vió Dios que la luz era buena: y apartó Dios la luz de las tinieblas.
And God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness.
✦ What the text says
Summary
Two narrative actions are chained: God saw the light and separated between the light and the darkness. The evaluation "that it was good" is introduced by the particle ki-, and the evaluative form is parsed in the data as a verb rather than an adjective.
Key words
- i.Yar' ("he saw", H7200) — qal verb in narrative form.
- Tov ("good", H2895) — qal verb in the perfect, third person ("he").
- i.yav.Del ("he separated", H0914) — hiphil (causative) verb in narrative form.
- bein ("between", H0996) — repeated before each term of the separation.
- Cho.shekh ("darkness", H2822) — masculine singular noun.
What the text says
The verse continues the chain with two narrative forms linked by the vav va ("and", H9001). First, i.Yar' ("he saw", H7200): God ('E.lo.Him, "God", H0430) saw the object marked with 'et- ("", H0853) and the article: the light ('Or, "light", H0216). The next clause opens with ki- ("that", H3588), a particle the data describe as conditional or subordinating ("if", "that"), and introduces the evaluation: Tov ("good", H2895), parsed as a qal verb in the perfect, third person ("he"). The versions render it with an adjective: καλόν, bona, «buena», "good".
The second action is i.yav.Del ("he separated", H0914), in the hiphil stem, which the data mark as causative; its narrative form continues the sequence ("and then…"). The separation is phrased with bein ("between", H0996) repeated before each term — literally "between the light and between the darkness" (Cho.shekh, "darkness", H2822) — with the article ha. ("the", H9009) before both nouns.
Differences between versions
The LXX mirrors the Hebrew repetition of bein ("between", H0996) with ἀνὰ μέσον… καὶ ἀνὰ μέσον, whereas the Vulgate (divisit lucem a tenebris), the RV1909 («apartó Dios la luz de las tinieblas»), and the BSB ("separated the light from the darkness") condense the construction into "separate X from Y". In addition, where the Hebrew has the verbal form Tov ("good", H2895), all four versions use a predicate adjective (καλόν, bona, «buena», "good").
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.