Genesis 19:22

Summary

The verse records a divine command to hurry to a nearby place, followed by the reason (the speaker's inability to act until the addressee arrives there) and closes with an etiological note explaining the name of the city Zoar.

Key words

• ma.Her ("hurry", H4116A) — Piel imperative, giving intensive urgency to the command, reinforcing the following verb.
• hi.ma.Let ("escape", H4422) — Niphal imperative; the passive/reflexive stem frames the action as the subject bringing himself out of danger, not merely moving.
• 'u.Khal ("I will be able", H3201) — Qal imperfect, first person, expressing an ongoing/future incapacity tied to the condition stated by ki ("for", H3588A).
• bo.'a.Kha ("your going/arrival", H0935G + H9041) — Qal infinitive with second-person suffix, functioning as a verbal noun ("your arriving") governed by 'ad ("until", H5704), marking the temporal limit of the stated inability.
• ka.Ra' ("someone called", H7121H) — Qal perfect, third person, impersonal/indefinite subject ("someone called"), introducing the naming formula that closes the verse.

What the text says

The verse opens with two stacked imperatives, ma.Her ("hurry", H4116A) and hi.ma.Let ("escape", H4422), both directed at the same addressee (masculine singular), followed by sha.mah ("there", H8033G) with the directional he suffix, reinforcing motion toward a specific place already established in context. The causal clause begins with ki ("for", H3588A) and lo' ("not", H3808), negating the verb 'u.Khal ("I will be able", H3201), a first-person qal imperfect describing an unfinished state of inability. This inability is qualified by an infinitive construction, la'a.Sot davar ("to do anything", H6213A + H1697I), meaning "to do a thing/anything." The temporal boundary of this inability is marked by 'ad ("until", H5704) plus the infinitive bo.'a.Kha ("your arriving", H0935G with suffix H9041) — a construction where the infinitive functions nominally, taking a pronominal suffix as its subject, followed again by sha.mah ("there", H8033G).

The second half of the verse shifts to a narratorial, etiological statement: 'al-ken ("therefore", H5921A + H3651C) introduces the naming explanation, and ka.Ra' ("someone called", H7121H), a qal perfect with an unspecified/impersonal subject, governs the construct phrase shem-ha'ir ("the name of the city", H8034 + H5892B), followed by the proper name Tzo.'ar ("Zoar", H6820). The verb form using an unspecified subject in Hebrew ("someone called") differs structurally from active naming constructions with an explicit subject.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the double imperative construction differently, using σπεῦσου ("hurry") followed by an infinitive of purpose (τοῦ σωθῆναι, "to be saved"), where the Hebrew has two separate imperatives, ma.Her ("hurry") and hi.ma.Let ("escape"). The Vulgate similarly splits into "festina" ("hurry") and "salvare" ("save yourself"), paralleling the Hebrew's two-verb structure more closely than the LXX's verb-plus-infinitive form. For the naming clause, the LXX uses ἐπωνόμασεν ("he named" — a form with an implied but unstated subject), and the Vulgate uses "vocatum est" ("it was called" — a passive construction), while the Hebrew ka.Ra' ("someone called") is an active verb with an unexpressed subject.