Genesis 35:2

Summary

Jacob addresses his household and everyone accompanying him with three commands: to remove the foreign gods among them, to purify themselves, and to change their garments. The verse is framed as direct speech introduced by the narrative verb va-yomer ("and he said").

Key words

• va-yomer ("and he said", H0559) — qal narrative form, the standard verb opening reported speech in biblical narrative.
• heisiru ("remove", H5493G) — hiphil (causative) plural imperative from the root sur ("to turn aside"); the hiphil makes it "cause to turn aside / put away," directed at a group.
• elohei ha-nekhar ("gods of foreignness", H0430J + H5236) — construct chain: elohei is the plural construct form "gods of," bound to ha-nekhar ("the foreignness"), literally "gods of the foreign(-ness)."
• hitaharu ("purify yourselves", H2891) — hithpael (reflexive) plural imperative, indicating the subjects act upon themselves.
• ha-chalifu ("change", H2498) — hiphil plural imperative from the root meaning "to pass/change," here causative: "cause [your garments] to be changed."

What the text says

The sentence opens with the narrative vav plus va-yomer, marking a new speech act by Ya'aqov (Jacob). The addressees are given in two coordinated prepositional phrases: el-beito ("to his household," construct noun + suffix "his") and ve-el kol asher immo ("and to all who [were] with him"), the relative clause asher immo specifying an additional group beyond the household itself.

The speech itself consists of three parallel imperative clauses, all second-person masculine plural, each opened by a hiphil or hithpael verb form that signals command: hasiru ("remove"), hitaharu ("purify yourselves"), ha-chalifu ("change"). The object of the first command is marked by the direct-object particle et before elohei ha-nekhar, "gods of the foreign(-ness)," itself qualified by a further relative clause, asher be-tokhekhem ("which [are] in the midst of you"), using the construct noun tokh ("midst of") plus the second-person plural suffix. The third command's object, simlotekhem ("your garments"), is likewise a construct-plus-suffix form ("clothes of you").

The three imperatives are grammatically parallel but morphologically distinct: two are hiphil (causative, acting on external objects — gods, garments) and one is hithpael (reflexive, acting on the self — purification), a distinction the English and Spanish glosses convey but which the underlying Hebrew stems make more explicit through verb pattern alone.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew hasiru ("cause to turn aside/remove") is rendered in the LXX as Ἄρατε ("take up/carry away") and in the Vulgate as abjicite ("throw away"), both intensifying the sense of disposal beyond the more neutral Hebrew "turn aside." The Hebrew construct phrase elohei ha-nekhar ("gods of the-foreign") appears in the LXX as τοὺς θεοὺς τοὺς ἀλλοτρίους ("the foreign gods," adjectival) and in the Vulgate as deos alienos ("alien gods"), both converting the Hebrew's noun-construct structure into an adjective-noun structure.