Leviticus 1:4

Summary

The verse describes the ritual gesture that follows the presentation of a burnt offering: the offerer leans his hand on the animal's head, after which the offering "will be accepted" on his behalf, with the stated purpose of making atonement for him.

Key words

• samakh ("he will lean", H5564) — qal, sequential perfect. This form continues a chain of ritual actions from the preceding verse, marking each step as following logically/temporally from the last.
• yadov ("hand of + his", H3027G + H9023) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, literally "hand-of-him," i.e., "his hand." The construct chain links the body part directly to its possessor without a separate word for "his."
• nirtzah ("it will be accepted", H7521) — niphal, sequential perfect. The niphal stem marks the verb as passive: the text states that the offering "will be accepted" without naming who accepts it.
• kapper ("to make atonement", H3722A) — piel infinitive construct, introduced by the prefixed preposition le- ("to/for"). The infinitive expresses the purpose or result of the accepted offering: atonement.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built from three sequential-perfect clauses joined by the narrative vav ("and"), a construction typical of ritual instruction texts where each verb continues the action begun earlier: "and he will lean... and it will be accepted... to make atonement." The first clause uses the construct phrase rosh ha-'olah ("head of the burnt offering," H7218A + H9009 + H5930A) to specify exactly where the hand is placed. The second clause switches to the niphal stem of ratzah ("to accept," H7521), which grammatically suppresses the agent — the Hebrew does not say who accepts the offering, only that acceptance happens. The final clause uses the piel infinitive kapper ("to make atonement") preceded by le-, expressing the goal toward which the accepted offering moves: atonement "on him" ('alav, preposition + suffix, H5921A + H9033), repeating the same preposition used earlier for "on the head."

The grammar thus creates a chain: hand-placement leads to acceptance, and acceptance leads to atonement, but the Hebrew leaves the identity of the one who accepts unstated, relying on the passive niphal form alone.

Differences between versions

The LXX text supplied here is fragmentary, showing only "καὶ ἐπιθήσει... τὴν περὶ αὐτοῦ" ("and he will place... the one concerning him"), which covers only part of the first clause and does not include the nirtzah or kapper clauses present in the Hebrew and Vulgate. The Vulgate renders the niphal nirtzah as "acceptabilis erit" ("it will be acceptable"), preserving the passive sense without naming an agent, and turns the infinitive kapper into a participial phrase, "in expiationem ejus proficiens" ("proceeding toward his expiation"), rather than a purpose infinitive. The Spanish SBLIBRE translation supplies an explicit subject for the passive verb, "Yehová se la aceptará" ("Yehovah will accept it for him"), naming an agent that the Hebrew niphal form leaves grammatically unspecified.