Leviticus 11:24

Summary

The verse states that these animals (referring to what precedes) cause uncleanness, and specifically that anyone who touches their carcasses becomes unclean until evening. The text distinguishes two related but separate declarations: general defilement from "these" creatures, and the specific mechanism of contracting impurity through physical contact with a carcass.

Key words

• 'Elleh ("these", H0428) — a demonstrative particle pointing back to the preceding list of animals; it anchors the clause to what was already enumerated.
• titamma'u ("you will make yourselves unclean", H2930A) — hithpael (reflexive) imperfect, second person plural; the reflexive stem indicates the subject brings the state of uncleanness upon itself, distinct from a passive rendering.
• noGea' ("[one who] touches", H5060) — qal participle, masculine singular; participles in Hebrew function as substantives ("the one touching"), so this word itself denotes "the toucher" as a category of person.
• nivlaTam ("carcass of them", H5038) — feminine singular noun in construct state with a possessive suffix ("their"), literally "carcass-of-them," linking the noun directly to the animals mentioned earlier.
• yitma' ("he will be unclean", H2930A) — qal (simple stem) imperfect, third person singular; unlike titamma'u, this is not reflexive, describing the resulting state rather than a self-inflicted action.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence divides into two independent statements joined by a shift in verb stem. The first clause uses titamma'u, a hithpael (reflexive/self-involved) form, addressed to "you" plural, tied to 'Elleh ("these"), summarizing that the group of animals just listed produces uncleanness for the community collectively. The second clause changes both subject and stem: ha-noGea' ("the one touching") is a qal participle functioning as the grammatical subject of yitma', a plain (non-reflexive) qal imperfect. This shift from hithpael to qal marks a distinction between a general declarative statement about the animals and a specific case-law formulation about an individual toucher, whose resulting impurity lasts 'ad ha'arev ("until the evening", H6153 with definite article), a fixed temporal boundary using the preposition 'ad ("until", H5704).

Differences between versions

The LXX (καὶ ἐν τούτοις μιανθήσεσθε) preserves the first clause's collective structure but renders the second clause more compactly (πᾶς τῶν θνησιμαίων αὐτῶν ἀκάθαρτος), omitting an explicit participle equivalent to "the one touching" and instead stating directly that "everyone of their dead bodies" is unclean. The Vulgate (quicumque morticina eorum tetigerit, polluetur) supplies an explicit relative clause with a finite verb ("whoever will have touched"), closely paralleling the Hebrew participle's function but using a different grammatical construction (relative clause vs. participle).