Leviticus 14:15

Summary

The verse describes a priestly action in a purification ritual: the priest takes a portion of oil measured in a log and pours it into the hollow of his own left hand. The verse consists of two sequential actions linked by narrative vav, continuing the ritual instructions of the chapter.

Key words

• la.Kach ("he will take", H3947) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the chain of ritual actions begun in the surrounding verses; the subject is ha-kohen ("the priest").
• Log ("[the] log of", H3849) — masculine singular construct noun, a specific unit of liquid measure, bound to ha-shamen ("the oil") that follows.
• yaTzak ("he will pour [it]", H3332) — qal sequential perfect, parallel in form to la.Kach, marking the second step of the action.
• kaf ("[the] palm of", H3709) — feminine singular construct noun; denotes specifically the hollow/palm of the hand, not the whole hand, and is bound to ha-kohen ("the priest").
• se.ma.Lit ("left", H8042) — feminine singular adjective, agreeing grammatically with kaf (feminine) rather than with ha-kohen (masculine), showing that the adjective modifies "palm," not "priest."

What the text says

The verse is built as two clauses joined by the narrative vav, each opening with a sequential perfect verb (la.Kach, then yaTzak), a pattern typical of procedural or legal Hebrew prose that lists ordered actions. The first clause specifies the material taken: mi-Log ha-shamen, "some of the log of the oil," where the preposition mi ("some of," H9006) indicates a partitive relation — the priest takes a portion from the full measure, not the entire log at once.

The second clause specifies the destination of the poured oil: 'al-kaf ha-kohen ha-semalit, "onto the palm of the priest, the left one." The construct chain kaf ha-kohen ("palm of the priest") is followed by the adjective se.ma.Lit ("left"), which is feminine to match kaf, clarifying that "left" describes the palm specifically, not the priest generally. The noun kaf itself denotes the concave part of the hand, distinct from a general word for "hand."

Differences between versions

The LXX renders Log with κοτύλης ("kotyle"), a Greek liquid measure used as an equivalent for the Hebrew unit, while the Vulgate uses "sextario," a Latin measure term — both substituting local units for the Hebrew Log. Where the Hebrew text repeats ha-kohen ("the priest") explicitly with the noun kaf, the Vulgate uses the reflexive possessive "manum suam sinistram" ("his own left hand"), and the LXX uses χεῖρα ("hand") rather than a specific term for "palm," not preserving the Hebrew's more precise anatomical term kaf.