Leviticus 14:16

Summary

The verse describes a priestly ritual action: the priest dips his right finger into oil that rests on his left palm, then sprinkles some of that oil with his finger seven times before Yehovah. The action is presented as two sequential steps within a larger purification ritual.

Key words

• ta.Val ("he will dip", H2881) — qal sequential perfect; continues the narrative chain of prescribed priestly actions.
• ko.Hen ("priest", H3548) — definite masculine singular noun; identifies the sole agent performing both actions.
• 'etz.ba.' ("finger", H0676) — feminine singular construct, appearing twice (words 6 and 25), each time followed by a possessive suffix ("his finger").
• hi.Zah ("he will spatter/sprinkle", H5137A) — hiphil (causative) sequential perfect; the causative stem indicates the priest actively causes the oil to scatter, distinct from the simple dipping action.
• She.va' pe.'a.Mim ("seven times", H7651 + H6471) — cardinal number plus plural noun, specifying the fixed repetition count of the sprinkling.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a chain of two sequential perfect verbs (ta.Val ... ve.hi.Zah), a common syntactic pattern in ritual instruction texts where each verb form continues the procedural sequence begun in the preceding verses. The subject, ha.ko.Hen ("the priest", H3548 with article H9009), is stated once and governs both verbs.

The text distinguishes the two hands explicitly through adjectives: ha.y.ma.Nit ("the right", H3233G) modifies the finger used for dipping, while ha.se.ma.Lit ("the left", H8042G) modifies the palm holding the oil. Both adjectives are feminine singular, agreeing with the feminine nouns 'etz.ba.' ("finger") and ka.P ("palm", H3709G) respectively. The relative clause 'a.Sher 'al-ka.P.O ha.se.ma.Lit ("which [is] on his left palm") specifies the location of the oil before the sprinkling action.

The second clause repeats min-ha.She.men ("some of the oil", H4480A + H8081) as the object of the sprinkling verb hi.Zah, this time performed be.'etz.ba.'O ("with his finger", H9003 + H0676) — the same finger identified earlier — for a fixed count of She.va' pe.'a.Mim ("seven times") li.f.Nei Yehovah ("before Yehovah", H9005 + H6440G construct + H3068G).

Differences between versions

The LXX renders ta.Val ... ha.y.ma.Nit as βάψει τὸν δάκτυλον τὸν δεξιρόν ("he will dip the right finger"), omitting the phrase corresponding to ha.She.men ("the oil") as a separate stated object before "of the oil" — the Greek structure places "from the oil" as the source rather than paralleling the Hebrew's double naming of She.men. The Vulgate's tingetque digitum dextrum in eo ("and he will dip the right finger in it") uses the pronoun eo referring back to the oil rather than repeating the noun, differing stylistically from the Hebrew's explicit repetition of ha.She.men in both clauses.