Leviticus 14:29

Summary

The verse describes the priest applying the remaining oil from his palm onto the head of the person undergoing purification, as an act of atonement performed before Yehovah. This concludes a ritual sequence involving oil application during the purification ceremony.

Key words

• noTar ("remainder", H3498) — niphal participle, masculine singular, functioning substantively as "the thing remaining/left over," referring to the leftover oil after previous applications.
• kaf ("palm of", H3709G) — feminine singular construct, linking to "the priest" that follows; denotes the physical location (palm) from which the oil is taken.
• mitaHer ("one purifying himself", H2891) — hithpael participle, masculine singular, reflexive/reciprocal form indicating the person is the subject undergoing the purification process, not merely a passive recipient.
• khaPer ("make atonement", H3722A) — piel infinitive construct, intensive stem expressing the purpose ("in order to atone") of the oil application.
• liphNei ("before", H6440G) — masculine plural construct of "face," idiomatically meaning "in the presence of," here preceding Yehovah (H3068G).

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with a casus pendens construction: ha-noTar min-ha-Shemen ("the remainder from the oil") stands as the grammatical subject, followed by a relative clause asher al-kaf ha-kohen ("which is on the palm of the priest") specifying its location. The main verb yiTen ("he will put/give", H5414H) is a qal imperfect, indicating an action to be carried out by the priest, who is implied as the subject rather than restated. The object of the placement is rosh ha-mitaHer ("head of the one purifying himself"), using the hithpael participle to describe the ritual subject in a reflexive-continuous state.

The purpose clause introduced by le-khaPer ("to make atonement") uses the piel infinitive construct, a common syntactic pattern in Leviticus expressing the goal of a priestly action. The phrase alav ("on/for him", combining H5921A with the third-person suffix) specifies the beneficiary of the atonement. The final phrase liphNei Yehovah ("before Yehovah") locates the ritual act within a specific relational or spatial framework, using the construct plural noun phanim ("face") in its idiomatic sense of "presence."

Differences between versions

The Vulgate (VULCLEM) specifies in sinistra manu ("in the left hand"), an added detail not present in the Hebrew kaf ha-kohen ("palm of the priest"), which does not specify which hand. The LXX (καταλειφθὲν, "the thing left behind") and Hebrew noTar both function as substantival participles denoting "remainder," showing structural correspondence. The Vulgate's ut placet pro eo Dominum diverges syntactically from the Hebrew's le-khaPer alav liphNei Yehovah, rendering the atonement clause with a different verbal construction ("that he may appease the Lord for him") rather than a direct equivalent of khaPer ("to atone").