Leviticus 16:23

Summary

The verse describes Aaron entering the Tent of Meeting after the Day of Atonement rites, removing the linen garments he had put on to enter the holy place, and leaving them there. The sentence is structured as a chain of sequential actions describing a ritual undressing procedure.

Key words

• Va' ("he will go", H0935G) — qal sequential perfect; continues the narrative chain begun in the preceding verses, marking this as the next act in a fixed sequence of ritual steps.
• fa.Shat ("he will strip off", H6584) — qal sequential perfect, parallel in form to Va'; denotes the physical removal of garments, distinct from ordinary "taking off."
• big.Dei ha.Bad ("garments of... linen", H899B + H906) — construct chain, "garments of linen," specifying the material of the vestments being removed, definite through the article on Bad.
• la.Vash ("he wore", H3847) — qal perfect (not sequential), marking a completed prior action; it describes what Aaron had already done (put on the garments) before the present sequence, contrasting with the ongoing narrative verbs.
• vo' ("went", H0935G) — infinitive form of the same root as Va', governed by the preposition be ("when"), producing "when he entered," a temporal clause embedded within the main narrative.

What the text says

The verse opens with the narrative vav attached to Va' ("and he will go", H0935G), continuing a chain of sequential perfect verbs that structure the passage as a series of ordered ritual actions: Aaron goes (Va'), strips off (fa.Shat), and leaves (hi.ni.Cha, H5117, hiphil). The hiphil stem of hi.ni.Cha is causative, indicating that Aaron actively causes the garments to remain in place, rather than simply that they remain on their own.

Within this chain, the relative clause 'a.Sher la.Vash ("which he wore", H3847) uses a plain qal perfect rather than the sequential form, marking it as background information — a completed prior act (putting on the garments) rather than part of the ongoing sequence. This is further specified by the temporal clause be.vo'.O ("when he entered", H0935G infinitive + H9043 suffix "his"), which uses the infinitive of the same root seen in Va', tying the earlier entry into the holy place to the present undressing scene through shared vocabulary rather than a new finite verb.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders 'ohel mo'ed ("tent of meeting", H0168G/H4150I) as σκηνὴν τοῦ μαρτυρίου ("tent of the testimony"), a difference in terminology from the Hebrew "meeting." The Vulgate uses revertetur ("he will return") for Va' ("he will go", H0935G), introducing a nuance of return not explicit in the Hebrew verb itself, which simply denotes going/entering.