Leviticus 24:19

Summary

The verse establishes a conditional structure: if a man causes a physical injury (mum, "blemish") to his fellow, the same act done to that fellow will be done to him. The Hebrew builds this through a case-law formula: a protasis introduced by ki ("if") followed by an apodosis using a corresponding passive verb form.

Key words

• 'Ish ("anyone", H0376I) — masculine singular noun, here functioning generically as "a man" or "anyone," setting up the subject of the conditional clause.
• ki ("if", H3588A) — a conditional particle opening the protasis, typical of legal/case formulations in Hebrew law codes.
• mum ("a blemish", H3971B) — masculine singular noun denoting a physical defect or injury inflicted on another person.
• 'amiT ("fellow citizen", H5997) — construct form ("of...") that requires the following suffix to complete its meaning, here "his fellow."
• ye'Aseh ("it will be done", H6213A) — niphal (passive) imperfect of the same root used earlier in 'aSah ("he has done", H6213A) qal perfect. The shift from active qal to passive niphal, using the identical root, creates a grammatical mirror: the doer of the action in the protasis becomes the passive recipient in the apodosis.

What the text says

The sentence is built as a classic apodictic-conditional legal formula. The protasis (ve'ish ki-yiTen mum ba'amiTo, "and a man, if he gives a blemish on his fellow") uses the qal imperfect yiTen ("he will give/make") to describe a hypothetical future act. The object of that act is mum, "a blemish," placed on 'amiTo, literally "his fellow" — the construct noun 'amiT plus the third-person masculine suffix o ("his").

The apodosis mirrors this structure through the phrase ka'asher 'aSah ken ye'Aseh lo — "as he has done, so it will be done to him." Here 'aSah is qal perfect (completed action, describing what "he has done"), while ye'Aseh is niphal imperfect (passive, "it will be done"). Both forms share the same root, H6213A, so the Hebrew text creates a verbal echo: the same root appears first as an active perfect describing the offender's deed, then as a passive imperfect describing what will happen to him. This root-repetition is a feature of the Hebrew that translations render as "as he has done, so it will be done to him," but the underlying wordplay — same root, opposite voice — is a structural feature specific to the Hebrew grammar and not visually present in English or Spanish renderings, which must supply different words ("has done" / "will be done") to convey the same root pair.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders 'amiT ("fellow citizen", H5997) as τῷ πλησίον ("the neighbor"), a slightly broader term than the Hebrew's more specific "fellow" or "companion." The Vulgate's cuilibet civium suorum ("to any of his fellow citizens") expands the phrase further, making the "citizen" relationship explicit, whereas the Hebrew 'amiT itself does not contain a term equivalent to "citizen."