Leviticus 24:3

Summary

The verse specifies where and when a continual arrangement is to take place: outside the curtain that stands before the "testimony," inside the Tent of Meeting. Aaron is to perform this action from evening until morning, before Yehovah, as a perpetual statute for future generations.

Key words

• chutz ("the outside", H2351) — construct noun marking a spatial position relative to what follows, "outside of."
• parochet ("the curtain of", H6532) — feminine singular construct, linking to ha-'edut ("the testimony", H5715); together, "the curtain of the testimony."
• ya'aroch ("he will arrange", H6186A) — Qal imperfect, third person masculine singular, denoting a habitual or future-repeated action performed by Aaron.
• 'oto ("it", H0853 + H9033) — direct object marker with a masculine singular suffix, pointing to an object mentioned earlier in the context (not named again in this verse).
• chuqqat 'olam ("a statute of perpetuity", H2708 + H5769G) — construct chain expressing a fixed, enduring legal ordinance, further specified by le-dorotei-khem ("to your generations", H1755 + H9026).

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with two stacked construct phrases — mi-chutz le-farochet ha-'edut ("from outside to the curtain of the testimony") — establishing a precise spatial location before naming the agent or the action. Only after this spatial framing does the verb ya'aroch ("he will arrange") appear, with Aaron as the subject and 'oto ("it," masculine singular) as the object. The object itself is not named within this verse; the suffix presupposes an antecedent from the surrounding material, since the Hebrew here does not use a noun for "lamps." The time frame me-'erev 'ad boqer ("from evening until morning") and the phrase li-fnei Yehovah tamid ("before Yehovah continually") reinforce the sustained, repeated nature of the imperfect verb. The final clause, chuqqat 'olam le-dorotei-khem ("a statute of perpetuity for your generations"), closes the verse by projecting the instruction's validity across generational time, using two construct nouns in sequence rather than a finite verb.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the verb as καύσουσιν ("they will burn/kindle"), plural, and adds καὶ οἱ υἱοὶ αὐτοῦ ("and his sons") as additional subjects — elements not present in the Hebrew text, which has only Aaron as subject with a singular verb ya'aroch. The Vulgate uses ponetque eas ("and he will place them"), with a feminine plural pronoun eas, making explicit that the unnamed masculine object 'oto in the Hebrew refers to feminine plural items (lamps) understood from context, whereas the Hebrew itself keeps the referent masculine singular and unspecified within this verse.