Leviticus 26:44

Summary

The verse declares that even while the people are in the land of their enemies, God has not rejected or abhorred them to the point of total destruction or annulment of the covenant. It closes with a self-identification formula, "I am Yehovah their God."

Key words

• 'af ("also", H0637) + gam ("also", H1571) — two emphatic particles stacked together before zot ("this", H2063), producing a triple emphasis roughly "and even also this," intensifying the contrast with what precedes.
• bi-heyotam ("in their being", H1961) — a qal infinitive construct with prefixed preposition and pronominal suffix, forming a temporal clause: "while/when they are."
• me'asti ("I have rejected", H3988A) — qal perfect, 1st person singular, with negation lo': a completed-aspect verb describing the state of not-rejecting.
• ge'alti ("I have abhorred", H1602) — qal perfect, 1st person singular, parallel in form and negation to me'asti, using a different root for revulsion/abhorrence.
• le-khalotam ("to make an end of them", H3615H) and le-hafer ("to break", H6565A) — piel and hiphil infinitives construct, both introduced by le-, expressing purpose/result: the outcome that the negated verbs prevent.

What the text says

The sentence opens with the triple particle cluster ve-'af-gam-zot, which piles emphasis onto the following clause before any verb appears — a construction that foregrounds contrast with the surrounding context (destruction, exile) rather than stating a new action. The temporal infinitive bi-heyotam ("in their being") sets the scene: "in the land of their enemies." The core statement uses two parallel qal perfect verbs, me'asti and ge'alti, both negated by lo', describing what has not happened despite the circumstance just introduced. These are followed by two purpose infinitives, le-khalotam ("to make an end of them") and le-hafer... beriti ("to break my covenant"), which specify the consequence that the negated verbs are said not to produce. The verse ends with the formula ki 'ani Yehovah 'elohei-hem ("for I [am] Yehovah their God"), a nominal clause without a copula in Hebrew, functioning as grounds for the preceding statement.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders me'asti ("I have rejected") as ὑπερεῖδον ("I overlooked/disregarded") and ge'alti ("I have abhorred") as προσώχθισα ("I was vexed/angry"), shifting the semantic field from rejection/revulsion to disregard/irritation. The Vulgate adds penitus ("utterly") to "abjeci," a qualifier not present in the Hebrew text, and restructures the final purpose clause as a subjunctive result ("ut... irritum facerent pactum meum" — "so that they would render my covenant void"), which shifts the grammatical subject of the covenant-breaking action away from the divine speaker as found in the Hebrew le-hafer beriti ("to break my covenant").