Leviticus 4:14
וְנֽוֹדְעָה הַֽחַטָּאת אֲשֶׁר חָטְאוּ עָלֶיהָ וְהִקְרִיבוּ הַקָּהָל פַּר בֶּן־בָּקָר לְחַטָּאת וְהֵבִיאוּ אֹתוֹ לִפְנֵי אֹהֶל מוֹעֵֽד׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וְנֽוֹדְעָה֙ הַֽחַטָּ֔את אֲשֶׁ֥ר חָטְא֖וּ עָלֶ֑יהָ וְהִקְרִ֨יבוּ הַקָּהָ֜ל פַּ֤ר בֶּן־בָּקָר֙ לְחַטָּ֔את וְהֵבִ֣יאוּ אֹת֔וֹ לִפְנֵ֖י אֹ֥הֶל מוֹעֵֽד׃
καὶ γνωσθῇ αὐτοῖς ἡ ἁμαρτία ἣν ἥμαρτον ἐν αὐτῇ, καὶ προσάξει ἡ συναγωγὴ μόσχον ἐκ βοῶν ἄμωμον περὶ τῆς ἁμαρτίας, καὶ προσάξει αὐτὸν παρὰ τὰς θύρας τῆς σκηνῆς τοῦ μαρτυρίου.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
et postea intellexerit peccatum suum, offeret pro peccato suo vitulum, adducetque eum ad ostium tabernaculi.
Cuando se den cuenta del pecado que cometieron, la comunidad ofrecerá un becerro como ofrenda por el pecado y lo llevará ante la Tienda del Encuentro.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Luego que fuere entendido el pecado sobre que delinquieron, la congregación ofrecerá un becerro por expiación, y lo traerán delante del tabernáculo del testimonio.
when they become aware of the sin they have committed, then the assembly must bring a young bull as a sin offering and present it before the Tent of Meeting.
✦ What the text says
Summary
The verse describes the moment when a sin unknowingly committed by the community becomes known to them. Once recognized, the assembly must bring a young bull as a sin offering to the entrance of the Tent of Meeting.
Key words
- nod'ah ("it will be made known", H3045) — Niphal (passive) sequential perfect; the sin becomes known without a stated human agent in the Hebrew.
- cha.Tat ("the sin", H2403B) — feminine singular noun with definite article, referring to the wrongdoing itself.
- cha.te.'U ("they have sinned", H2398) — Qal perfect, third person plural, marking the community as the subject who erred.
- hik.Ri.vu ("they will present", H7126H) — Hiphil (causative) sequential perfect; the assembly causes the bull to be brought near.
- ben-baqar ("young one of [the] herd", H1121H + H1241) — construct chain specifying the bull's origin/type, "a young one belonging to the herd."
What the text says
The verse is built on a chain of sequential perfects (ve- + perfect) that continue a narrative sequence begun earlier in the chapter: nod'ah ("it will be made known"), hiqrivu ("they will present"), and hevi'u ("they will bring"). This grammatical form signals consecutive actions in a conditional-narrative sequence rather than isolated statements.
The verb nod'ah is Niphal, a passive/reflexive stem, so the Hebrew text does not name who makes the sin known — it simply becomes known. This grammatical choice leaves the agent of discovery unspecified, which the Hebrew syntax alone communicates.
The word chattat (H2403B, "the sin") appears in the first clause referring to the wrongdoing itself, while later in the verse the same root chattat (H2403H) is used with the preposition le- ("to/for") to mean "a sin offering" — the same consonantal word functioning as both the transgression and its ritual remedy, a duality visible only in the Hebrew.
The phrase par ben-baqar uses a construct chain: ben ("son/young one of") governs baqar ("herd"), literally "a bull, a young one of the herd," specifying the animal's classification rather than simply calling it "a bull."
Differences between versions
The LXX adds ἄμωμον ("unblemished"), a descriptive qualifier for the bull that has no corresponding word in the Hebrew text at this point. The Vulgate renders the verse in the third person singular ("intellexerit," "offeret," "suum"), consistently treating the subject as an individual, whereas the Hebrew and LXX use plural verb forms (chate'u, hiqrivu, hevi'u) and the collective noun qahal ("assembly," H6951), attributing the actions to the community as a group.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.