Leviticus 5:14

Summary

This verse contains the standard introductory formula announcing that Yehovah spoke to Moses. It marks the beginning of a new divine speech unit, with no content of the message itself given in this verse — that follows in subsequent verses.

Key words

• va-y'daBer ("and he spoke", H1696G) — piel verb with narrative vav, indicating a sequential, intensive act of speaking; the piel stem here marks formal or authoritative speech rather than casual talk.
• Yehovah ("Yehovah", H3068G) — the divine proper name, functioning as the grammatical subject of the verb y'daBer.
• 'el ("to", H0413) — preposition marking the addressee of the speech, here introducing Mosheh.
• Mosheh ("Moses", H4872) — proper name, functioning as the indirect object / recipient of the divine speech.
• leMor ("saying", H0559) — qal infinitive construct with prefixed preposition le, functioning adverbially to introduce the forthcoming direct discourse; literally "to say" or "in saying."

What the text says

The Hebrew clause follows a fixed syntactic pattern common in the legal sections of Leviticus: verb + subject + prepositional phrase + infinitive. The narrative vav prefixed to y'daBer ("and he spoke") links this verse to the preceding textual unit, signaling continuation of a larger discourse rather than an isolated event. The piel stem of daBer ("to speak", H1696G) is the standard verbal form used throughout Leviticus for divine communication to Moses, distinguishing it from the qal stem used for ordinary speech.

The subject Yehovah (H3068G) directly follows the verb, a normal verb-subject order in Biblical Hebrew narrative. The prepositional phrase 'el-Mosheh ("to Moses") identifies the recipient, and the clause culminates in the infinitive leMor ("saying", H0559), which functions as a quotation marker — it does not carry independent meaning but signals that direct speech will follow. This entire five-word clause is a formulaic introduction (found repeatedly across Leviticus) that frames the legal or ritual instruction to come, without itself containing any legal content.

Differences between versions

The Septuagint (LXX) renders va-y'daBer with the aorist active elalēsen ("he spoke"), matching the Hebrew narrative sequence closely. The Vulgate uses locutusque est ("and he spoke"), also preserving the sequential sense with the enclitic -que. The infinitive leMor ("saying") is rendered in the LXX with the participle legōn ("saying") and in the Vulgate with dicens ("saying"), both functioning similarly to the Hebrew infinitive as speech-introducing markers, though grammatically they are participles rather than infinitives.