Leviticus 8:17

Summary

Leviticus 8:17 describes the disposal of the sacrificial bull's remaining parts: Moses burns the bull's hide, flesh, and offal with fire outside the camp, following the specific command Yehovah had given him.

Key words

• par ("bull", H6499) — masculine singular noun with definite article, referring to the specific bull previously designated for the sacrifice.
• oro ("its hide", H5785+H9023) — construct noun with 3rd person masculine singular suffix, meaning "hide of it," specifying the animal's skin.
• pirshvo ("its offal", H6569+H9023) — construct noun with pronominal suffix, denoting the animal's dung/refuse as a distinct disposed item.
• saraf ("he burned", H8313) — qal perfect verb, indicating a completed single action of burning performed by the subject (Moses, per context).
• tzivah ("he had commanded", H6680) — piel perfect verb, marking a prior completed command; the piel stem intensifies the verbal action of ordering.

What the text says

The verse opens with a chain of three direct objects — ha-par ("the bull", H6499), oro ("its hide", H5785), besaro ("its flesh", H1320), and pirshvo ("its offal", H6569) — each marked separately by the object marker 'et (H0853) and joined by the conjunction ve ("and", H9002). This repetitive structure lists each component of the animal individually before the single verb saraf ("he burned", H8313) appears, meaning the verb governs all four objects at once even though it is stated only once, at the end of the list. This is a common word order in Biblical Hebrew: objects precede the verb when the writer wants to enumerate them clearly before stating the action that applies to all.

The phrase mi-chutz la-machaneh ("from outside of the camp", H2351+H4264) locates the burning spatially, outside the camp, using two prepositions (min and la) combined with construct and article forms. The final clause, introduced by ka'asher ("just as", H0834D), reintroduces the verb tzivah ("he had commanded", H6680) in the piel perfect, referring back to a previous instruction given by Yehovah (H3068G) to Mosheh ("Moses", H4872). The piel stem here carries the sense of a formal, authoritative directive.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the four Hebrew objects (ha-par, oro, besaro, pirshvo) as τὸν μόσχον, τὴν βύρσαν, τὰ κρέα, τὴν κόπρον, matching the Hebrew's fourfold enumeration, and adds the pronoun αὐτὰ ("them") before "he burned," making explicit what the Hebrew leaves implicit through repeated 'et. The Vulgate condenses the list into a single phrase, "vitulum cum pelle, et carnibus, et fimo" ("the calf with the skin, and the flesh, and the dung"), using "cum" ("with") to subordinate the parts to the bull, rather than treating all four as separate coordinate objects as the Hebrew does.