Numbers 15:14

Summary

Numbers 15:14 establishes that a ger ("sojourner", H1616) residing with the Israelites, across future generations, may offer a fire offering to Yehovah, and that this offering must follow the same procedure the Israelites themselves use. The verse links the foreigner's ritual practice to the native practice through explicit comparison.

Key words

• khi ("if", H3588A) — conditional particle opening the clause, setting up a hypothetical/legal case ("if a sojourner..."); the verse describes a recurring situation, not a single event.
• ger ("a sojourner", H1616) — masculine singular noun, the subject of the conditional; the one whose potential offering is being regulated.
• do.Ro.tei.khem ("generations", H1755) — feminine plural construct with 2nd person plural suffix ("your generations"), placing the regulation across time, not limited to the immediate audience.
• 'asah ("he will offer", H6213I) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the narrative chain begun by the conditional khi; grammatically it advances the case from "if he sojourns" to "and [then] he offers."
• ta'aseu...ken ya'aseh ("you do... so he will do", H6213A) — the imperfect verb repeated for "you" (plural) and "he" (singular), built with the comparative ka'asher ("as", H0834D) and adverb ken ("so", H3651C), forming the syntactic frame of equivalence between the two parties' actions.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a conditional chain: the particle khi introduces the hypothetical case of a ger sojourning "with you" ('itekhem, H0854+H9036) or one who is "in your midst" (betokhekhem, H8432+H9026), specified as applying "to your generations" (ledorotekhem)—indicating the rule is not a one-time provision but a standing law across generational time. The verb 'asah ("he will offer") appears in the sequential perfect, a form that continues the logical flow from the initial conditional verb yagur ("he will sojourn", H1481A, imperfect), producing a two-step legal structure: "if he sojourns... and he offers..."

The closing clause uses a balanced comparative construction: ka'asher ta'aseu ("as you do", 2nd person plural imperfect) matched with ken ya'aseh ("so he will do", 3rd person singular imperfect). This grammatical parallelism—same verb root H6213A in both halves, differing only in person and number—expresses procedural equivalence: the sojourner's ritual action is measured against the collective practice of "you" (the Israelite assembly), without the Hebrew stating any content difference between the two practices, only that the action itself must match.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders betokhekhem ("in your midst") with the added phrase "in the land" (ἐν τῇ γῇ ὑμῶν), a specification not present in the Hebrew construct phrase. Where the Hebrew closes with ken ya'aseh ("so he will do," 3rd person singular, referring to the sojourner), the LXX shifts the final subject to "the assembly" (ἡ συναγωγὴ) acting "to the Lord," differing from the Hebrew's focus on the individual sojourner's action. The Vulgate fragment given, "eodem ritu offerent sacrificia" ("by the same rite they shall offer sacrifices"), uses a plural verb offerent, contrasting with the Hebrew's singular yaaseh.