Numbers 15:4

Summary

Numbers 15:4 specifies that whoever brings a personal offering to Yehovah must accompany it with a grain offering: one tenth of an ephah of fine flour mixed with a quarter hin of oil. The verse establishes a fixed proportion linking the main offering to a mandatory grain-and-oil supplement.

Key words

• hikRiv ("he will bring near", H7126) — hiphil (causative) verb in sequential perfect, indicating an action that follows logically from a previous condition; the causative stem implies "causing [the offering] to draw near," i.e., presenting it.
• hammakRiv ("the one bringing near", H7126) — same root as above but as a hiphil participle with the definite article, designating the agent: "the one who presents" as an ongoing role, not a single event.
• korbanO ("his offering", H7133A) — masculine singular noun in construct with the suffix "his," meaning literally "offering-of-him," linking the object directly to its owner.
• minChah ("grain offering", H4503G) — feminine singular noun designating a specific category of offering distinct from animal sacrifice, here introduced as an addition to whatever korban the person brings.
• baLul ("mixed", H1101A) — qal passive participle, describing the flour as being in a passive state of "having been mixed," without specifying who performed the mixing.

What the text says

The verse opens with a narrative vav (H9001) connecting it to the preceding conditions in the chapter, followed by hikRiv in the sequential perfect — a form that in Biblical Hebrew continues a chain of instructions rather than describing an isolated event. The subject is hammakRiv, a participle functioning as a substantive ("the one bringing near"), which frames the offerer not as a one-time actor but as someone in the act/role of presenting.

The syntax places korbanO ("his offering") as the object of the verb, directed la-Yehovah ("to Yehovah"). Immediately after, minChah is introduced without a connecting conjunction, functioning almost as an appositional clarification of what accompanies the korban: this grain offering consists of solet ("fine flour", H5560) in the amount of one issaron ("tenth", H6241), described as baLul — a passive participle indicating the flour's mixed state without naming an agent. The measurement of oil is expressed through a construct chain, revi'It ha-Hin ("fourth of the hin"), specifying quantity through a fraction-noun construction rather than a separate adjective.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders hammakRiv ("the one bringing near", H7126) as ὁ προσφέρων ("the one offering"), matching the participle sense but using a Greek term whose semantic range differs slightly from the Hebrew's causative-motion root ("bring near"). The Vulgate uses quicumque immolaverit ("whoever shall have sacrificed"), which shifts the emphasis toward the act of slaughtering/sacrificing rather than the Hebrew's more general "bringing near" or "presenting."