Numbers 27:22

Summary

Numbers 27:22 narrates Moses' compliance with Yehovah's instruction: he takes Joshua and makes him stand before Eleazar the priest and the entire congregation. The verse is structured as a sequence of three narrative actions performed by Moses.

Key words

• va-yya'as ("and he did", H6213A) — qal narrative form opening the verse; establishes Moses as the acting subject in the wayyiqtol chain that drives the story forward.
• ka'asher ("just as", H0834D) — relative particle combined with the preposition ka ("just", H9004), introducing the standard of comparison: Moses' action matches a prior command exactly.
• tzivvah ("he had commanded", H6680) — piel perfect of the same root used elsewhere for divine commands; the piel stem intensifies the verb, marking authoritative instruction; the perfect aspect places this command as completed prior to Moses' action.
• va-ya'amiDehu ("and he made him stand", H5975G) — hiphil narrative form with 3ms suffix hu ("him"); the hiphil (causative) stem shows Moses causing Joshua to stand, not merely Joshua standing on his own.
• li-fnei ("before", H6440G) — construct plural noun panim ("face/presence") governed by the preposition li; literally "to the face of," a common Hebrew idiom for spatial/social presence before someone.

What the text says

The verse opens with a narrative vav-consecutive chain typical of Biblical Hebrew storytelling: va-yya'as ("and he did"), va-yyiqqach ("and he took"), va-ya'amidehu ("and he made him stand") — three sequential completed actions by Moses. The first clause, va-yya'as Mosheh ka'asher tzivvah Yehovah oto ("and Moses did just as Yehovah had commanded him"), uses the object marker oto (H0853+H9033, "him") to specify that the command was directed at Moses personally. The piel perfect tzivvah denotes a prior completed command, syntactically subordinated to the main narrative action by ka'asher.

The second and third clauses report the content of that obedience: Moses "takes" (yiqqach, qal) Joshua, then "makes him stand" (ya'amidehu, hiphil) before Eleazar and the congregation. The hiphil stem of 'amad ("to stand", H5975G) is grammatically significant: it marks Joshua's standing as caused by Moses' action rather than as Joshua's own initiative. The repeated preposition li-fnei ("before," literally "to the face of") occurs twice, once for Eleazar the priest and once for "all the congregation" (kol ha-'edah), both governed by the same construct noun panim, placing Joshua's presentation in parallel spatial relation to both parties.

Differences between versions

The LXX and Vulgate follow the Hebrew sequence closely, but the LXX (Swete) adds material not present in the Hebrew of this verse: καὶ ἐπέθηκεν τὰς χεῖρας αὐτοῦ ἐπ' αὐτόν, καὶ συνέστησεν αὐτόν, καθάπερ συνέταξεν κύριος τῷ Μωυσῇ ("and he laid his hands upon him, and he commissioned him, just as the Lord instructed Moses"). This additional clause about hand-laying is not represented in the Hebrew word list provided for this verse. The Vulgate's statuit eum ("he set him") and the Hebrew's ya'amidehu ("he made him stand") both convey a causative placement, though the Vulgate uses statuere rather than a verb built on "standing."