Numbers 7:52

Summary

The verse lists a single component of the offering brought by the leader of a tribe (in this section of Numbers 7, part of the repeated formula for each tribal chief's gift): one male goat designated as a sin offering. The clause is brief and formulaic, consisting of only two grammatical units.

Key words

• se'ir ("a male goat of", H8163B) — masculine singular noun in construct state, meaning it must be linked to the following word to form the phrase "male goat of goats."
• 'izzim ("goats", H5795) — masculine plural noun, the absolute form completing the construct chain begun by se'ir; together they specify the animal as a goat from the goat-kind (as opposed to sheep or cattle).
• 'echad ("one", H0259) — cardinal number, feminine singular in form despite modifying a masculine noun in this list's grammatical pattern; it specifies the quantity as a single animal.
• le ("to", H9005) — preposition prefixed to the following noun, indicating purpose or designation ("for" or "as").
• chattat ("a sin offering", H2403H) — feminine singular noun naming the ritual category to which the animal is assigned.

What the text says

The Hebrew clause is built from a construct chain, se'ir 'izzim ("male goat of goats"), followed by the numeral 'echad ("one") and the prepositional phrase le-chattat ("for a sin offering"). The construct chain is a common Biblical Hebrew way of specifying species: se'ir alone means "male goat," and adding 'izzim in construct clarifies that this goat belongs to the goat category, distinguishing it from similar terms used for sheep or lambs elsewhere in the same list.

The numeral 'echad appears in feminine singular form, which is grammatically unusual since it modifies the masculine noun se'ir. This reflects a known pattern in these list-formulas within Numbers 7, where the numeral's gender does not consistently match the noun it quantifies. The final element, the preposition le attached to chattat, indicates the ritual function assigned to the animal — it is designated "for" or "as" a sin offering, a category name derived from the root meaning "to sin" or "to miss the mark." The verse itself contains no verb; it is a nominal list entry, continuing the enumeration of offering items typical of this chapter's repeated tribal-donation formula.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the construct phrase se'ir 'izzim with chimaron ex aigōn ("a young goat from goats"), using a prepositional phrase (ex aigōn) rather than a construct chain to express the same specification found in the Hebrew. The Vulgate simplifies this to hircum ("male goat") alone, omitting an explicit second term for "goats" and rendering chattat as pro peccato ("for sin"), a slightly more general phrase than the Hebrew's technical term "sin offering."