Numbers 7:82

Summary

This verse lists a single item within the offerings brought by a tribal leader (in context, part of the twelve-day dedication offerings for the tabernacle): one male goat designated as a sin offering. The clause is short and formulaic, matching the repeated pattern used throughout Numbers 7 for each tribal leader's gift.

Key words

• se.'ir ("a male goat of", H8163B) — construct form, meaning it must be joined to the following noun; it cannot stand alone but requires "goats" to complete its sense as "male goat of goats."
• 'i.Zim ("goats", H5795) — masculine plural, the noun completing the construct chain; together with se.'ir it forms the specific phrase "male goat of the goats," i.e., a male goat from the goat flock.
• 'e.Chad ("one", H0259) — cardinal number; grammatically feminine, though attached here to a masculine phrase, functioning to specify quantity ("one" male goat).
• le. ("to", H9005) — inseparable preposition prefixed to the following noun, marking purpose or destination ("for/toward").
• cha.Tat ("a sin offering", H2403H) — feminine singular noun naming the category of offering; combined with the preposition le., it indicates the goat's designated function.

What the text says

The Hebrew clause consists of a construct chain (se.'ir 'i.Zim, "male goat of goats") followed by the number 'e.Chad ("one") and the prepositional phrase le.cha.Tat ("for a sin offering"). The construct chain is a common Hebrew way of specifying a subtype within a category — here, distinguishing the male goat from other animals within the broader class of "goats." The numeral 'e.Chad follows the noun it modifies, as is typical in Hebrew numeral syntax, confirming that exactly one animal is designated. The final phrase le.cha.Tat attaches the purpose of the offering directly to the noun phrase, without a verb, since the clause functions as an inventory-style listing rather than a full narrative sentence. This clipped, listing style — noun phrase plus purpose phrase, no verb — is consistent with the repetitive structure of the surrounding verses in Numbers 7, where each offering item is named similarly.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders the construct phrase se.'ir 'i.Zim ("male goat of goats") as χίμαρον ἐξ αἰγῶν ("a young goat from among the goats"), using a prepositional phrase (ἐξ αἰγῶν, "from goats") rather than a direct construct-genitive equivalent, which slightly shifts the phrase from "a male goat of the goat-kind" to "one taken from the goats." The Vulgate simplifies this to hircum ("male goat") without any equivalent to the "of goats" specification, and it also omits an explicit rendering of 'e.Chad ("one") as a separate numeral, incorporating the idea of singularity implicitly rather than lexically. The Spanish and English translations (RV1909, BSB, SBLIBRE) follow the Hebrew sense closely, rendering it simply as "one male goat for a sin offering" without reproducing the construct-chain structure.