Numbers 8:22

Summary

Numbers 8:22 reports that, after the preceding purification rites, the Levites entered the Tent of Meeting to carry out their assigned service under the supervision of Aaron and his sons. The verse closes by affirming that this was done exactly as Yehovah had commanded Moses concerning the Levites.

Key words

• ba'u ("they went", H0935G) — qal perfect, third person plural: a completed action, marking the Levites' entry as an accomplished fact rather than an ongoing process.
• la'avod ("to serve", H5647H) — qal infinitive with the preposition la ("to"), expressing purpose: the Levites came in order to serve, not merely to be present.
• avodatam ("their service", H5656H) — feminine singular noun in construct with the suffix "their," tying the abstract noun "service" directly to the Levites as its possessors/performers.
• tzivah ("he had commanded", H6680) — piel perfect, third person masculine singular, of Yehovah: the intensive stem underscores a formal, authoritative act of command, prior in time to the Levites' action (expressed by ka'asher, "as").
• ken ("thus/so", H3651C) — adverb appearing twice in the verse (lines 3 and 32), framing the report: "after thus" ('acharei-khen) opens the verse, and "so they did" (ken 'asu) closes it, creating a structural echo between the command and its execution.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built in two main clauses joined by a comparative structure. The first clause (ve'acharei-khen ba'u halviyyim la'avod et-avodatam be'ohel mo'ed lifnei aharon velifnei vanav) states the action: the Levites (halviyyim, H3881) entered "the tent of meeting" (ohel mo'ed, both nouns in construct forming a fixed phrase) to perform "their service," positioned "before" (lifnei, construct plural of paneh, "face") Aaron and his sons. The repeated construct chain lifnei...velifnei creates a parallel spatial framing, placing the Levitical activity under the visual/supervisory presence of the priestly line twice — first Aaron, then his sons.

The second clause (ka'asher tzivah YHWH et-Mosheh al-halviyyim, ken 'asu lahem) is a classic Biblical Hebrew comparative construction using ka'asher... ken ("as... so"), which frames the entire preceding narrative as compliance with a prior divine directive. The verb tzivah is perfect in the piel stem, denoting a completed authoritative command, while 'asu ("they did", H6213A) is also qal perfect, denoting the completed execution. The grammar thus presents command and execution as two finished, matching actions, with no gap in fulfillment implied by the tense or the ka'asher...ken frame.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders tzivah YHWH et-Mosheh elliptically as "Κύριος τῷ Μωυσῇ περὶ τῶν Λευειτῶν" without an explicit verb of commanding, where the Hebrew has the finite verb tzivah ("he commanded", H6680) governing the object marker 'et before "Moses." The Vulgate supplies "præceperat" ("had commanded"), matching the Hebrew's perfect/command sense more explicitly than the LXX's elliptical phrasing.