Deuteronomy 16 — Hebrew and Greek compared
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Same 2 Similar 3 Different 10 Divergent 3 Disparate 4
Disparate in this chapter: 16:7, 16:8, 16:10, 16:15
Each verse is rendered independently from the Hebrew (Rabbinic reading tradition) and from the Greek (Saints reading tradition). The badge classifies the relationship between the two readings; the note beneath records the source document’s comparison and attributed interpretation. Each column retains its own verse references where numbering differs.
The Passover and Unleavened Bread
16:1 Divergent
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:1 Observe the month of Abib and celebrate Passover for YHWH your God, for in the month of Abib YHWH your God brought you out of Egypt by night.
Greek · Saints priority
16:1 Observe the month of new produce and celebrate Passover for the Lord your God, for in the month of new produce you came out of Egypt by night.
Greek renders the month-name descriptively and says you came out, omitting the explicit divine-agent clause. The addressee, not the Lord, is the Greek subject of came out. In this context the omission does not deny the divine deliverance repeatedly affirmed elsewhere in the speech.
16:2 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:2 Sacrifice the Passover to YHWH your God from the flocks and cattle at the place YHWH will choose to make His name dwell there.
Greek · Saints priority
16:2 Sacrifice the Passover to the Lord your God, sheep and cattle, at the place the Lord your God will choose for His name to be invoked there.
Greek adds your God in the place-selection clause and uses invocation rather than dwelling of the name. Both retain cattle alongside flock animals.
16:3 Similar
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:3 Do not eat leavened food with it. For seven days eat unleavened bread with it, bread of affliction, because you came out of the land of Egypt in haste, so that you may remember the day you left the land of Egypt all the days of your life.
Greek · Saints priority
16:3 Do not eat leaven with it. For seven days eat unleavened bread with it, bread of affliction, because you came out of Egypt in haste, so that you may remember the day of your departure from the land of Egypt all the days of your life.
Greek first says Egypt without land and uses a collective plural address in the recollection. The festival's duration and memorial purpose agree.
16:4 Same
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:4 No leaven shall be seen with you anywhere in your territory for seven days, and none of the meat you sacrifice on the evening of the first day shall remain overnight until morning.
Greek · Saints priority
16:4 No leaven shall be seen with you anywhere in your boundaries for seven days, and none of the meat you sacrifice on the evening of the first day shall remain overnight until morning.
The leaven and overnight-meat prohibitions agree.
16:5 Similar
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:5 You may not sacrifice the Passover within any of your gates that YHWH your God is giving you.
Greek · Saints priority
16:5 You may not sacrifice the Passover in any of your cities that the Lord your God is giving you.
Greek renders the local gates idiom as cities; the restriction agrees.
16:6 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:6 Sacrifice the Passover only at the place YHWH your God will choose to make His name dwell there, in the evening at sunset, at the appointed time of your departure from Egypt.
Greek · Saints priority
16:6 Sacrifice the Passover only at the place the Lord your God will choose for His name to be invoked there, in the evening at sunset, at the time of your departure from Egypt.
The recurring distinction between the name's dwelling and invocation remains visible; time and location restrictions otherwise agree.
16:7 Disparate
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:7 Cook it and eat it at the place YHWH your God will choose; in the morning turn back and go to your tents.
Greek · Saints priority
16:7 Boil it, roast it, and eat it at the place the Lord your God will choose; in the morning turn back and go to your houses.
Hebrew has one cooking verb, bashal, often used for boiling but rendered broadly here. Greek explicitly has both boil and roast, and houses instead of tents. Neither cooking instruction is silently harmonized to Exodus 12.
16:8 Disparate
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:8 Eat unleavened bread for six days; on the seventh day hold a solemn assembly for YHWH your God. Do no work.
Greek · Saints priority
16:8 Eat unleavened bread for six days; on the seventh day hold a concluding celebration, a feast for the Lord your God. Do no work on it except what is done for a person's needs.
Greek expressly permits work for a person’s needs, whereas this Hebrew verse contains no exception. Food preparation is relevant in the festival-meal context, but eating is not an explicit word in the Greek exception. The permission is not restricted to emergency lifesaving. Greek also identifies the seventh day as a concluding feast.
The Feast of Weeks
16:9 Divergent
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:9 Count seven weeks for yourself; begin counting the seven weeks when the sickle first cuts the standing grain.
Greek · Saints priority
16:9 Count seven complete weeks for yourself; begin counting seven weeks when you first put the sickle to the harvest.
Greek adds complete to the first seven-week command.
16:10 Disparate
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:10 Celebrate the Feast of Weeks for YHWH your God with a voluntary contribution from your hand, which you give according to the blessing YHWH your God grants you.
Greek · Saints priority
16:10 Celebrate the Feast of Weeks for the Lord your God according to your hand's ability, whatever He gives you, as the Lord your God has blessed you.
Hebrew expressly names the voluntary offering that you give; Greek describes your capacity and what He gives you. The direction of giving and the offering terminology differ.
16:11 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:11 Rejoice before YHWH your God, you, your son and daughter, your male and female slaves, the Levite within your gates, and the resident alien, orphan, and widow among you, at the place YHWH your God will choose to make His name dwell there.
Greek · Saints priority
16:11 Rejoice before the Lord your God, you, your son and daughter, your male and female slaves, the Levite in your cities, and the newcomer, orphan, and widow among you, at the place the Lord your God will choose for His name to be invoked there.
Both include the same beneficiary groups; the place formula again differs between dwelling and invocation of the name.
16:12 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:12 Remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and keep and practice these statutes.
Greek · Saints priority
16:12 Remember that you were a household slave in the land of Egypt, and keep and practice these commandments.
Greek adds land, specifies household slavery, and uses commandments rather than statutes.
The Feast of Tabernacles
16:13 Similar
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:13 Celebrate the Feast of Booths for seven days when you gather in from your threshing floor and winepress.
Greek · Saints priority
16:13 Celebrate the Feast of Tents for seven days when you gather in from your threshing floor and winepress.
Greek skēnai denotes tents or temporary shelters, corresponding here to Hebrew booths. The harvest and duration agree.
16:14 Same
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:14 Rejoice at your feast, you, your son and daughter, your male and female slaves, and the Levite, resident alien, orphan, and widow within your gates.
Greek · Saints priority
16:14 Rejoice at your feast, you, your son and daughter, your male and female slaves, and the Levite, newcomer, orphan, and widow in your cities.
Both include the full household and the same socially vulnerable groups.
16:15 Disparate
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:15 Celebrate the feast for YHWH your God seven days at the place YHWH will choose, because YHWH your God will bless you in all your produce and all the work of your hands, and you shall be wholly joyful.
Greek · Saints priority
16:15 Celebrate the feast for the Lord your God seven days at the place the Lord your God will choose for Himself. If the Lord your God blesses you in all your produce and all the work of your hands, then you shall rejoice.
Greek makes the blessing conditional with if and the rejoicing its consequence; Hebrew gives the blessing as the reason and emphasizes complete joy. Greek also expands the place-selection title.
Centralized Worship and Justice
16:16 Divergent
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:16 Three times a year all your males shall appear before YHWH your God at the place He will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Booths. They shall not appear before YHWH empty-handed.
Greek · Saints priority
16:16 Three times a year every male among you shall appear before the Lord your God at the place the Lord will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tent-pitching. Do not appear before the Lord your God empty-handed.
Greek names the Lord in the selection clause, adds your God to the final warning, and directly addresses the worshipper there. All three annual appearances agree.
16:17 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:17 Each shall give according to the gift of his hand, according to the blessing YHWH your God has given you.
Greek · Saints priority
16:17 Each shall give according to the ability of your hands, according to the blessing the Lord your God has given you.
Greek makes ability explicit where Hebrew speaks of the hand's gift; it also uses plural your hands.
16:18 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:18 Appoint judges and officers within all your gates that YHWH your God is giving you, for your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.
Greek · Saints priority
16:18 Appoint judges and recording officials in all your cities that the Lord your God is giving you, tribe by tribe, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.
Greek specifies recording officials where Hebrew has officers, clarifying their administrative role; the judicial obligation agrees.
Rabbinic: Rashi distinguishes judges who decide cases from officials who enforce their decisions; appointments must include expertise and uprightness.
Source: Rashi on Deuteronomy 16:18
16:19 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:19 Do not bend justice, show partiality, or accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous.
Greek · Saints priority
16:19 They shall not bend justice, show partiality, or accept a bribe, for bribes blind the eyes of the wise and nullify the words of the righteous.
Greek assigns the prohibitions to the appointed officials, they, rather than the Hebrew you, and describes the effect as nullifying rather than twisting righteous words. Both require impartial judgment from those administering it. Greek δῶρον here means a bribe; it is not a general prohibition of every gift.
Rabbinic: Rashi extends impartiality to how litigants are treated while speaking and prohibits a bribe even when the judge intends a just verdict.
Source: Rashi on Deuteronomy 16:19
16:20 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:20 Justice, justice you shall pursue, so that you may live and possess the land YHWH your God is giving you.
Greek · Saints priority
16:20 Pursue what is just justly, so that you may live and enter and inherit the land the Lord your God is giving you.
Greek turns the doubled justice into pursuing what is just justly, explicitly describing the manner, and adds entry into the land. This makes just means explicit while retaining the shared obligation to pursue justice. The Hebrew repetition does not establish permission to use unjust means.
16:21 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:21 Do not plant for yourself an Asherah, any tree, beside the altar of YHWH your God that you make for yourself.
Greek · Saints priority
16:21 Do not plant for yourself a sacred grove, any tree, beside the altar of the Lord your God that you make for yourself.
Greek uses sacred grove where Hebrew names the Asherah cult object; both also state any tree beside the altar.
16:22 Different
Hebrew · Rabbinic priority
16:22 Do not set up for yourself a sacred pillar, which YHWH your God hates.
Greek · Saints priority
16:22 Do not set up for yourself a sacred pillar, things the Lord your God hated.
Greek's plural things can look back over both prohibited cult installations, whereas Hebrew's relative clause is singular. The hatred verb is also past in Greek.
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Saints Translation · Companion comparison edition · working draft awaiting specialist review.