| 11. Linguistic Exegesis The clause opens with the wayyiqtol vayyaaseh {וַיַּֽעַשֶֽׂ{m}ה | wăyyāʿăśeh} ‘and he did,’ moving the narrative forward with a standard royal-evaluation formula. The object hara {הָרַ֖ע | hārāʿ} ‘the evil’ is definite, portraying the wrongdoing as a known category rather than an isolated mistake. The prepositional phrase beene Yahweh {בְּעֵינֵ֣י יְהוָ֑ה | bəʿēnê Yə-hō-wāh} ‘in the eyes of the LORD’ frames the assessment as divine appraisal, not merely political failure. The negated perfect lo sar {לֹ֣א סָ֠ר | lōʾ sār} ‘he did not turn aside’ expresses settled persistence: a completed-state verb under negation describes an enduring refusal to change course. The chain mikkol-chattoot yarovam ben-nevat {מִכָּל־חַטֹּ֞אות יָרָבְעָ֧ם בֶּן־נְבָ֛ט | mik-kōl-ḥaṭṭōʾōṯ yārāḇəʿām ben-nəḇāṭ} links the king’s behavior to an earlier paradigm of apostasy, while the relative clause asher-hecheti {אֲשֶׁר־הֶחֱטִ֥יא | ʾăšer heḥĕṭîʾ} ‘who caused to sin’ uses Hiphil causation to present Jeroboam as an active instigator of national sin. The closing bāh halakh {בָּ֥הּ הָלָֽךְ | bāh hālaḵ} ‘in it he walked’ employs the Hebrew “walk” idiom for an ongoing lifestyle; the feminine singular bāh functions as a resumptive reference to the sinful course as a unified way, which English can render with “in it” or “in that path” to keep the discourse cohesion. |