| 11. Linguistic Exegesis The Hebrew verse opens with the sequential imperfect verbs yishme’u {יִשְׁמְעוּ | yiš-mə-ʿû} ‘will hear’ and veyira’un {וְיִרָאוּן | wə-yî-rā-ʾûn} ‘and will fear,’ establishing a temporal-causal progression. The following negative volitive clause velo-yosifu la’asot {וְלֹא־יוֹסִפוּ לַעֲשׂוֹת | wə-lō-ʾ yō-sî-pû la-ʿă-śôṯ} ‘and they will not continue to do’ employs the infinitive construct la’asot {לַעֲשׂוֹת | la-ʿă-śôṯ} ‘to do’ to introduce the prohibited action. The comparative phrase kadavar hara hazeh {כַּדָּבָר הָרַע הַזֶּה | ka-ḏā-var hā-rāʿ ha-z-zeh} ‘as this evil thing’ uses kadavar as a comparative marker, while bekirbekha {בְּקִרְבְּךָ | bə-qir-bê-khā} ‘in your midst’ specifies the communal context. The vav-imperfect sequence conveys anticipated communal response, and the decisive negation in velo-yosifu underscores the absolute ban. The English translation preserves the Hebrew verb sequence, comparative structure, and locative emphasis by rendering the infinitive as a full clause and the prepositional phrase as a locative complement. |