| 7. Linguistic Exegesis The verse begins with ve’ānu {וְעָנוּ | wə-ʿānû} ‘and they shall answer’ followed by ve’āmrū {וְאָמְרוּ | wə-ʾāmə-rū} ‘and they shall say’, introducing the condemned party’s testimony. The parallelism of yādeīnû {יָדֵינוּ | yā-ḏê-nû} ‘our hands’ and wə’ênēnû {וְעֵינֵינוּ | wə-ʿê-nê-nû} ‘and our eyes’ underscores bodily innocence. The negative particle lōʾ {לֹא | lōʾ} precedes both šāpəḵû {שָׁפְכוּ | šāpəḵû} ‘have shed’ and rāʾû {רָאוּ | rāʾû} ‘have seen’, reinforcing denial. The direct object marker ʾet {אֶת־ | ʾet} with haddām {הַדָּם | ha-dām} ‘blood’ specifies the forbidden category, and the demonstrative hazzeh {הַזֶּה | ha-zzeh} ‘this incident’ pinpoints the specific act. This structure employs judicial formula and parallelism to emphasize the claim of innocence. |