Deuteronomy 19:10

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

that innocent blood not be shed in the midst of your land, which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance, and so blood be on you.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Download a study sheet

One document with this verse’s original text, its word-by-word gloss line, the meaning frame, cross-references with their text, attributed commentary, and full source and license credits — printable, and it pastes into notes with its structure intact.

This verse Autodidact and up

Study sheet (.html) Plain text (.txt)

A passage Seminary Student

Up to 50 verses in one chapter. A passage sheet keeps up to 6 commentary sources and 12 cross-references per verse, in the order this page ranks them, and says so on the sheet whenever that leaves anything out. Ask for a single verse and you get the Autodidact verse sheet above.

Everything on this page stays free to read, with no account — the sheet is a download of what is already on screen, not access to it.

Want to remove ads? Support Godless Engineer

Word by word

More ways to search: Search by grammar → Find every occurrence → Compare this word →

Practice this passage: Drill this verse → Learn its vocabulary →

נָקִ֔י

nâqîy

H5355

“innocent”

Adjective, Adjective, Masculine, Singular, Absolute

Appears 43× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Genesis 24:41

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H5352

TWOT: 1412a , 1412b

clean, free from, exempt, clear, innocent - free from guilt, clean, innocent - free from punishment - free or exempt from obligations - innocent

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

15: words
13: distinct lemmas
Pentateuch: section

Shared distinctive vocabulary

נָקִ֔י innocent H5355 occurs in 42 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

3 verbs
7 nouns
1 adjective
2 prepositions
2 particles

Verb forms

יִשָּׁפֵךְ֙ Niphal · Imperfect
נֹתֵ֥ן Qal · Participle Active
וְהָיָ֥ה Qal · Sequential Perfect

Repetition

A word recurs within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

דָּ֣ם blood H1818 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 27 words from the Hebrew and 30 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 15 Hebrew tokens and 25 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Deuteronomy 19:10 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Proverbs 6:17 Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, Hands that shed innocent blood;
Isaiah 59:7 Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their paths.
Matthew 27:4–5 saying, "I have sinned in that I betrayed innocent blood." But they said, "What is that to us? You see to it."
Numbers 35:33 So you shall not pollute the land in which you are: for blood, it pollutes the land; and no expiation can be made for the land for the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him who shed it.
Deuteronomy 19:13 Your eye shall not pity him, but you shall put away the innocent blood from Israel, that it may go well with you.
Deuteronomy 21:1–9 If one be found slain in the land which Yahweh your God gives you to possess it, lying in the field, and it isn't known who has struck him;
1 Kings 2:31 The king said to him, Do as he has said, and fall on him, and bury him; that you may take away the blood, which Joab shed without cause, from me and from my father's house.
2 Kings 21:16 Moreover Manasseh shed innocent blood very much, until he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another; besides his sin with which he made Judah to sin, in doing that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh.

2 Kings 24:4 and also for the innocent blood that he shed; for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood: and Yahweh would not pardon.
Jeremiah 7:6–7 if you don't oppress the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, and don't shed innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your own hurt:
Joel 3:19 Egypt will be a desolation, And Edom will be a desolate wilderness, For the violence done to the children of Judah, Because they have shed innocent blood in their land.
Jonah 1:14 Therefore they cried to Yahweh, and said, "We beg you, Yahweh, we beg you, let us not perish for this man's life, and don't lay on us innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you."
Psalms 94:21 They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, And condemn the innocent blood.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Deuteronomy 19:10 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וְלֹ֤א יִשָּׁפֵךְ֙ דָּ֣ם נָקִ֔י בְּקֶ֣רֶב אַרְצְךָ֔ אֲשֶׁר֙ יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לְךָ֖ נַחֲלָ֑ה וְהָיָ֥ה עָלֶ֖יךָ דָּמִֽים

that innocent blood not be shed in the midst of your land, which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance, and so blood be on you.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Deuteronomy 19:10 Septuagint · lemma form

καί οὐ ἐκχέω αἷμα ἀναίτιος ἐν ὁ γῆ σύ ὅς κύριος ὁ θεός σύ δίδωμι σύ ἐν κλῆρος καί οὐ εἰμί ἐν σύ αἷμα ἔνοχος

So innocent blood shall not be spilled in the land, which the Lord your God gives you to inherit, and there shall not be in you one guilty of blood.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

On this verse, The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges discusses the Septuagint’s reading. Read the note in Commentary ↓

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Onkelos Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וְלָא יִשְׁתְּפֵךְ דָם זַכַּי בְּגוֹ אַרְעָךְ דִי יְיָ אֱלָהָךְ יָהֵב לָךְ אַחֲסָנָא וִיהֵי עֲלָךְ חוֹבַת דִין דִקְטוֹל

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Onkelos — Aramaic: “Onkelos Genesis” (public domain); “Onkelos Exodus” (public domain); “Onkelos Leviticus” (public domain); “Onkelos Numbers” (public domain); “Onkelos Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “J.W. Etheridge. The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan Ben Uzziel on the Pentateuch. London: Longmans, Green, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וְלָא יִתְשַׁד אֲדַם זַכַּאי בְּאַרְעֲכוֹן דַּיְיָ אֱלָהָכוֹן יָהֵיב לְכוֹן אַחְסָנָא וִיהֵי עֲלֵיכוֹן חוֹבַת דִּין קָטוֹלָא

that innocent blood may not be shed in your land which the Lord your God giveth you to inherit, and the guilt of the judgment of death may not be upon you.

Targum Pseudo-Jonathan — Aramaic: “Targum Jonathan on Genesis” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Exodus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Leviticus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Numbers” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “The Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel, trans. J. W. Etheridge, London, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Deuteronomy 19:10 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Geneva Bible (1599)

Geneva Bible translators

Lest thou be punished for innocent blood.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

10. that innocent blood be not shed] Cp. Deu_21:8, Deu_27:25 : here the blood of an innocent slayer.

which … for an inheritance] Another standard phrase, om. by Luc., and some LXX Codd.

and so blood be upon thee] Upon the nation as a whole, on the principle of ethical solidarity so often illustrated in D. For the idiom, cp. 1Sa_16:8; for the synon. blood in the midst of Israel, see Deu_21:8.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

But if any man hate his neighbour,.... Has conceived enmity in his heart against him, bears him a mortal hatred, and has formed a scheme in his mind to take away his life:

and lie in wait for him knowing and expecting he will come by in such a way at such a time:

and rise up against him; out of the place where he lay in wait, just at the time he is passing by:

and smite him mortally that he die; or smite him

in soul or life (z); in such a part where life is in danger, and the consequence of it is that he dies:

and fleeth into one of these cities; for shelter from the avenger of blood.

(z) "anima", Montanus, Vatablus.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

The Pulpit Commentary

The design of appointing these cities was to prevent the shedding of innocent blood, which would be the case were the unintentional manslayer killed in revenge by one of the relatives of the man he had slain; in this case the guilt of bloodshed would rest upon the nation if they neglected to provide for the escape of the manslayer.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Deuteronomy, in the Pentateuch, opens this verse with 15 words (13 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is nâqîy (“innocent”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word nâqîy carries the sense “innocent.” How does it shape the verse?
Genesis 24:41 shares the word «innocent» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
“blood” occurs 2× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
These translations render this verse differently; the difference is in the English rendering, not the original. What questions does that raise?
The verb «יִשָּׁפֵךְ֙» is Niphal Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Geneva Bible (1599) and The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 15 Hebrew ↔ 25 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 13 words in this verse.
“blood” occurs 2× in this single verse.
13 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 15 words in this verse.