Zechariah 5:10

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Then said I to the angel who talked with me, "Where are these carrying the ephah basket?"

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 →

הָאֵיפָֽה

ʼêyphâh

H374

“the · ephah”

Particle, Definite Article + Noun, Common, Feminine, Singular, Absolute

Appears 40× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Exodus 16:36

Full BDB Definition

Origin: of Egyptian derivation

TWOT: 82

ephah - a dry measure of quantity, equal to 3 seahs, 10 omers; the same as the liquid measure bath; (about 9 imperial gallons (40 liters), rabbinical writings give sizes of one-half this amount) - the receptacle for measuring or holding that amount

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 →

10: words
9: distinct lemmas
Prophets: section

Shared distinctive vocabulary

הָאֵיפָֽה ephah H374 occurs in 29 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

3 verbs
2 nouns
1 pronoun
2 prepositions
1 adverb
1 particle

Verb forms

וָאֹמַ֕ר Qal · Sequential Imperfect
הַדֹּבֵ֣ר Qal · Participle Active
מֽוֹלִכ֖וֹת Hiphil · Participle Active

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 17 words from the Hebrew and 17 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — the same length.

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 10 Hebrew tokens and 14 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.

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 Zechariah 5:10 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וָאֹמַ֕ר אֶל הַמַּלְאָ֖ךְ הַדֹּבֵ֣ר בִּ֑י אָ֛נָה הֵ֥מָּה מֽוֹלִכ֖וֹת אֶת הָאֵיפָֽה

Then said I to the angel who talked with me, "Where are these carrying the ephah basket?"

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Zechariah 5:10 Septuagint · lemma form

καί εἶπον πρός ὁ ἄγγελος ὁ λαλέω ἐν ἐγώ ποῦ οὗτος ἀποφέρω ὁ μέτρον

And I said to the angel that spoke with me, Whither do these carry away the measure?

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

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 Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

וַאֲמָרֵית לְמַלְאֲכָא דִמְמַלֵיל עִמִי לְאָן אִינוּן מַגְלַן יַת עַמָא דַהֲווֹ נַסְבִין וְיָהֲבִין בִמְכִילְתָּא דְשִׁקְרָא:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Zechariah 5:10 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 →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

Zec 5:10 Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah?

Ver. 10. Whither do these bear the ephah?] That is, saith Ribera, Quamdiu duratura est populi huius impietas? How long shall this people’s wickedness last? like as Isa 6:10-11, when the prophet had heard, "make the heart of this people fat, and shut their eyes," &c., he cries out, "How long, Lord?" the answer whereunto is the same in effect with this of the angel; until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate; and the Lord have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

Then said I to the angel that talked with me;.... This the prophet said after he had seen the "ephah" come forth; the woman, wickedness, cast into it, and the talent of lead upon her; and the two women lifting up the ephah between heaven and earth:

Whither do these bear the ephah? he neither asks what the ephah signified, nor who were the women that bore it, but only whither they bore it.

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

Matthew Poole's English Annotations

Then, when I saw the ephah, woman imprisoned, and lead too, on the wings of those two women in motion,

said I, Zechariah, Whither, to what place, and how far, do these bear the ephah? not as a nurse carrieth the child, but as criminals are carried to punishment.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Scofield Reference Notes

C. I. Scofield

angel

(See Scofield "Heb 1:4").

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

unfoldingWord translationNotes

Door43 World Missions Community

To build a temple in the land of Shinar for it

The ellipsis can be supplied from the previous verse. AT: "They are taking the basket to the land of Shinar to build a temple for it" (See: Ellipsis)

the basket will be set there

This can be stated in active form. AT: "they will set the basket there" (See: Active or Passive)

on its prepared base

The words "prepared base" refer to a pedestal or other kind of fixture upon which they will place the basket.

translationWords

Shinar

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

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.

Zechariah, in the Prophets, opens this verse with 10 words (9 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is ʼêyphâh (“ephah”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “ephah” (ʼêyphâh) shape what this verse is saying?
How does Exodus 16:36, which shares the word «ephah», read alongside this verse?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
«וָאֹמַ֕ר» is a Qal Sequential Imperfect verb. How does that grammatical form shape the action described?
Compare how Trapp's Complete Commentary and John Gill's Exposition read this verse. Where do they agree or differ?

Things to notice

This verse counts 10 Hebrew ↔ 14 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 10 words in this verse.
9 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 10 words in this verse.