What Does Numbers 11:13 Mean in the King James?
Whence should I have flesh to give unto all this people? for they weep unto me, saying, Give us flesh, that we may eat.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The repeated word “give” reveals that being made responsible for a need does not make you its source.
THE MEANING
When people look to you for what they need, the question “from where?” names the limit of what you can supply. The verse lets that limit remain visible instead of pretending the demand itself creates an answer.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being asked to provide means I must somehow possess and produce what others need.
THE ROOT
לָתֵת
latet
GROWS FROM
נתן
To give, put or place, or appoint.
The verse uses two forms of נָתַן (natan, give or place): Moses imagines being the one to give, then the people command, “Give us.” That repetition puts the pressure on who can place food into their hands, not only on the shortage of flesh.
ALSO GROWS
mattanah: Gift or present.
מַתָּנָה
This noun from נתן shows giving from the receiver’s side: what is given can be received as a gift, rather than produced by the person being asked.
natun: Given, assigned, or placed.
נָתוּן
This form makes the root’s sense of placing visible: the question is who can set provision before the people.
THE PATTERN
A demand can expose the limit of human capacity while pointing beyond the person asked to provide.
He answered and said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they say unto him, Shall we go and buy two hundred pennyworth of bread, and give them to eat?So they did eat, and were well filled: for he gave them their own desire;Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God;THE THREAD
And Moses said, This shall be, when the LORD shall give you in the evening flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full; for that the LORD heareth your murmurings which ye murmur against him: and what are we? your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD.The same root, נָתַן (natan, give or place), appears in Moses’s question and in the statement that the LORD gives the flesh. The connection shifts the focus from Moses bearing the supply to the one who places provision into the people’s hands.
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