What Does Numbers 31:2 Mean in the King James?
Avenge the children of Israel of the Midianites: afterward shalt thou be gathered unto thy people.
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 Hebrew says “avenge the vengeance,” binding the act of requital to the one commanded, then placing his death after it.
THE MEANING
This verse meets you with an unsoftened command for violent requital, followed by the addressed person’s gathering to his people. It holds the act and the actor’s mortality in one sentence: the violence is not separated from the death that follows it.
THE ROOT
נְקֹם
neqom
GROWS FROM
נ־ק־ם
n-q-m
To exact requital; to avenge.
The Hebrew pairs the command נְקֹם (neqom, “avenge”) with נִקְמַת (niqmat, “vengeance”), repeating the same root as verb and object. This binds the commanded act to the requital it carries out, rather than leaving vengeance as an abstract feeling.
ALSO GROWS
nāqām: Vengeance, requital.
נָקָם
This noun names the claim enacted by the command in the verse.
niqmāh: Vengeance, the act of requiting.
נִקְמָה
It shares the root that appears in the verse’s paired command and object.
nōqēm: Avenger; one who exacts requital.
נֹקֵם
This branch makes visible the person who carries out the act.
תֵּאָסֵף
te’asef
GROWS FROM
א־ס־ף
ʾ-s-p
To gather, collect, or take in.
The passive form תֵּאָסֵף (te’asef, “you will be gathered”) comes from the root אָסַף (ʾāsap, “gather, collect”). Here, death is phrased as being gathered to one’s people, so the end of the one carrying out the command follows directly after the act.
ALSO GROWS
ʾāsap: Gather, collect, take in.
אָסַף
This is the root verb behind the verse’s image of being gathered to one’s people.
ʾāsîp: Ingathering, harvest.
אָסִיף
It shows the same root describing a collection brought in, echoing the verse’s language of gathering.
THE PATTERN
The biblical language of vengeance names who may claim it: some passages command a specific act, while others forbid personal vengeance and assign repayment to the LORD.
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste.Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.THE THREAD
To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste.Numbers repeats the נ־ק־ם (n-q-m, “avenge; vengeance”) root in both the command and its object; Deuteronomy says this vengeance belongs to the LORD. Together, the verses bind the violence of the command to the question of who holds the claim to requital.
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