What Does Numbers 34:13 Mean in the King James?
And Moses commanded the children of Israel, saying, This is the land which ye shall inherit by lot, which the LORD commanded to give unto the nine tribes, and to the half tribe:
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 verse joins Moses, the one named “drawn out,” to an allotted inheritance: being brought out opens into receiving a place.
THE MEANING
The land is received as a portion assigned by lot and given at the LORD’s command. Moses’s name carries the image of one drawn out; here that movement stands beside a people receiving a place. For the reader now, inheritance appears as a portion received, not something whose source is the receiver.
THE ROOT
תִּתְנַחֲלוּ
titnachalu
GROWS FROM
נחל
n-ḥ-l
To inherit or possess.
The verb תִּתְנַחֲלוּ (titnachalu, “you shall inherit”) comes from נחל (n-ḥ-l), a root for inheriting or possessing. Its branch נַחֲלָה (naḥalah, “inheritance, possession”) names the received portion, while הִנְחִיל (hinchil, “cause to inherit”) names the act of making someone its recipient; the verse holds allotment and reception together.
ALSO GROWS
naḥalah: Inheritance, possession.
נַחֲלָה
It names the portion that is received as an inheritance.
hinchil: Cause to inherit; hand down as a possession.
הִנְחִיל
It shows the same root describing someone making another a recipient.
לָתֵת
latet
GROWS FROM
נתן
n-t-n
To give, put, or set.
לָתֵת (latet, “to give”) comes from נתן (natan), whose range includes giving, putting, and setting. The related מַתָּן (mattan, “gift”) grows from the same root, so the command to give the land holds giving and gift together: the inheritance is a portion placed into its recipients’ keeping.
ALSO GROWS
natan: Give, put, set.
נָתַן
This is the verb whose infinitive form appears in the verse.
mattan: Gift.
מַתָּן
The related noun makes the gift dimension of the commanded giving visible.
mattanah: Gift, present.
מַתָּנָה
This noun from the same root names what is given.
מֹשֶׁה
Moshe
GROWS FROM
משה
m-sh-h
To draw out, especially from water in the name’s biblical explanation.
“Moses” in this verse is Moshe. The name מֹשֶׁה (Moshe, “drawn out”) is tied in Exodus to מָשָׁה (mashah, “to draw out”). Here the one named for being drawn out speaks of a people receiving a place, linking being brought out with being given a portion.
ALSO GROWS
mashah: Draw out.
מָשָׁה
This is the verb behind the name’s explanation.
meshitihu: I drew him out.
מְשִׁיתִהוּ
This form in Exodus 2:10 explains Moses’s name through the act of drawing him from the water.
THE PATTERN
A portion becomes an inheritance as it is assigned and received, rather than originating in the receiver.
The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise.And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.THE THREAD
Notwithstanding the land shall be divided by lot: according to the names of the tribes of their fathers they shall inherit.Both verses use the root נחל (n-ḥ-l), “inherit or possess”: Numbers 34:13 says the tribes will inherit the land, and this verse joins inheriting directly to division by lot. Together they reveal the lot as the means by which the inheritance becomes each tribe’s portion.
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