What Does Numbers 12:9 Mean?
And the burning of the LORD's anger flared against them, and he went away.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And the anger of the LORD was kindled against them; and he departed.THE KEY
The anger is embodied as heat at the nostrils, and the sentence ends in movement: the LORD goes away.
THE MEANING
You meet anger and departure in the same frame: the heat is directed against them, and the LORD departs. Anger has relational force here; it changes the scene. The sentence leaves the departure unexplained.
THE ROOT
אַף
af
GROWS FROM
אף
Nose or nostril; also anger or heat at the nostrils.
“the burning of the LORD's anger flared” in this verse is af. Af names both the nose and anger, keeping the image of heat at the nostrils inside the emotion expressed by the word. Here, that heat is followed by an unmistakable relational action: the LORD goes away.
ALSO GROWS
appayim: Nostrils; in idioms, anger.
אַפַּיִם
In the phrase rendered “slow to anger,” this form keeps the physical image of the nostrils within the expression of anger.
be’appo: In his nose; in his anger.
בְּאַפּוֹ
This inflected form carries the same nose-and-anger image into descriptions of anger, preserving the bodily language behind the verse.
וַיֵּלֶךְ
wayyelekh
GROWS FROM
הלך
Walk, go, move along.
“went away” in this verse is wayyelekh. The closing verb carries actual motion: the LORD goes away. The root keeps departure concrete as a going, rather than leaving it as an abstract change of state.
ALSO GROWS
halakh: To walk; to go.
הָלַךְ
This is the root verb behind the verse’s final movement.
mahalakh: A going, course, or movement.
מַהֲלָךְ
This noun from the same root keeps the idea of departure in the realm of movement through a scene.
THE PATTERN
Scripture makes anger’s force visible in what follows: speech, action, or withdrawal.
And the burning of the LORD's anger flared against Moses, and he said, Is not Aaron the Levite your brother? I know that he speaks well. And also, behold, he is going out to meet you, and when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart.The burning of the LORD's anger flared against his people, and he recoiled from his inheritance.And when he had looked around at them with swelling anger, pained together over the stoniness of their hearts, he said to the man, Stretch out your hand. And he stretched it out, and his hand was set back in place, whole as the other.THE THREAD
And the burning of the LORD's anger flared against Moses, and he said, Is not Aaron the Levite your brother? I know that he speaks well. And also, behold, he is going out to meet you, and when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart.Numbers 12:9 and Exodus 4:14 use the same Hebrew expression for the LORD’s kindled anger, with אַף (af, nose or anger) at its center. In Exodus, speech and Aaron’s approach follow; here, departure follows, making the difference in what comes next stand out.
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