What Does Numbers 13:21 Mean?
So they went up and scouted out the land, from the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, as men come to Hamath.
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
So they went up, and searched the land from the wilderness of Zin unto Rehob, as men come to Hamath.THE KEY
Here, searching is a going-about, and the route reaches Rehob, a name that carries the sense of a broad place.
THE MEANING
The verse lets you see a stretch of land through a moving search: from Zin’s wilderness toward Rehob and the approach to Hamath. The terrain becomes knowable as it is traversed, its far reach held together in one view. Rehob’s name echoes breadth, giving this search a sense of expanse.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that one fixed vantage is enough to know a place: the search takes in a long stretch, from the wilderness toward Hamath.
THE ROOT
וַיָּתֻרוּ
wayyāturū
GROWS FROM
תּוּר
tûr
To seek out, explore, or go about.
“scouted out” in this verse is wayyāturū. The same verb describes both a survey across the land and eyes going about after desire. The root holds exploration as movement of attention, whether outward across terrain or inward toward what draws the eyes.
ALSO GROWS
lātûr: To explore or search out.
לָתוּר
Numbers 13:16 uses this form for the task of searching the land, showing that the verse’s search is an active survey.
tātûrû: To go about after, or follow.
תָּתוּרוּ
Numbers 15:39 uses this form for going after the heart and eyes, revealing how the same search can follow an inward direction.
רְחֹב
reḥōḇ
GROWS FROM
רָחַב
rāḥaḇ
To be wide or spacious.
The place-name Rehob carries the sense of a broad place, so the route’s reach echoes spaciousness. The land is encountered as an expanse, not as a single point.
ALSO GROWS
reḥōḇ: A broad place, open space, or street.
רְחֹב
This form gives Rehob its name and echoes the breadth of the territory being surveyed.
hirḥîḇ: To widen or enlarge.
הִרְחִיב
This causative form shows the root’s movement toward greater space, deepening the verse’s echo of breadth.
THE PATTERN
A place becomes known through movement across its terrain and approach toward what is seen.
Rise, walk through the land in its length and in its breadth, for I will give it to you.He went before you on the way, circling ahead to find you a place to set your tents, in fire by night to show you the way you should go, and in a cloud by day.He said to them, Come and see. They came and saw where he stayed, and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour.THE THREAD
He went before you on the way, circling ahead to find you a place to set your tents, in fire by night to show you the way you should go, and in a cloud by day.Numbers uses the same verb for the scouts’ search that Deuteronomy uses for the search for a place to camp. The shared root joins exploring the terrain with finding a place to rest and a way forward.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us