What Does Numbers 3:21 Mean?
Of Gershon was the family of the Libnites, and the family of the Shimites; these are the families of the Gershonites.
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
Of Gershon was the family of the Libnites, and the family of the Shimites: these are the families of the Gershonites.THE KEY
These clan labels still carry the meanings of the names beneath them: hearing, whiteness, and a debated echo of being driven out.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks to you as someone whose place in a larger whole can still be named in particular branches. Beneath the clan labels, the names preserve distinct echoes of hearing, whiteness, and, through a debated link, being driven out.
THE ROOT
שִׁמְעִי
Shim‘i
GROWS FROM
שמע
To hear or listen.
The name Shimi is built on the root for hearing, so “Shimites” retains a sound of listening inside the family label. English turns it into a group name and smooths away that echo.
ALSO GROWS
shama: Hear, listen.
שָׁמַע
This is the verb beneath Shimi’s name, making hearing part of the name carried by this branch.
shemuah: A report or news heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
This related form shows how the root of hearing also gives rise to what is heard and passed on.
לִבְנִי
Libni
GROWS FROM
לבן
To be white or become white.
“Libnites” in this verse is Libni. Libni is associated with the root for whiteness, a meaning the English clan label does not show. The name carries that color-image inside the lineage.
ALSO GROWS
lavan: White.
לָבָן
This direct form makes the root meaning audible in the name Libni.
levanah: The moon, literally “the white one.”
לְבָנָה
This related name preserves whiteness as an image rather than an abstract quality.
גֵּרְשׁוֹנִי
Gershoni
GROWS FROM
גרש
To drive out or expel.
“Gershonites” in this verse is Gershoni. Gershon is often connected with this root, though the name’s derivation is not certain. If that echo is heard, the family name holds a trace of being driven out within a lineage that remains named.
ALSO GROWS
garash: To drive out, expel.
גָּרַשׁ
This verb is the proposed source of Gershon’s name and gives the label an echo of displacement.
gerush: Driving out; expulsion.
גֵּרוּשׁ
This noun carries the same root’s sense of being sent away.
THE PATTERN
Scripture keeps belonging legible by naming the generations and branches that carry it.
And the sons of Levi, Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.The sons of Gershon were Libni, and Shimi, according to their families.The book of the origin of Jesus, the anointed one, son of David, son of Abraham.THE THREAD
The sons of Gershon were Libni, and Shimi, according to their families.Exodus gives the names behind Numbers’ clan labels: Libni and Shimi are named as Gershon’s sons, each with a family of their own. Numbers 3:21 compresses that family tree into two group names.
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