What Does Numbers 31:37 Mean?
And the LORD's tribute of the sheep was six hundred seventy-five.
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 LORD’s tribute of the sheep was six hundred and threescore and fifteen.THE KEY
The word for tribute belongs to the language of counting: what is set apart for the LORD becomes visible by its measure.
THE MEANING
The LORD’s portion appears as an exact count: 675 sheep. What is set apart has a visible place within the whole, rather than remaining an abstract claim.
THE ROOT
מֶכֶס
mekes
GROWS FROM
כָּסַס
To reckon, count, or assess.
The word belongs to a counting and assessment family, so tribute carries the sense of an apportioned share. In Exodus, the same word family counts people to determine a lamb-sized portion; here it names the share set apart for the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
mikhṣat: number, count, or assessed amount
מִכְסַת
In Exodus 12:4, the lamb is apportioned according to the number of people; the branch shows the root measuring a share.
takossu: you shall count or reckon
תָּכֹסּוּ
Also in Exodus 12:4, this verb describes making the count for the lamb, connecting tribute with deliberate reckoning.
THE PATTERN
A share set apart becomes visible through measured allocation.
And concerning the tenth of the herd or of the flock, even of whatever passes under the rod, the tenth is set apart to the LORD.Give the LORD weight with your wealth, and with the first of all your yield.On the first day of the week, let each of you lay something by at his own side, storing it up, as his way has gone well for him, so that no gatherings are made when I come.THE THREAD
And if the house is too small for the lamb, then he and his neighbor beside his house will take it according to the count of living souls. Each man, according to the mouth of his eating, you will count toward the lamb.The word family behind “tribute” appears here in the count of people and the reckoning of a lamb portion. The same counting language connects a measured share for a household with the sheep counted as a share for the LORD.
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