What Does Numbers 34:13 Mean?
And Moses commanded the children of Israel, saying, This is the land which you shall take hold of by lot, which the LORD commanded to give to the nine branches and to the half branch.
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 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 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.
“take hold of” in this verse is titnachalu. 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 my share and of my cup; you hold fast my lot.For if the inheritance comes out of instruction, it is no longer out of promise, but God has given it to Abraham by favor, through promise.And for this reason he is the one who stands in the middle of a new covenant, so that, with a death having come for the release from the crossings over under the first covenant, those who are called might take hold of the promise of the inheritance of the ages.THE THREAD
Only by the cast stones shall the land be divided. 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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