Bilangan 14:24

14:24 Only my servant Caleb, because he had a different spirit and has followed me fully – I will bring him into the land where he had gone, and his descendants ¹  will possess it.

Bilangan 16:13

16:13 Is it a small thing ²  that you have brought us up out of the land that flows with milk and honey, ³  to kill us in the wilderness? Now do you want to make yourself a prince ⁴  over us?

Bilangan 27:3

27:3 “Our father died in the wilderness, although ⁵  he was not part of ⁶  the company of those that gathered themselves together against the Lord in the company of Korah; but he died for his own sin, ⁷  and he had no sons.

Bilangan 35:15

35:15 These six towns will be places of refuge for the Israelites, and for the foreigner, and for the settler among them, so that anyone who kills any person accidentally may flee there.

[14:24]  ¹ tn Heb “seed.”

[16:13]  ² tn The question is rhetorical. It was not a small thing to them – it was a big thing.

[16:13]  ³ tn The modern scholar who merely sees these words as belonging to an earlier tradition about going up to the land of Canaan that flows with milk and honey misses the irony here. What is happening is that the text is showing how twisted the thinking of the rebels is. They have turned things completely around. Egypt was the land flowing with milk and honey, not Canaan where they will die. The words of rebellion are seldom original, and always twisted.

[16:13]  ⁴ tn The verb הִשְׂתָּרֵר (histarer) is the Hitpael infinitive absolute that emphasizes the preceding תִשְׂתָּרֵר (tistarer), the Hitpael imperfect tense (both forms having metathesis). The verb means “to rule; to act like a prince; to make oneself a prince.” This is the only occurrence of the reflexive for this verb. The exact nuance is difficult to translate into English. But they are accusing Moses of seizing princely power for himself, perhaps making a sarcastic reference to his former status in Egypt. The rebels here are telling Moses that they had discerned his scheme, and so he could not “hoodwink” them (cf. NEB).

[27:3]  ⁵ tn This clause begins with a vav (ו) on a pronoun, marking it out as a disjunctive vav. In this context it fits best to take it as a circumstantial clause introducing concession.

[27:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “in the midst of.”

[27:3]  ⁷ tn The word order is emphatic: “but in/on account of his own sins he died.”