Numbers 3:16

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Moses numbered them according to the word of Yahweh, as he was commanded.

World English Bible · Public Domain

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וַיִּפְקֹ֥ד

pâqad

H6485

“and · to visit”

Conjunction + Verb, Qal, Sequential Imperfect, 3rd Person, Masculine, Singular

Appears 304× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Genesis 21:1

Full BDB Definition

Origin: a primitive root

TWOT: 1802

to attend to, muster, number, reckon, visit, punish, appoint, look after, care for (verb) - (Qal) - to pay attention to, observe - to attend to - to seek, look about for - to seek in vain, need, miss, lack - to visit - to visit upon, punish - to pass in review, muster, number - to appoint, assign, lay upon as a charge, deposit - (Niphal) - to be sought, be needed, be missed, be lacking - to be visited - to be visited upon - to be appointed - to be watched over - (Piel) to muster, call up - (Pual) to be passed in review, be caused to miss, be called, be called to account - (Hiphil) - to set over, make overseer, appoint an overseer - to commit, entrust, commit for care, deposit - (Hophal) - to be visited - to be deposited - to be made overseer, be entrusted - (Hithpael) numbered - (Hothpael) numbered - musterings, expenses (noun masculine plural abstract)

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

8: words
8: distinct lemmas
Pentateuch: section

Grammatical profile

2 verbs
3 nouns
1 preposition
2 particles

Verb forms

וַיִּפְקֹ֥ד Qal · Sequential Imperfect
צֻוָּֽה Pual · Perfect

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 13 words from the Hebrew and 17 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 8 Hebrew tokens and 14 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Numbers 3:16 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Numbers 3:39 All who were numbered of the Levites, whom Moses and Aaron numbered at the commandment of Yahweh, by their families, all the males from a month old and upward, were twenty-two thousand.
Numbers 4:37 These are those who were numbered of the families of the Kohathites, all who served in the Tent of Meeting, whom Moses and Aaron numbered according to the commandment of Yahweh by Moses.
Numbers 3:51 and Moses gave the redemption money to Aaron and to his sons, according to the word of Yahweh, as Yahweh commanded Moses.
Numbers 4:27 At the commandment of Aaron and his sons shall be all the service of the sons of the Gershonites, in all their burden, and in all their service; and you shall appoint to them in charge all their burden.
Numbers 4:41 These are those who were numbered of the families of the sons of Gershon, all who served in the Tent of Meeting, whom Moses and Aaron numbered according to the commandment of Yahweh.
Numbers 4:45 These are those who were numbered of the families of the sons of Merari, whom Moses and Aaron numbered according to the commandment of Yahweh by Moses.
Numbers 4:49 According to the commandment of Yahweh they were numbered by Moses, everyone according to his service, and according to his burden. Thus were they numbered by him, as Yahweh commanded Moses.
Deuteronomy 21:5 The priests the sons of Levi shall come near; for them Yahweh your God has chosen to minister to him, and to bless in the name of Yahweh; and according to their word shall every controversy and every stroke be.

Genesis 45:21 The sons of Israel did so. Joseph gave them wagons, according to the commandment of Pharaoh, and gave them provision for the way.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Numbers 3:16 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וַיִּפְקֹ֥ד אֹתָ֛ם מֹשֶׁ֖ה עַל פִּ֣י יְהוָ֑ה כַּאֲשֶׁ֖ר צֻוָּֽה

Moses numbered them according to the word of Yahweh, as he was commanded.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Numbers 3:16 Septuagint · lemma form

καί ἐπισκέπτω αὐτός μωυσῆς καί ἀαρών διά φωνή κύριος ὅς τρόπος συντάσσω αὐτός κύριος

And Moses and Aaron numbered them by the word of the Lord, as the Lord commanded them.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Onkelos Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וּמְנָא יָתְהוֹן משֶׁה עַל מֵימְרָא דַיְיָ כְּמָא דְאִתְפַּקָד

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Onkelos — Aramaic: “Onkelos Genesis” (public domain); “Onkelos Exodus” (public domain); “Onkelos Leviticus” (public domain); “Onkelos Numbers” (public domain); “Onkelos Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “J.W. Etheridge. The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan Ben Uzziel on the Pentateuch. London: Longmans, Green, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan Torah (Genesis–Deuteronomy)

וּמְנָא יַתְהוֹן משֶׁה עַל פּוּם מֵימְרָא דַיְיָ הֵיכְמָא דְאִתְפָּקֵד

Moses therefore numbered them according to the mouth of the Word of the Lord, as he had been commanded.

Targum Pseudo-Jonathan — Aramaic: “Targum Jonathan on Genesis” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Exodus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Leviticus” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Numbers” (public domain); “Targum Jonathan on Deuteronomy” (public domain). English: “The Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel, trans. J. W. Etheridge, London, 1862” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Numbers 3:16 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Adam Clarke's Commentary

Verse 16. Moses numbered them] Though Moses and Aaron conjointly numbered the twelve tribes, yet Moses alone numbered the Levites; "for as the money with which the first-born of Israel, who exceeded the number of Levites, were redeemed, was to be paid to Aaron and his sons, Nu 3:48, it was decent that he, whose advantage it was that the number of the first-born of Israel should exceed, should not be authorized to take that number himself." - Dodd, from Bishop Kidder.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

John Gill's Exposition

And Moses numbered them according to the word of the Lord,.... Took the account of all of a month old in the several houses and families of the tribe of Levi; though Moses is only here mentioned, yet it seems from Num 3:39; that Aaron was concerned with him in it; yea, in an after numbering of the Levites who were fit for business from thirty to fifty years of age, the chief of the children of Israel were assisting to him and Aaron, Num 4:46,

as he commanded; he was obedient to the divine will in all things, and so in this, though it was his own tribe and his own posterity, which in all successive ages were to be no other than ministering servants to the priests, and to have no inheritance in the land of Israel.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Rashi

Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (Rashi)

על פי ה׳ [AND MOSES NUMBERED THEM] ACCORDING TO THE WORD OF THE LORD — Moses said to the Holy One, blessed be He, “How can I enter their tents to ascertain the number of their babes?!” Thereupon the Holy One, blessed be He, replied to him, “You do your share and I will do Mine!’ Moses accordingly went and stationed himself at the entrance of each tent, the Shechinah having gone there beforehand, and a divine voice issued from the tent, saying, “So-and-so many babes are in this tent”. It is on this account that it states, “[and Moses numbered them] according to the word (by the mouth) of the Lord” (Numbers Rabbah 3 9).

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Numbers, in the Pentateuch, opens this verse with 8 words (8 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is pâqad (“to visit”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word pâqad carries the sense “to visit.” How does it shape the verse?
Numbers 3:39 shares this passage’s theme. How do the two illuminate each other?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «וַיִּפְקֹ֥ד» is Qal Sequential Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Adam Clarke's Commentary and John Gill's Exposition read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 8 Hebrew ↔ 14 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 9 words in this verse.
8 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 8 words in this verse.