Deuteronomy 3:11

Summary

The verse explains that Og, king of Bashan, was the last survivor of the Rephaim, and offers physical proof: his iron bed (or sarcophagus), located in Rabbah of the Ammonites, measured nine cubits long and four cubits wide, using the standard human cubit as reference.

Key words

• nish'ar ("he survived", H7604) — Niphal perfect verb; the Niphal stem marks Og as the one "left remaining" (passive/reflexive nuance), the sole survivor of a group rather than an active agent.
• Refa'im ("Rephaites", H7497B) — masculine plural gentilic noun; designates a named people-group, here presented as extinct except for Og.
• 'eres ("sarcophagus/bed", H6210) — feminine singular noun in construct form (appearing twice: arso "his ereṣ" and ereṣ barzel "an ereṣ of iron"), forming a construct chain that specifies the material.
• ba'amat-'ish ("by the cubit of a man", H0520A + H0376G) — construct phrase specifying the unit of measurement as the ordinary human cubit, distinguishing it from other possible standards.
• ha-lo ("is it not?", H9008 + H3808) — interrogative particle combined with negation, forming a rhetorical question embedded in the description.

What the text says

The verse opens with the subordinating particle ki ("for", H3588A) reinforced by rak ("only", H7535), together framing Og as an exceptional case — the sole remaining member of the Rephaim, expressed through nish'ar ("he survived", H7604), a Niphal perfect verb. This grammatical form presents Og's survival as a completed state rather than an ongoing action, and the passive/reflexive character of the Niphal suggests he was "left over" rather than the subject of any deliberate act.

The core description of the bed uses a double construct chain: arso ("his sarcophagus", combining H6210 with the suffix H9023) followed by ereṣ barzel ("a sarcophagus of iron", H6210 + H1270). This repetition of the same noun in construct form emphasizes the material composition — iron — as the notable feature. The interrogative ha-lo ("is it not?", H9008 + H3808) introduces a rhetorical question about its location "in Rabbah of the people of Ammon" (be-rabbat bene ammon), implying the object was known to still be visible or attested there.

The measurements — tesha' ammot ("nine cubits", H8672 + H0520A) for length and arba' ammot ("four cubits", H0702 + H0520A) for width — are given using construct nouns orko ("its length") and rochbo ("its width"), each bearing a third-person feminine singular suffix (H9024) referring back to the 'eres. The final phrase ba'amat-'ish ("by the cubit of a man", H0520A + H0376G) specifies that the standard human cubit, not a specialized unit, was used for measurement.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew 'eres (H6210) is rendered by the LXX as klinē ("bed/couch") and by the Vulgate as lectus ("bed"), both translating the term as a bed rather than a sarcophagus, which is a semantic range difference reflected in the gloss itself. The Vulgate adds the phrase "de stirpe gigantum" ("of the race of giants"), an interpretive expansion not present in the Hebrew construct phrase miyeter ha-refa'im ("from the remnant of the Rephaim").