Deuteronomy 3:9

Summary

The verse records that Mount Hermon carried different names in different traditions: the Sidonians called it Sirion (H8303), while the Amorites called it Senir (H8149). It functions as a geographical gloss identifying alternate regional names for the same mountain mentioned in the preceding verses.

Key words

• tzidonim ("Sidonians", H6722) — gentilic plural noun, subject of the first clause, naming the people who use the term Sirion.
• yikre'u ("they call", H7121) — qal imperfect, third person plural, appearing twice; the imperfect here expresses a customary or habitual naming practice rather than a single past event.
• Chermon ("Hermon", H2768) — proper place name, the object of the Sidonian designation, marked with the preposition le- ("to", H9005).
• ha-Emori ("the Amorite", H0567) — definite gentilic noun, singular in form but paired with the plural verb yikre'u, functioning as a collective term for the people group.
• lo ("it/his", H9033) — pronominal suffix attached to the second le- preposition, referring back to Hermon without repeating the name.

What the text says

The sentence is built as two parallel clauses, each following the pattern subject + verb ("they call") + indirect object (the mountain) + name given. In the first clause, tzidonim ("Sidonians", H6722) is the explicit subject and Chermon ("Hermon", H2768) is named directly as the object of address, receiving the name Sirion (H8303). In the second clause, the subject ha-Emori ("the Amorite", H0567) is grammatically singular (a gentilic collective) yet takes the plural verb yikre'u ("they call", H7121), a common pattern in Biblical Hebrew where a people-group noun, though singular in form, is treated as a plural collective agreeing with a plural verb. Instead of repeating "Hermon," the second clause uses the pronominal suffix lo ("it", H9033) attached to the preposition, pointing back to the mountain already named. The resulting structure economically conveys that one geographic feature bore two distinct names among two different peoples.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate (VULCLEM) opens with quem ("which"), a relative pronoun linking the verse back to Hermon mentioned earlier in the chapter, and renders the Sidonian name as "Sarion" rather than the Hebrew Sirion (H8303). The Septuagint excerpt provided (LXXSWETE) preserves only the second half of the verse, giving "καὶ ὁ Ἀμορραῖος αὐτὸ Σανείρ" ("and the Amorite [calls] it Sanir"), without the clause about the Sidonians and Sirion found in the Hebrew and the Vulgate.