Genesis 6:3

וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה לֹֽא־יָדוֹן רוּחִי בָֽאָדָם לְעֹלָם בְּשַׁגַּם הוּא בָשָׂר וְהָיוּ יָמָיו מֵאָה וְעֶשְׂרִים שָׁנָֽה׃

✦ Hebrew interlinear

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✦ The same verse in five languages

Hebrew

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר יְהוָ֗ה לֹֽא־יָד֨וֹן רוּחִ֤י בָֽאָדָם֙ לְעֹלָ֔ם בְּשַׁגַּ֖ם ה֣וּא בָשָׂ֑ר וְהָי֣וּ יָמָ֔יו מֵאָ֥ה וְעֶשְׂרִ֖ים שָׁנָֽה׃

Greek (Septuagint)

καὶ εἶπεν κύριος ὁ θεός Οὐ μὴ καταμείνῃ τὸ πνεῦμά μου ἐν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις τούτοις εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, διὰ τὸ εἶναι αὐτοὺς σάρκας· ἔσονται δὲ αἱ ἡμέραι αὐτῶν ἑκατὸν εἴκοσι ἔτη.

Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0

Latin (Vulgate)

Dixitque Deus: Non permanebit spiritus meus in homine in æternum, quia caro est: eruntque dies illius centum viginti annorum.

Spanish

Entonces Yehová dijo: “Mi Espíritu no permanecerá en el hombre para siempre, porque él no es más que carne mortal. Por eso, el hombre no vivirá más de ciento veinte años”.

Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)

Y dijo Jehová: No contenderá mi espíritu con el hombre para siempre, porque ciertamente él es carne: mas serán sus días ciento y veinte años.

English

So the LORD said, “ My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days shall be 120 years.”

✦ What the text says

Summary

Yehovah announces that his ruach ("spirit", H7307) will not remain/act within ha'adam ("humankind", H0120) le'olam ("forever", H5769), giving as the reason that humankind basar ("is flesh", H1320). The verse concludes with a stated limit of 120 years for human days (yamim, H3117).

Key words

yaDon (" will remain", H1777) — qal imperfect, third person; the root behind this form is lexically ambiguous in the tradition, producing different renderings across versions (see below).
ruchi ("my spirit", H7307+H9020) — noun in construct-like use with the first-person suffix "my," making Yehovah's ruach the subject of the negated verb.
beshagam (H9003+H9007+H1571, "in that also") — a compound of preposition be ("in"), relative particle sha ("that/who"), and adverb gam ("also"), forming an unusual causal expression rare elsewhere in the corpus.
basar ("flesh", H1320) — bare noun without article or verb "to be" supplied in Hebrew; the copula "is" is implied, not explicit.
yamav ("his days", H3117+H9023) — plural noun in construct with third-person suffix, subject of the sequential perfect hayu ("they will be", H1961).

What the text says

The sentence opens with the narrative formula vayyomer Yehovah ("and Yehovah said"), followed by a negated verbal clause: lo-yadon ruchi va'adam le'olam — "not will-remain my-spirit in-the-humankind for-ever." The subject ruach precedes no explicit verb "to be"; the finite verb yadon itself carries the full predication. The causal clause beshagam hu basar lacks a copula in Hebrew — literally "in-that also he flesh" — the reader supplies "is." The final clause shifts tense to a sequential perfect (vehayu, "and they will be"), stating a numerical limit tied to yamav ("his days"), a plural noun governed by the singular suffix "his," referring back to adam.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew verb yadon (H1777) is rendered by the LXX as καταμείνῃ ("remain") and by the Vulgate as permanebit ("will remain"), matching the gloss "will remain." Several later translations (BSB "contend," RV1909 "contenderá," SBLIBRE "permanecerá") diverge: some follow the "remain" sense, others render it as "contend," reflecting different construals of the same consonantal form. The LXX also renders Yehovah as κύριος ὁ θεός ("Lord God"), adding ὁ θεός, which has no separate Hebrew word here. Additionally, the LXX turns the Hebrew collective singular ha'adam into a plural, ἐν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις τούτοις ("in these men"), while the Hebrew and Vulgate (in homine) keep it singular. The SBLIBRE rendering "carne mortal" adds "mortal," an interpretive expansion not present in the Hebrew basar ("flesh") alone.

This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.