Numbers 16:17
וּקְחוּ׀ אִישׁ מַחְתָּתוֹ וּנְתַתֶּם עֲלֵיהֶם קְטֹרֶת וְהִקְרַבְתֶּם לִפְנֵי יְהוָה אִישׁ מַחְתָּתוֹ חֲמִשִּׁים וּמָאתַיִם מַחְתֹּת וְאַתָּה וְאַהֲרֹן אִישׁ מַחְתָּתֽוֹ׃
✦ Hebrew interlinear
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✦ The same verse in five languages
וּקְח֣וּ׀ אִ֣ישׁ מַחְתָּת֗וֹ וּנְתַתֶּ֤ם עֲלֵיהֶם֙ קְטֹ֔רֶת וְהִקְרַבְתֶּ֞ם לִפְנֵ֤י יְהוָה֙ אִ֣ישׁ מַחְתָּת֔וֹ חֲמִשִּׁ֥ים וּמָאתַ֖יִם מַחְתֹּ֑ת וְאַתָּ֥ה וְאַהֲרֹ֖ן אִ֥ישׁ מַחְתָּתֽוֹ׃
καὶ λάβετε ἕκαστος τὸ πυρεῖον αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐπιθήσετε ἐπ’ αὐτὰ θυμιάματα, καὶ προσάξετε ἔναντι Τυρίου ἕκαστος τὸ πυρεῖον αὐτοῦ, πεντήκοντα καὶ διακόσια πυρεῖα, καὶ σὺ καὶ Ἀαρὼν ἕκαστος τὸ πυρεῖον αὐτοῦ.
Greek text from Swete's edition, CC BY-SA 4.0
Latin (Vulgate)
Tollite singuli thuribula vestra, et ponite super ea incensum, offerentes Domino ducenta quinquaginta thuribula: Aaron quoque teneat thuribulum suum.
Que cada uno tome su incensario y le ponga incienso; y cada uno de ustedes, los doscientos cincuenta, lleve su incensario delante de Yehová. Tú y Aarón también llevarán el suyo”.
Classic Spanish (Reina-Valera 1909)
Y tomad cada uno su incensario, y poned sahumerio en ellos, y allegad delante de Jehová cada uno su incensario: doscientos y cincuenta incensarios: tú también, y Aarón, cada uno con su incensario.
Each man is to take his censer, place incense in it, and present it before the LORD —250 censers. You and Aaron are to present your censers as well.”
✦ What the text says
Summary
Moses instructs each man to take his own censer, put incense on it, and bring it before Yehovah, totaling 250 censers. Moses and Aaron are also included, each with his own censer.
Key words
- ke.Chu ("take", H3947G) — qal imperative plural, a direct command addressed to the group of men.
- mach.ta.T + o ("his censer", H4289 + H9023) — feminine singular noun in construct with a possessive suffix, repeated three times to stress individual ownership ("each man his own censer").
- ne.ta.Tem ("you will put", H5414H) — qal sequential perfect, continuing the chain of commands begun by the imperative ke.Chu.
- hik.rav.Tem ("you will bring near", H7126H) — hiphil (causative) sequential perfect; the causative stem marks the action of causing the censer to approach, i.e., presenting it.
- chamishim ... matayim ("fifty" ... "two hundred", H2572 + H3967) — cardinal numbers combined (50 + 200) to state the total count of censers, 250.
What the text says
The verse opens with the imperative ke.Chu ("take"), addressed collectively to "each one" ('ish, H0376I), followed by the singular noun mach.ta.T with the third-person suffix -o ("his"), producing the distributive sense "each man his censer." The narrative then shifts to two sequential perfects, ne.ta.Tem ("you will put") and hik.rav.Tem ("you will bring near"), both marked as continuations of the initial command rather than new independent actions. The hiphil stem of hik.rav.Tem is notable: it is a causative form of the root meaning "to be near," so the text literally expresses "causing to draw near" the censer li-fnei Yehovah ("before Yehovah"), using the construct noun fnei ("face of," H6440G) plus the divine name.
The phrase 'ish mach.ta.to ("each man his censer") recurs three times in the verse — once for the general group, once tied to the count of 250, and once specifically for Moses and Aaron — reinforcing that every participant, regardless of status, brings an individual censer. The numeral construction chamishim u-matayim ("fifty and two hundred") follows the pattern of stating the smaller number before the larger, yielding the sum 250 censers.
Differences between versions
The LXX renders li-fnei Yehovah ("before Yehovah") as ἔναντι Κυρίου ("before the Lord"), using the standard Greek substitution for the divine name rather than transliterating it. The Vulgate restructures the verse syntactically, placing "ducenta quinquaginta thuribula" ("two hundred fifty censers") as a description of the offering action itself, whereas the Hebrew lists the number as a separate clause following the reference to Moses and Aaron's approach before Yehovah. The BSB and SBLIBRE both render hik.rav.Tem with "present," which conveys the causative sense of "bringing near" but does not preserve the literal image of causing the censer to approach the divine presence found in the Hebrew hiphil form.
This explanation describes the text using linguistic data; it adds no doctrine or confessional interpretation.