Numbers 16:29

Summary

Moses proposes a test to distinguish an ordinary death from divine judgment: if these men (Korah and his followers) die as all humans normally die, or are "visited" as all humans are visited, then Moses' claim that Yehovah sent him is false. The verse sets up a conditional standard for what would NOT count as evidence of divine intervention.

Key words

• yemuTun ("they will die", H4191) — qal imperfect with paragogic nun, an emphatic verbal ending marking ongoing/future action, here describing a normal death.
• fekuDat ("visitation of", H6486) — feminine singular construct noun, linking to "all humanity" (kol ha'adam), indicating a general, expected fate rather than a special one.
• yippaKed ("it will be visited", H6485I) — niphal (passive) imperfect, meaning the action of "visiting" is done TO them, not something they do; describes a fate that happens to a person rather than a natural process.
• lo' ("not", H3808) — simple negation opening the apodosis (result clause), stating the consequence if the condition holds.
• shelaChaNi ("he has sent me", H7971G) — qal perfect with 1st person suffix, completed action: Moses' claim of having been sent, whose truth is tied to the outcome of the test.

What the text says

The verse is built as a conditional sentence introduced by 'im ("if", H0518A), with two parallel clauses describing what would happen if these men die an ordinary human fate. The first clause uses ke-mot kol ha'adam ("like the death of all humanity") governing the verb yemuTun ("they will die") — a qal (active, simple) form describing a natural process. The second clause shifts to the niphal form yippaKed ("it will be visited"), a passive construction: rather than something these men actively experience, "visitation" (fekuDat) is described as something that happens to them ('aleihem, "upon them"), from an external agent. This grammatical shift from active dying to passive being-visited creates two possible readings of an ordinary death: one as biological process, one as an expected fate imposed from outside.

The apodosis (result) is short and stark: lo' Yehovah shelaChaNi — "not Yehovah has sent me" — using the perfect shelaChaNi ("he has sent me") to state a completed, past claim now placed into question. The negation lo' stands emphatically before the divine name, structurally foregrounding the negative outcome.

Differences between versions

The LXX repeats ei ("if") twice — "εἰ κατὰ θάνατον... εἰ καὶ κατ' ἐπίσκεψιν" — creating two distinct conditional clauses, whereas the Hebrew presents one condition with two coordinated verbs (yemuTun... yippaKed) joined by u- ("and"). The Vulgate renders fekuDat with the phrase "plaga, qua et ceteri visitari solent" ("a plague by which others are accustomed to be visited"), introducing "plaga" (plague/blow) as an explanatory addition not present as a separate lexical item in the Hebrew noun fekuDat ("visitation") itself.