Numbers 16:6

Summary

Moses issues a double command — "do this" and "take censers for yourselves" — before naming the addressees: Korah and his entire company. The verse functions as the opening instruction for the test that follows, in which the censers will be used before YHWH.

Key words

• zot ("this", H2063) — a demonstrative particle standing alone at the head of the sentence, pointing forward to the action about to be specified.
• 'aSu ("do", H6213A) — qal imperative, masculine plural, addressed collectively to Korah's group; establishes the command register of the verse.
• qechu ("take", H3947G) — second qal imperative, masculine plural, coordinated with the first; specifies the concrete action (taking censers).
• machtot ("censers", H4289) — feminine plural noun, the direct object of qechu, without a numeral, so the text does not specify how many censers per person.
• 'adato ("his company", H5712) — feminine singular noun in construct with the suffix -o ("his", H9023), forming "his congregation/company," referring back to Korach.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with zot ("this") followed immediately by the imperative 'aSu ("do"), forming a short introductory clause: "This do." This is then followed by a second imperative, qechu-lachem machtot ("take for yourselves censers"), which gives the actual content of what is to be done. Only after both imperatives does the text name the addressees — Qorach ve-khol-'adato ("Korah and all his company") — using a construct chain (kol-'adato, "all of his company") where the suffix -o ("his") ties the group grammatically back to Korah as its head.

This word order — command first, addressee named second — is a feature of the Hebrew that most translations restructure. The BSB, for instance, moves "You, Korah, and all your followers" to the front of the sentence, converting the trailing vocative into a fronted subject. The Hebrew instead presents the instruction as already in motion before identifying who receives it, a construction that places grammatical weight on the action ('aSu, qechu) rather than on the identity of the actors.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate renders the plural imperative qechu ("take," plural) as tollat unusquisque ("let each one take"), shifting from a collective plural command to a distributive singular one — introducing "each" (unusquisque) where the Hebrew simply has a plural verb form with no explicit distributive marker. The LXX (λάβετε ὑμῖν αὐτοῖς) preserves the plural imperative and adds a reflexive/emphatic pronoun (αὐτοῖς, "for yourselves") paralleling the Hebrew lachem, staying closer to the Hebrew's collective address than the Vulgate does.