Numbers 22:36

Summary

The verse reports that Balak learned of Balaam's arrival and went out to meet him at a city of Moab located on the border of the Arnon, at the edge of the territory. The sentence is built from two narrative actions (hearing, going out) followed by a chain of geographical descriptions.

Key words

• va-yish-Ma' ("he heard", H8085G) — qal narrative form, first action of the sequence, introduced by the narrative vav that links it to the ongoing story.
• va-ye-Tze' ("he went out", H3318G) — second narrative qal verb, marking the immediate consequence of hearing.
• li-k'ra-T-o ("to meet him", H7122G + H9033) — infinitive construct with preposition li ("to", H9005) and pronominal suffix "him", expressing purpose ("in order to meet him").
• ge-Vul ("border of", H1366G) — masculine singular construct noun, used twice in the verse (once for the Arnon, once with the article for "the territory"), each time governing the following noun.
• 'a-Sher ("which", H0834A) — relative particle, appears twice, each time introducing a clause that further specifies the location just named.

What the text says

The verse opens with two sequential narrative verbs in the qal stem, va-yish-Ma' ("he heard") and va-ye-Tze' ("he went out"), both carrying the narrative vav that marks consecutive past action in the storyline: Balak's hearing directly triggers his departure. The subordinating particle ki ("that", H3588A) introduces the content of what Balak heard — that Balaam va' ("had come", H0935G), a perfect form indicating an action already completed at the time Balak heard of it.

The purpose of Balak's going out is expressed through the infinitive construct li-k'ra-T-o ("to meet him"), combining the preposition "to" with the suffixed pronoun "him." The remainder of the verse is a chain of construct-noun phrases stacking location upon location: "city of" ('ir, H5892B) Moab, "border of" (ge-Vul, H1366G) Arnon, and "end of" (k'Tzeh, H7097A) "the territory" (ha-ge-Vul, with the definite article). Each geographical unit is linked to the next by the relative particle 'a-Sher ("which"), producing a nested description: the city is in Moab, which itself is qualified as being on the border of Arnon, which is further qualified as being at the edge of "the territory." This layering of construct chains and relative clauses narrows the location progressively, rather than naming a single place outright.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew uses two distinct construct nouns, ge-Vul ("border/territory", H1366G) applied twice — once to Arnon's border, once to "the territory" generically. The LXX renders both occurrences with the Greek term for "boundaries" (ὁρίων), collapsing the Hebrew's two separate uses of ge-Vul into repeated but undifferentiated Greek phrasing. The Vulgate simplifies the nested relative-clause structure into a single phrase, "in extremis finibus Arnon" ("in the farthest borders of Arnon"), merging what the Hebrew presents as two separate qualifying clauses (border of Arnon; edge of the territory) into one expression.