Numbers 24:5

Summary

The verse is an exclamatory statement praising the tents and dwelling places belonging to Jacob/Israel. It uses a poetic, parallel structure in which two synonymous terms for habitation are each qualified as good or beautiful.

Key words

• mah ("how!", H4100) — interrogative pronoun used here not as a question but as an exclamatory particle, introducing an expression of admiration ("how...!").
• Tou ("they are good", H2895) — qal perfect verb, third person, expressing a completed or settled state ("they are/have become good"); the perfect aspect presents the goodness as an established fact rather than an ongoing process.
• 'ohalei-kha ("your tents", H0168G + H9021) — masculine plural noun in construct form with a second-person masculine singular suffix, meaning "tents of you" = "your tents."
• ya'aqo ("Jacob", H3290) — proper name in direct address (vocative), the person being spoken to.
• mishkenotei-kha ("your dwelling places", H4908 + H9021) — feminine plural noun in construct with the same second-person suffix, parallel to 'ohalei-kha.

What the text says

The sentence opens with mah, an interrogative pronoun that functions here as an exclamatory marker rather than a true question — a common Biblical Hebrew usage where "what?" becomes "how...!" This particle governs the verb Tou, a qal perfect of the root H2895 ("to be good"), agreeing in gender and number with the plural noun that follows it, 'ohalei-kha ("your tents"). The construct chain 'ohalei-kha links the plural noun "tents" to the second-person suffix -kha ("your"), producing "your tents," addressed directly to Ya'aqo ("Jacob"), a vocative.

The second half of the verse repeats the same grammatical pattern with a different noun: mishkenotei-kha ("your dwelling places"), also plural and construct with the -kha suffix, addressed to Yisra'El ("Israel"). Although the verb Tou is not repeated in the second clause, its force carries over by ellipsis, a common feature of Hebrew poetic parallelism. The two clauses are thus grammatically parallel: noun-in-construct + suffix + vocative name, both governed by the initial exclamatory mah...Tou. The two vocatives, Ya'aqo and Yisra'El, refer to the same entity under two names, reinforcing the poetic parallelism rather than indicating two separate addressees.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew nouns 'ohalim ("tents") and mishkenot ("dwelling places") are both concrete terms for temporary or fixed habitations. The LXX renders these with oikoi ("houses") and skēnai ("tents"), reversing the more literal correspondence — oikoi for the first term, which in Hebrew specifically means "tents," not "houses." The Vulgate uses tabernacula ("tabernacles/tents") and tentoria ("tents/pavilions"), both terms evoking temporary dwellings, closer to the Hebrew sense than the LXX's oikoi.