Numbers 32:8

Summary

Numbers 32:8 records Moses recalling how the previous generation's fathers acted when he sent them from Kadesh-barnea to reconnoiter the land. The verse sets up a comparison between that past generation's response and the current request of the Reubenites and Gadites in the surrounding context.

Key words

• koh ("thus", H3541) — a demonstrative adverb pointing to a manner of action; it frames the whole verse as a comparison, referring either backward to what precedes or forward to what will be described (in this case, the coming account of the spies' report).
• 'a.Su ("they did", H6213A) — qal perfect 3rd person plural, marking a completed past action: the fathers' deed is presented as a finished historical fact.
• be.sha.le.Ch.i ("when I sent", H7971G + H9040) — an infinitive construct prefixed with be ("in/when") and suffixed with the 1st person pronoun; this construction creates a temporal clause ("in my sending them"), attributing the sending directly to Moses' own voice.
• li.r'ot ("to see", H7200G) — an infinitive construct prefixed with li ("to/for"), expressing purpose: the fathers were sent "in order to see" the land, not merely to travel there.
• 'a.vo.tei.Khem ("your fathers", H0001G + H9026) — a construct noun with 2nd person plural suffix, directly addressing the audience about the ancestors, connecting past and present generations.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with koh ("thus") followed immediately by the perfect verb 'asu ("they did"), producing a compact declarative statement: "Thus your fathers did." The verse then supplies two subordinate infinitive clauses that explain the circumstances: be-shalchi ("when I sent [them]"), marking the temporal setting of Moses' own action, and li-r'ot ("to see"), marking the purpose of that sending. Both infinitives use prefixed prepositions (be and li) attached directly to the verbal root, a common Hebrew way of expressing "when/while doing" and "in order to do" without separate conjunctions. The object markers 'otam ("them") and 'et-ha'aretz ("the land") are grammatically necessary but semantically empty markers (H0853), simply flagging the direct objects of "sent" and "see."

Differences between versions

The Hebrew koh ("thus") is affirmative, but the LXX renders it as οὐχ οὕτως ("not thus"), introducing a negation absent from the Hebrew. The Vulgate follows this pattern with Nonne ("did they not..."), forming a rhetorical question. The Hebrew text as given contains no interrogative or negative particle, so the LXX and Vulgate present a different grammatical shape (negative/rhetorical) compared to the straightforward declarative statement in the Hebrew.