Numbers 34:24

Summary

The verse names the tribal leader appointed for the tribe of Ephraim in the list of representatives commissioned to divide the land west of the Jordan. It identifies him as Kemuel (H7055H), son of Shiphtan (H8204).

Key words

• matteh ("tribe of", H4294H) — masculine singular construct noun, opening a construct chain that links "tribe" to the following genitive, here beginning the phrase "tribe of the descendants of Ephraim."
• vene ("descendants of", H1121G) — masculine plural construct of "son/descendant," forming a second link in the chain (matteh bene Efrayim, "tribe of the sons of Ephraim").
• nasi ("a leader", H5387A) — masculine singular absolute noun, standing in apposition to the tribal name; it designates the office/role of the person named next, without a definite article in the Hebrew.
• ben ("son of", H1121A) — masculine singular construct, introducing patronymic identification ("Kemuel, son of Shiphtan"), the standard Hebrew way of naming a person through his father.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is built as a construct chain followed by an appositional title and a patronymic. The conjunction u ("and", H9002) connects this clause to the preceding list of tribal leaders, showing this verse is one unit in a longer enumeration. The phrase u-le-matteh vene-Efrayim ("and for/of the tribe of the descendants of Ephraim") uses the preposition le (H9005) to mark the tribe as the group being assigned a representative, paralleling the syntax of the surrounding verses in the list.

The word nasi (H5387A) appears without a definite article and without a copula ("is"), so the Hebrew simply juxtaposes "leader" next to the tribal designation and then the name — a common apposition pattern in Biblical Hebrew where a title precedes a proper name to identify a role. The final segment, Kemuel ben-Shiftan, follows the standard construct pattern for patronymics: the personal name is followed by ben (H1121A) plus the father's name, with no additional verb needed, since Hebrew often omits explicit verbs like "is" in identifying clauses.

Differences between versions

The Hebrew word order places the tribal designation first (matteh bene Efrayim, "tribe of the descendants of Ephraim") and the leader's name second (nasi Kemuel ben-Shiftan). The LXX (Καμουὴλ υἱὸς Σαβαθά) and Vulgate (Camuel filius Sephthan) both render the personal and patronymic names but transliterate Shiphtan (H8204) differently — as Sabatha in the LXX and Sephthan in the Vulgate — reflecting differing transliteration choices for the same Hebrew consonants rather than a difference in meaning. The BSB reorders the clause to place the name first ("Kemuel son of Shiphtan, a leader from the tribe of Ephraim"), a translational restructuring not present in the Hebrew word order.