Numbers 35:31

Summary

The verse prohibits accepting a ransom or monetary payment in exchange for the life of a person who has committed murder and is legally condemned to die. The clause is reinforced by a doubled verbal form emphasizing the certainty of the execution.

Key words

• tik.Chu ("you will take", H3947H) — qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine plural, negated by lo' ("not", H3808) to form a legal prohibition addressed to the community.
• kho.fer ("a ransom", H3724A) — masculine singular noun denoting a payment offered as substitute or compensation, here forbidden as a substitute for the killer's life.
• ro.Tze.ach ("a killer", H7523) — qal participle, masculine singular, functioning as a noun describing the one who performs the killing; the participle form frames the killer by his ongoing identity as agent of the act rather than as a fixed title.
• ra.Sha' ("guilty", H7563) — masculine singular noun/adjective, here predicating the killer's legal status directly, linked to la.Mut ("to die", H4191, infinitive) expressing the purpose or result of that guilt.
• Mot yu.Mat ("certainly...he will be put to death", H4191 + H4191) — the infinitive absolute Mot combined with the hophal imperfect yu.Mat creates an emphatic construction underscoring the certainty of the causative-passive action: he will surely be caused to die.

What the text says

The sentence divides into two main clauses joined by ki ("for/that", H3588A). The first clause, "ve-lo' tik.Chu kho.fer le-Ne.fesh ro.Tze.ach," sets the prohibition: no kho.fer ("ransom") may be taken for the Ne.fesh ("life") — the construct form le-Ne.fesh ties "ransom" directly and only to "the life of," specifying that it is life itself, not property or lesser damage, that cannot be redeemed by payment. The relative clause "asher hu' ra.Sha' la.Mut" further defines the killer: he "is guilty to die," where the infinitive la.Mut expresses the destination or purpose of his guilty status — death is the outcome tied to his ra.Sha' condition.

The second clause, introduced by ki, functions less as a simple causal "because" and more as an intensifying confirmation: "Mot yu.Mat" doubles the root mut ("to die," H4191) — first as an infinitive absolute, then as a hophal imperfect — a construction that in Biblical Hebrew grammar signals certainty or emphasis rather than mere repetition. The hophal form marks the action as causative-passive: the subject does not die by natural means but "is caused to be put to death," implying an external agent (the community/legal system) executing the sentence.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders kho.fer as λύτρα ("ransom/price") and expands ro.Tze.ach with a participial clause (τοῦ φονεύσαντος τοῦ ἐνόχου ὄντος ἀναιρεθῆναι, "the one who murdered, being liable to be put to death"), making explicit in Greek what the Hebrew construct chain implies more compactly. The Vulgate's statim et ipse morietur ("immediately he himself will die") introduces the notion of immediacy not explicitly present in the Hebrew Mot yu.Mat, which stresses certainty of outcome rather than timing.