Numbers 15:31-33

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Numbers 15:31 tn The verb בָּזָה (bazah, “to despise”) means to treat something as worthless, to treat it with contempt, to look down the nose at something as it were.
2. Numbers 15:31 tn The verb פָּרַר (parar, “to break”) can mean to nullify, break, or violate a covenant.
3. Numbers 15:31 tn Heb “soul.”
4. Numbers 15:31 tn The construction uses the Niphal imperfect with the modifying Niphal infinitive absolute. The infinitive makes the sentence more emphatic. If the imperfect tense is taken as an instruction imperfect, then the infinitive makes the instruction more binding. If it is a simple future, then the future is certain. In either case, there is no exclusion from being cut off.
5. Numbers 15:31 sn The point is that the person’s iniquity remains with him—he must pay for his sin. The judgment of God in such a case is both appropriate and unavoidable.
6. Numbers 15:32 tn The preterite of the verb “to be” is here subordinated to the next, parallel verb form, to form a temporal clause.
7. Numbers 15:32 sn For this brief passage, see A. Phillips, “The Case of the Woodgatherer Reconsidered,” VT 19 (1969): 125-28; J. Weingreen, “The Case of the Woodgatherer (Numbers XV 32-36),” VT 16 (1966): 361-64; and B. J. Bamberger, “Revelations of Torah after Sinai,” HUCA 16 (1941): 97-113. Weingreen argues that there is something of the Rabbinic method of setting a fence around the Law here; in other words, if this sin were not punished, the Law would have been violated in greater ways. Gathering of wood, although seemingly harmless, is done with intent to kindle fire, and so reveals a culpable intent.