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Exodus 32:26-28
New English Translation
Exodus 32:26-28
New English Translation
26 So Moses stood at the entrance of the camp and said, “Whoever is for the Lord, come[a] to me.”[b] All the Levites gathered around him, 27 and he said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said ‘Each man fasten[c] his sword on his side, and go back and forth[d] from entrance to entrance throughout the camp, and each one kill his brother, his friend, and his neighbor.’”[e]
28 The Levites did what Moses ordered,[f] and that day about 3,000 men of the people died.[g]
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Exodus 32:26 tn “come” is not in the text, but has been supplied.
- Exodus 32:26 tn S. R. Driver suggests that the command was tersely put: “Who is for Yahweh? To me!” (Exodus, 354).
- Exodus 32:27 tn Heb “put.”
- Exodus 32:27 tn The two imperatives form a verbal hendiadys: “pass over and return,” meaning, “go back and forth” throughout the camp.
- Exodus 32:27 tn The phrases have “and kill a man his brother, and a man his companion, and a man his neighbor.” The instructions were probably intended to mean that they should kill leaders they knew to be guilty because they had been seen or because they failed the water test—whoever they were.
- Exodus 32:28 tn Heb “did according to the word of Moses.”
- Exodus 32:28 tn Heb “fell.”
New English Translation (NET)
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