16:9 You must count seven weeks; you must begin to count them 6 from the time you begin to harvest the standing grain.
1 tn Heb “the
2 tc Some scholars, on the basis of v. 11, emend the MT reading שִׁכְנוֹ (shikhno, “his residence”) to the infinitive construct לְשָׁכֵן (lÿshakhen, “to make [his name] to dwell”), perhaps with the 3rd person masculine singular sf לְשַׁכְּנוֹ (lÿshakÿno, “to cause it to dwell”). Though the presupposed nounשֵׁכֶן (shekhen) is nowhere else attested, the parallel here with שַׁמָּה (shammah, “there”) favors retaining the MT as it stands.
3 tn The Hebrew text uses the infinitive absolute for emphasis, which the translation indicates with the words “without fail” (cf. NIV “you must certainly put him to death”).
4 tn Heb “to put him to death,” but this is misleading in English for such an action would leave nothing for the others to do.
5 tn The Hebrew text uses the infinitive absolute for emphasis, which the translation indicates with “generously.”
6 tn Heb “the seven weeks.” The translation uses a pronoun to avoid redundancy in English.
7 tn Heb “must not multiply” (cf. KJV, NASB); NLT “must not take many.”
8 tn Heb “brother.”
9 tn Heb “sojourner.”
10 tc Smr reads “Mount Gerizim” for the MT reading “Mount Ebal” to justify the location of the Samaritan temple there in the postexilic period. This reading is patently self-serving and does not reflect the original. In the NT when the Samaritan woman of Sychar referred to “this mountain” as the place of worship for her community she obviously had Gerizim in mind (cf. John 4:20).