Discovery BoxNumbers 4:27 
Context4:27 “All the service of the Gershonites, whether 1 carrying loads 2 or for any of their work, will be at the direction of 3 Aaron and his sons. You will assign them all their tasks 4 as their responsibility.
Numbers 9:21-22
Context9:21 And when 5 the cloud remained only 6 from evening until morning, when the cloud was taken up 7 the following morning, then they traveled on. Whether by day or by night, when the cloud was taken up they traveled. 9:22 Whether it was for two days, or a month, or a year, 8 that the cloud prolonged its stay 9 over the tabernacle, the Israelites remained camped without traveling; 10 but when it was taken up, they traveled on.
Numbers 18:15
Context18:15 The firstborn of every womb which they present to the Lord, whether human or animal, will be yours. Nevertheless, the firstborn sons you must redeem, 11 and the firstborn males of unclean animals you must redeem.
1 tn The term “whether” is supplied to introduce the enumerated parts of the explanatory phrase.
2 tn Here again is the use of the noun “burden” in the sense of the loads they were to carry (see the use of carts in Num 7:7).
3 tn The expression is literally “upon/at the mouth of” (עַל־פִּי, ’al-pi); it means that the work of these men would be under the direct orders of Aaron and his sons.
4 tn Or “burden.”
5 tn The construction is the same in the preceding verse.
6 tn “Only” is supplied to reflect the contrast between the two verses.
7 tn The construction in this half of the verse uses two vav (ו) consecutive clauses. The first is subordinated to the second as a temporal clause: “when…then….”
8 tn The MT has אוֹ־יָמִים (’o-yamim). Most translators use “or a year” to interpret this expression in view of the sequence of words leading up to it, as well as in comparison with passages like Judg 17:10 and 1 Sam 1:3 and 27:7. See also the uses in Gen 40:4 and 1 Kgs 17:15. For the view that it means four months, see F. S. North, “Four Month Season of the Hebrew Bible,” VT 11 (1961): 446-48.
9 tn In the Hebrew text this sentence has a temporal clause using the preposition with the Hiphil infinitive construct of אָרַךְ (’arakh) followed by the subjective genitive, “the cloud.” But this infinitive is followed by the infinitive construct לִשְׁכֹּן (lishkon), the two of them forming a verbal hendiadys: “the cloud made long to stay” becomes “the cloud prolonged its stay.”
10 tn Heb “and they would not journey”; the clause can be taken adverbially, explaining the preceding verbal clause.
11 tn The construction uses the infinitive absolute and the imperfect tense of the verb “to redeem” in order to stress the point – they were to be redeemed. N. H. Snaith suggests that the verb means to get by payment what was not originally yours, whereas the other root גָאַל (ga’al) means to get back what was originally yours (Leviticus and Numbers [NCB], 268).
