Translations
F.O.G.MPrimary
F.O.G Message"Everyone who comes near — who dares approach the tabernacle of Yahweh — dies! Are we all going to perish?"
F.O.GSecondary
The F.O.G"Anyone who draws near — who draws near to the Mishkan of YHWH — dies! Are we to expire to the last man?"
KJV
King James VersionWhosoever cometh any thing near unto the tabernacle of the LORD shall die: shall we be consumed with dying?
BSB
Berean Standard BibleAnyone who comes near the tabernacle of the LORD will die. Are we all going to perish?”
Footnotes
The doubled *haqqarev haqqarev* ('who draws near, who draws near') is emphatic — the verbal repetition mimics paralysed dread, as though the word itself scorches the mouth. The closing question, *hatamnu ligvo*, is literally 'are we finished — finished with expiring?' — *tamam* means 'complete, at an end,' and combined with *gava* it asks whether total annihilation is now the only possible future. The people have arrived at the theological crisis the entire Korah narrative drives toward: YHWH's holiness is lethal to the unauthorised. Yet the question is not rhetorical despair but an unwitting setup for the answer YHWH will give in chapter 18 — not 'stop coming near' but 'I have given you the Levites as your buffer, your living shield.' The terror here is the shadow that makes the gift of the priesthood luminous. FOG employs the doubled approach and 'expire' to honour the Hebrew grammar and register; FOG Message elevates the dread with 'dares approach,' capturing the visceral terror the original audience would have felt standing at the edge of sacred fire.
