Translations
F.O.G.MPrimary
F.O.G MessageYahweh said to Moses, 'Make a serpent figure and mount it on a pole. Anyone who has been bitten — when they look up at it, they will live.'
F.O.GSecondary
The F.O.GYHWH said to Moshe, 'Make yourself a seraph and set it on a pole. It shall be that whoever is bitten — when he looks at it, he shall live.'
KJV
King James VersionAnd the LORD said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.
BSB
Berean Standard BibleThen the LORD said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and mount it on a pole. When anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will live.”
Footnotes
YHWH commands Moshe to make *a seraph* (שָׂרָף) — a burning image — and mount it on a *nes* (נֵס). Intriguingly YHWH says 'make a seraph' while Moshe in v.9 makes a *nachash nechoshet* (bronze serpent) — either 'seraph' here means 'fiery/venomous serpent,' or Moshe translates the divine instruction into a specific form. The word *nes* means both 'pole/standard' and 'banner/sign' — the word used for a military rallying standard — making the bronze serpent simultaneously a battlefield standard and a sign of salvation. This anticipates Yeshua's own words: 'Just as Moshe lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up' (John 3:14). FOG preserves 'seraph' to maintain the fiery-holy resonance; FOG Message renders 'serpent figure' for clarity.