| 44. Linguistic Exegesis The verse enumerates three localities joined by the vav conjunction and then provides a numerical summary with the noun ʿārîm {עָרִים | ʿā-rîm} ‘towns’ followed by tē-šaʿ {תֵּשַׁע | tē-šaʿ} ‘nine’ and wə-ḥaṣ-rê-yē-hen {וְחַצְרֵיהֶֽן | wə-ḥaṣ-rê-yē-hen} ‘and their villages.’ This paratactic list is characteristic of Hebrew boundary and inheritance formulas. In English, preserving the original word order and using punctuation clarifies coordination and quantitative summary. |