21:6a

The descendants of Gershon: Gershon was one of Levi’s three sons.

received thirteen cities by lot from the tribes of Issachar: This clause is like the clause in verse 21:5a.

Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:

The descendants of Gershon received towns by lot from the families of the clan of Issachar,
-or-
When the lot was thrown, the people who were descended from Gershon received towns from the clan of Issachar,

21:6b

Asher, Naphtali, and the half-tribe of Manasseh in Bashan: This part of the verse is like verse 21:5b. The phrase the half-tribe of Manasseh in Bashan refers to the part of the Manasseh clan that lived on the east side of the Jordan River. Bashan was an area northeast of the Sea of Galilee.

Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:

from the clan of Asher, from the clan of Naphtali, and from the part of the clan of Manasseh who live in Bashan, ⌊east of the Jordan River⌋ . They received thirteen towns.
-or-
and from the clan of Asher, and the clan of Naphtali, and from the half of the clan of Manasseh who live in Bashan, ⌊east of the Jordan⌋ . They received thirteen towns.

General Comment on 21:6

It may be more natural in some languages to rearrange the parts of this verse. For example:

The descendants of Gershon received thirteen towns by lot. These towns came from the families of the clan of Issachar, the clan of Naphtali, and half of the clan of Manasseh.

© 2001, 2011, 2020, 2022, 2023 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.