A beka a head, literally “a beqaʿ for a skull,” means “one beka per person” (New International Version). The beqaʿ, a unit of weight measurement, was equal to half a shekel and is mentioned only here and in Gen 24.22, where Revised Standard Version translates “a half shekel.” It is not used in 30.13, to which this verse refers. There is therefore no need to retain it here, so New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh has “a half-shekel a head.” Good News Translation avoids using even the word shekel, but this depends on how 30.13 is translated. That is, half a shekel is added in the Hebrew to explain what the beqaʿ was. (See the comment on half a shekel at 30.13.) By the shekel of the sanctuary is the same as in verse 24. (See the comment there.) Contemporary English Version has a helpful model: “Everyone who was counted paid the required amount, and there was a total of 603,550 men who were twenty years old or older.”

For every one who was numbered in the census, literally “for every passer-over to the counted ones,” is the same expression used in 30.13, 14. From twenty years old and upward is identical with 30.14. (See the comment there.) For six hundred and three thousand … men may be more easily written as “603,550 men” (Good News Translation), but rules of style in the receptor language should be followed consistently. This was the total number of men who had been “enrolled in the census” (Good News Translation).

Quoted with permission from Osborn, Noel D. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Exodus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1999. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .