On the noun אִישׁ in Genesis 12:20

(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation, an adaptation of the NJPS translation. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term אִישׁ—in this case, its plural form—by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)

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The first clause schematically depicts an event that creates a new situation. The narrator uses the term אֲנָשִׁים to refer to a set of participants in the depicted situation, in terms of that situation. The usage is prototypical, and conventional for introducing new participants.

The text is more informative and coherent if the clause is construed as making reference to a specific set rather than to a nonspecific class.

The bare plural noun indicates that the referents are identifiable to the speaker, while their number is unspecified, presumably because it is unimportant. Likewise their gender is unimportant, for it is grammatically specified only to the extent that at least one of the referents is not womanly. What matters to the narrator is that the audience can quickly grasp the introduction of new participants, who function as agents of the king.

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As for rendering into English, the NJPS ‘men’ (a bare plural) nowadays lends itself most readily to a generic interpretation—an explicit specification of masculine gender—which is not the meaning here. The new insertion of ‘some’ better evokes the classic usage of ‘men’ to label essential participants as such.

As noted above, the meaning expressed by ‘some’—namely that reference is being made to a specific party of unspecified size—is implicit in the usage of the bare Hebrew plural noun. Therefore it is often expressed in translations in similar settings, as in NJPS (and RJPS) for Exod 17:9; Num 9:6; Josh 2:2; 1 Kgs 13:25; 20:17; and Neh 1:2; see also RJPS for, e.g., Josh 7:2; 10:18.