On the noun אִישׁ in Genesis 18:2

(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 containing אִישׁ—in this case, its bare plural form אֲנָשִׁים—by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)

This is the first of about two dozen instances where אִישׁ is used to refer to supernatural messengers or guides. (The Tanakh regularly applies אִישׁ to a variety of non-human entities—including also animals, inanimate objects, and abstract sets.) When ancient Hebrew speakers needed to help their audience to mentally situate and keep track of non-human entities, אִישׁ was available to perform its same prototypical situating function as for persons.

As usual, the prototypical (and therefore highly available) meaning of a situating noun is in play: it use profiles its referent as a participant whose presence is essential for grasping the schematically described situation. In this case, the referents are profiled as a situationally definitive group participant.

As for rendering into English, the NJPS ‘men’ is no longer appropriate, because that word's meaning has since become too gendered and human-oriented; it has lost its classical ability to simply indicate situatedness in such a context of use. In such cases, the present edition prefers the label “figure(s).” This noun emulates the basic situating function of אִישׁ by downplaying the qualities of the referent, focusing attention on their presence as being definitive in the situation.