Commento su Numeri 32:19

מעבר לירדן וגו׳ ON THE SIDE OF THE JORDAN AND YONDER — i.e., on the western side.

FOR OUR INHERITANCE HAS COME TO US — “we have already received it on the eastern side [of the Jordan].” This is Rashi’s language. But it would not be correct for them to speak in this manner in front of Moses, saying, “we have already received it,” for it was not up to them, but on his will that the matter depended, and they did not receive it until he [decided to] give it to them. Instead, [the explanation of their words is that] they said to Moses: “For you do not have to give us an inheritance with them, thereby making their inheritance in their good Land smaller, for an inheritance which is suitable for us has come to us, since it is a land [fit] for cattle, and we have more cattle than the other tribes.” This they said in the nature of a request, not by way of contention. Or perhaps they said: “For we will not inherit with them, because even if you do not want to give us the land [on the east side of the Jordan] now, we will cross over together with them [the rest of the children of Israel], we and all that we have, but we will not inherit with them, for we will return to this land which is the inheritance that is suitable for us, and which we want, and which none of the other tribes want at all.”

כי לא ננחל אתם, "for we will not inherit with them, etc." They added this as the reason why they would wait until the other tribes had received their inheritance before returning themselves. They wanted to make it plain that they had excluded themselves from an inheritance on the West Bank. Alternatively, they wanted to demonstrate that the fact that they had chosen to remain on the East Bank had nothing to do with their being afraid to face the Canaanites as Moses had implied. Their reason was simply that they had already received their heritage.

כי באה נחלתינו אלינו, ”for our inheritance has already come to us.” According to Rashi they meant that they already considered their share on the east bank as a fait accomplit, as an irreversible fact. Nachmanides argues that it would be most inappropriate for these tribes to speak in such terms in Moses’ presence, as it had only been promised to them conditionally. What they said was that they did not plan to inherit with the other tribes on the west bank and to thereby reduce the size of the other tribes’ inheritance, seeing that they had already received their allocation on the east bank. They phrased all this as a request, pointing out that since they owned more cattle than the other tribes this would be appropriate as the land on the east bank was admirably suited for grazing cattle.

On the western [bank]. Rashi was answering the question: Their inheritance was also across the Yardein, so why did they say, “We do not want to take possession…”? Therefore, Rashi explains that “across the Yardein” means the western [bank], meaning that they did not take land on the western side, only on the eastern [bank], as it is written afterwards, “For our inheritance came to us to the east…”

כי באה נחלתנו FOR OUR INHERITANCE HAS COME [TO US] — This means: by that time we shall have already received it on the eastern side.