So Abimelech warned all the people: So suggests a conclusion. We may also translate the Hebrew connective here as “Then” or “After that.” Warned translates a verb meaning to “charge,” “command,” or “order.” Speiser says “Abimelech issued orders to….” Because the order carries with it the threat of death, warned is satisfactory in English. All the people means all the people of Gerar, or all Abimelech’s people.

Whoever touches … death: touch is used here, not in the usual sense of placing the hand in contact with something, but rather to hurt, harm, or act violently against. New Jerusalem Bible, Biblia Dios Habla Hoy say “molests,” Good News Translation “mistreats,” Revised English Bible “harmed.” Be put to death translates a Hebrew construction made up of two forms of the verb “die” and has the literal sense of “die the death,” but the sense is as in Revised Standard Version, or we may say “be killed.” In languages that do not use the passive, it will be necessary to say something like “will die,” “they will kill them,” or “I will order my men to kill him.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .