Numbers 32

The destruction of the power of Midian, who might have harassed them from the east, secured to Israel the quiet possession of the district east of Jordan, which their arms had already conquered. All along, from the river Arnon in the south, which divided Israel from Moab, to the river Jabbok and far beyond it, the land of Gilead and of Bashan, their borders were safe from hostile attacks. The accounts of travellers are unanimous in describing that district as specially suited for pastoral purposes. We read of magnificent park-like scenery, of wide upland pastures, and rich forests, which everywhere gladden the eye. No wonder that those of the tribes which had all along preserved their nomadic habits, and whose flocks and herds constituted their main possessions and their wealth, should wish to settle in those plains and mountains. To them they were in very truth the land of promise, suited to their special wants, and offering the very riches which they desired. The other side Jordan had little attraction for them; and its possession would have been the opposite of advantageous to a strictly pastoral people. Accordingly, “the children of Gad” and “the children of Reuben” requested of Moses: “Let this land be given unto thy servants for a possession, and bring us not over Jordan” (Nu. 32 : 5) A. E.

The Arnon was the southern limit of the trans-

Jordanic Palestine. “From Arnon to Hermon” was equivalent on the east side to “from Dan to Beersheba” on the west. The river absolutely splits by its narrow channel the great Moab range to their very base, for several thousand feet; yet its channel is not more than one hundred feet wide. South of it Israel never extended their conquests; while those north of it were, as we have seen, soon lost, at least as far as Heshbon. It is therefore difficult to separate the history of Reuben from that of Moab. H. B. T.—The part assigned to Reuben stretched from the deep chasm of the Arnon north to a line with the head of the Dead Sea; Gad secured the region from the limits of Reuben’s territory to the Jabbok, across the whole breadth of the country, and also a strip along the east side of the Jordan, to the Sea of Chinnereth, better known as the Lake of Galilee. Thence to the foot of Lebanon was made over to Manasseh. Geikie.

The trans-Jordanic territory was the forestland, the pasture-land of Palestine. The smooth downs received a special name, “Mishor,” expressive of their contrast with the rough and rocky soil of the west. The “oaks” of Bashan, which still fill the traveller with admiration, were to the prophets and psalmists of Israel the chief glory of the vegetation of their common country. The vast herds of wild cattle which then wandered through the woods were at once the terror and pride of the Israelite—“the fat bulls of Bashan.”

In the encampment of Israel two tribes, Reuben and Gad, were pre-eminently nomadic. They had “a very great multitude of cattle.” For this they desired the land, and for this it was given to them, “that they might build cities for their little ones, and folds for their sheep.” In no other case is the relation between the territory and its occupiers so expressly laid down, and such it continued to be to the end. From first to last they alone of the tribes never emerged from the state of their Patriarchal ancestors. Gad and Reuben accordingly divided the kingdom of Sihon between them—that is, the territory between the Arnon and the Jabbok, and the eastern side of the valley of the Jordan up to the Lake of Chinnereth or Gennesaret. The northern outposts of the eastern tribes were intrusted to that portion of Manasseh which had originally attacked and expelled the Amorite inhabitants from Gilead. The same martial spirit which fitted the western Manasseh to defend the passes of Esdraelon fitted “Machir, the first-born of Manasseh, the father of Gilead,” to defend the passes of

Hauran and Anti-Libanus; “because he was a man of war, therefore he had Gilead and Bashan.” The pastoral character common to Gad and Reuben was shared, but in a much less degree, by these descendants of the ruling tribe of Joseph. Stanley.—Machir, Jair, and Nobah, chiefs of Manasseh, were valiant warriors, whose deeds are frequently recorded. It was Jair who took all the tract of Argob with its sixty great cities; and Nobah who took Kenath and its dependencies; and we are told that because Machir was a man of war, therefore he had Gilead and Bashan. These districts, as we have seen, were the most difficult in the whole country, for they embraced the hills of Gilead, and the almost impregnable tract known as the Lejah, or “refuge,” from the security which its natural fortifications afforded. But Manasseh also, like Reuben and Gad, affected by its position and its isolation, gradually fell into the wandering shepherd life, and ceased to be a power in Israel. Nor did it even remain true to its ancient faith, but, like the other tribes of the east of Jordan, gave itself up to the local idolatry. Geikie.

17-23. They promised to go armed before the children of Israel. “Nay” (says Moses), “ye shall go armed before the Lord. It is God’s cause more than your brethren’s, and to him you must have an eye, not to them only.” Upon this condition he grants them this land, and neither sin nor blame should cleave to it; neither sin before God nor blame before Israel; and whatever possessions we have, it is desirable thus to come guiltless to them. But he warns them of the danger of breaking their word: If you fail, you sin against the Lord (verse 23), and not against your brethren only, and be sure your sin will find you out—that is, “God will certainly reckon with you for it, though you may make a light matter of it.” Sin will find out the sinner sooner or later. It concerns us therefore to find our sins out that we may repent of and forsake them, lest our sins find us out to our ruin and confusion. H.

Moses consents to the request of the Reubenites and Gadites on certain conditions; but is very earnest that the conditions which he prescribed should be punctually observed. Accordingly he represents sin, by which he means the consequence of sin, under the strong image of a person, who should certainly find out every transgressor among them that did not punctually perform the condition to which he had agreed. Gilpin.—The expression, “Sin will find you out,” is more emphatic than as if he had simply said, You shall not escape God’s hand; for the meaning of it is that vengeance is so connected with sin, that it cannot be severed from it. Thus, in Gen. 4: 7 it is said, “Sin lieth at the door” to lay hold at length of the guilty. Calv.—Moses meant to say, “Ye will recognize your sin when it overtakes you.” Men fail to recognize their sin at the time; often, that it is a sin at all; generally, how great a sin it is in deed. Then when it overtakes them in its consequences, then they see it in its true light. The awfulness of sin is not due to its awful consequences, but it is manifested by them. The particular sin against which Moses warned them was the sin of selfishly deserting their brethren, and thereby discouraging and enfeebling them. And this is a sin as great as it is common, the disastrous consequences of which are most sadly evident. R. W.—These words, though ultimately true of every sin, are spoken of actions which, going forth from us, perform their mischievous errands, but will come home again, bringing retribution with them. Sinners indulge vague hopes of impunity; they act as though they said, “The Lord shall not see” (Ps. 94: 7). But they cannot escape from sin. Lapse of time will not annihilate sin; careful concealment will not hide it up; mere repentance will not avert all its consequences. Nor will death screen from detection. Prout.

Men’s sins often find them out, though no visible sign or token may betray this fact to the world. All may outwardly stand fair; there may be no breach in the worldly prosperity; nay, this may be ampler, more strongly established than ever; while yet there may be that within which forbids to rejoice, which takes all the joy and the gladness out of life—the memory of that old sin which was as nothing when committed, but which now darkens all, the deadly arrow poisoning the springs of life, which will not drop from the side, which no force, no art of man’s device can withdraw. Is there not here one whose sin has found him out? Nor is it only the wicked whose sins thus come round to them again. God will not allow his own children to escape any more than the children of this present world. But there is still something which we can do. We can turn the table on our sins, and instead of waiting for them to find us out, we, earnestly seeking by aid of that candle which the Lord has lighted in us, may find them out; and then we have the sure word of promise that if we will judge ourselves we shall not be judged of the Lord. Trench.

33. “And unto half the tribe of Manasseh.”

As no mention has been previously made of this tribe in this connection, we are left to conjecture why it should have been divided at all, and why the one half should have received the remote regions of Northern Gilead and Bashan. The enormous increase in the tribal numbers during the wanderings may have made the division more advisable, and the adventurous and independent character of the Machirites may have rendered it almost a necessity. They had not apparently preferred any request to Moses, but since the trans-Jordanic territory was to be occupied, Moses probably recognized their claim to the conquests they had made. R. W.—It would seem that Moses, when assigning to the pastoral tribes the inheritance which they desired, took opportunity at the same time to appropriate to these Manassites specially the district they had already subdued. Thus the whole of the conquered country was provisionally disposed of, and the forwardness and valor of the Machirites rewarded. It seems clear from verse 39 and Josh. 17 : 1, that the claims of the Machirites arose simply out of their exploits. The notices of the conquest of northeast Gilead and Bashan by the Machirites plainly intimate that it was effected by a few chiefs of great military prowess, who overran rapidly a far larger district than they could colonize. The tribe of Manasseh was the least numerous of all at Sinai, and only stood sixth in the census recently held; yet it eventually received on the west of Jordan a territory as large on the average as fell to the other tribes.

34. The leading city of the first group is Dibon; called, from the possession which the Gadites now took of it, Dibon-gad. It lay four miles north of the Arnon, and its extensive ruins still bear the name Dhiban. It was here that the Moabite stone was discovered by the Rev. T. Klein, in 1868. Occupied on the first acquisition of the territory by the Gadites, and assigned by Joshua to the Reubenites, it was eventually recaptured by the Moabites, in whose hands it remained. Espin.—A wall runs round the town, and just within the gateway the famous Moabite stone, containing an inscription of King Mesha, was found. The inscription gives a brief account of King Mesha and his father, tells of the victorious campaigns of the former, and contains a record of the rebuilding of certain cities in Moab; among the names which appear are Jehovah, Israel, Omri, Chemosh, Dibon, Baal-meon, Horonaim, Kerioth, etc. A short distance south of Dhiban, on the “brink” of the torrent Arnon, are the featureless ruins of Araar, the ancient Aroer, the southern point of the territory of Sihon, King of the Amorites, and afterward of the tribe of Reuben. Wilson.

37,38. The Reubenites established themselves more compactly than the Gadites. Their central city was the old Amoitish capital, Heshbon. They occupied also Elealeh, now el-‘Al, a mile to the northeast; Nebo, probably three miles to the southwest, and Baal-meon, now apparently Myun, nearly two miles to the south. It is obvious that neither the Reubenites nor the Gadites were the founders of the cities of which they thus took possession, and which the text describes them as “building.” They probably fortified them, for the first time or afresh, so as to render them places of safety for their families during the campaigns on the other side of the Jordan, and provided them with all conveniences for their flocks and herds. Espin

De. 3 : 14. Unto this day. Why this phrase, when the conquest had occurred only three full months before? The phrase, used seven times in Genesis, never once in the three later books, reappears in De. 2 : 12, 22, in reference to the occupation of Seir and the conquest of the Horites. This was the first instance of the overthrow of a giant race by the posterity of Abraham, and the possession of Bashan was the last. Five similar events had occurred, and the latest, like the earliest, was an accomplished fact, marked by an abiding and settled change of possessors. Thus the use of the phrase by Moses is emphatic and significant. All the giant races outside of Canaan are at length finally vanquished and displaced. It remains only for Israel to overthrow the dreaded Anakims, and enter their promised inheritance. This day beholds Edom in the land of the Horims, Moab in that of the Emiims, Ammon in that of the Zamzummims, and Manasseh in the land of Og, the last remnant of the giants. To-morrow, then, must see the Anakims overthrown, and Israel settled in their stead. The use of the phrase is thus no objection to the Mosaic authorship, but its strong confirmation. Birks

Nu. 33 : 50-56. The expulsion of the Canaanites and the destruction of their monuments of idolatry had been already enjoined, and verse 54 is substantially a repetition from 26 : 53-55. But the solemn warning of verses 55, 56 is new. A call for it had been furnished by their past transgressions in the matter of Baal-peor, by their imperfect fulfilment, at the first, of Moses’ orders in the Midianitish war; and perhaps by the indulgence of the Machirites to those whom they conquered in Bashan (32 : 42). Espin.

55. Since God did not at once cast out the Canaanites, but made their conquest dependent on the faith of the Israelites, he thus secured an instrument for the punishment of their unbelief and disobedience, and so proved that his favor for them was not inconsiderate, but that they would be treated as the Canaanites if they resembled them in their character. D. M — 56. The righteous God would turn that wheel upon the Israelites which was to have crushed the Canaanites. I shall do to you as I thought to do unto them. It was intended that the Canaanites should be dispossessed, but if the Israelites fell in with them and learned their way, they should be dispossessed, for God’s displeasure would justly be greater against them than against the Canaanites themselves. Let us hear this, and fear. If we do not drive sin out, sin will drive us out; if we be not the death of our lusts, our lusts will be the death of our souls. H.