Numbers 16

f mind. - 29 If these men die the common death of all men, or if they be visited after the visitation of all men; then the Lord hath not sent me. swallowed them up, and their houses, and all appeared. _ 33 They, and all that appertained to them, that, by the rejection of their offerings, his honour and integrity might be vindicated, The awful appeal is now made: Korah gathers his party round the door of the congregation, while the 250 daring chiefs light the censers from the sacred altar. The glory of the Lord now appears in awful splendour, and Moses and Aaron are commanded to withdraw, that the whole congregation may be consumed; but they fall upon their faces, and, like the great antitype of Moses, plead for mercy to their enemies. The address is here made to “the God of spirits,”

a plain indication that they did not consider man as composed of flesh only; and when they call him “the God of the spirits of all flesh,” they also intimate that he was the God of all men, and “not of the Jews only,” as St. Paul expresses it, (Romans 3:29). This appeal to God, as the father of spirits, to pity his own offering, and not to punish the innocent with the guilty, had the desired effect. The congregation are ordered to withdraw from the tents of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram; whilst they, to show their hardihood and presumption, come and stand boldly in the door of their tents, till the earth opens and swallows them in a moment; while, at the same time, fire “from the Lord,” that is, from the cloud of glory, destroys the 250 men who were offering incense within the courts.—‘‘O God!

how terrible art thou in thy works! Through the greatness of thy power shall thine enemies submit themselves unto thee!” ((Psalms 66:3).) ‘Ver. 23—50. The punishment of the insurgents.—On this awful event, the late learned editor of Calmet very sensibly remarks:—* The history of the punishment of Korah is among the most striking instances of the divine power, exerted to 40 To be a memorial unto the children of Israel, that no stranger, which is not of the seed of Aaron, come near to offer incense before the Lord; that he be not as Korah, and as his company: as the Lord said to him. 44 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Let the earth swallow men and their dwellings, when it opens its abysses; there is nothing in that beyond the powers of nature.

When the earth trembles, those countries which are the seat of this disturbance must crumble into dust by the shock. Sicily and Italy furnish innumerable instances in proof of these assertions; yet even in these instances, though not miraculous, it is God who produces such commotions. All the works of nature are works of God. But here, while the earth is composed and tranquil, the man of God foretells the time, the place, the people concerned, and the manner in which this prodigy should happen; and this not in Sicily, not in Italy, not in a country undermined by subterranean fires, but in the sandy desert of Arabia, where rocks probably form the general under strata, and sand the upper; where earthquakes are little known, except by report; and where little expectation of this threat’s fulfilment could arise in the minds of the hearers, from general appearances, or from supposable natural causes.

Yet here, at the time appointed, the earth opens her mouth, and swallows down into her profound abysses the whole company of rebels: leaving no trace of them remaining, but by the void where they had been. It is good to remark here, in passing, that the great part of the miracles wrought to establish the Jewish religion were of a terrific nature, and often involved the ruin of a multitude of transgressors: witness, this destruction of Korah and his accomplices. On the contrary, the miracles wrought in establishing the truth of the Gospel were salutary and benevolent, as well to the enemies as to the friends of religion.” After this awful catastrophe, we might very naturally expect to hear of no more insurrections in the camp; but how obdu-

Notes on the verses

Chap. XVI. Ver. 1-22. The rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram.—Korah, who was related to Moses and Aaron, was of the family of the Kohathites, which encamped on the south side of the tabernacle; Dathan, and Abiram, and On, were all of the tribe of Reuben, which encamped behind the family of Kohath: but as On is only mentioned in the opening of the narrative, we may hope he repented and escaped; as did also, by some unknown means, the sons of Korah, as we read ch. xxvi. 11: and their descendants became famous, as singers, in the time of David, for several of his Psalms are particularly addressed to them. The ground of this insurrection was evidently Chap. XVI. Ver. 1, 2. Now Korah, &c.—[{As the word men is not in the text, some read “took counsel;’’ and some, ‘“ took courage.’’ Houbigant renders yikkach, “‘ they rebelled;”’

which scarcely any rule of criticism can ever justify. Dr. Geddes’ translation is, ‘* Another insurrection was raised against Moses by Korah,” &c. Others think that it may mean, ‘“ behaved with insolence.”” But, as Dr. A. Clarke observes, the verb wyyikkach, ‘and he took,” which, though at the end of the sentence in English, is the first word in Hebrew, is not in the plural, but the singular; and hence cannot be applied to the acts of all these chiefs. In every part of the Scripture, where this rebellion is referred to, it is attributed to Korah; therefore, the verb here belongs to him; and the whole verse should be translated: ‘* Now Korah, son of Izhar, son of Kohath, son of Levi, he took even Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, son of Peleth, son of Reuben, and they rose up,”

&c.; reading with some MSS., the Samaritan, and Septuagint, ben, son, instead of beney, sons.)—Bagster. company are gathered together against the Lord: and what is Aaron, that ye murmur against him? c.3.9. 12 | And Moses sent to call Dathan and Abiram; they will not come up. 15 And Moses was very wroth, and said unto them, 17 And take every man his censer, and put incense in them, and bring ye before the Lord every man his censer, two hundred and fifty censers; thou also and Aaron each of you. Rel. 84. | 291 Separate yourselves from among this envy at the superior honour of Moses the legislator, and Aaron the high priest. They pretended that, as the people were holy, they were all equally entitled to act as priests, and to take a share in the government.

By this palatable doctrine of equality, they persuaded 250 of the princes, leading men, famous in the congregation, to join them, and a great number of the lower classes sided with them. The 250 principal persons here referred to were evidently of different tribes, (Reubenites chiefly,) who had excited popularity by their levelling principles, claiming equal rights with the house of Aaron; they fill their censers from the sacred altar in defiance of the divine prohibition, and in sight of the miraculous cloud by which it was guarded, challenge the awful issue. The reasoning of Moses on this occasion is temperate and affectionate: ‘‘Hear, I pray you, ye sons of Levi;” and then he represents to them the privileges which they put in waiting upon God in the tabernacle, and the folly of aspiring to the priests’ office, which had been assigned to the house of Aaron.

It is by performing the duties assigned to us, and not by aspiring to those of others, that we may hope to receive the approbation of our divine Master. The conduct of Dathan and Abiram was, however, particularly insulting, not only to Moses, but to the Lord. They characterize Egypt, instead of Canaan, as the land “flowing with milk and honey;” and charge the Hebrew legislator with acting from motives of ambition and private interest, from which no man was ever more free. At this, therefore, Moses was very wroth, protested his innocence before God, and, in the decree, Ver. 14, Wilt thou put out (Hebrew, “bore out”?) the eyes of these men?— The meaning is, wilt thou blind these men by thine artful pretensions?

thus denying the divine mission of Moses. Ver. 15. Not taken one ass.—‘Though Moses was their ruler, under God, yet so far from oppressing them, he had not imposed the smallest tax, nor taken, as a present, so much as an ass from one of them. The common present that is now made to the great, in these countries, is a horse; but there is reason to believe, that an ass might formerly have answered the same purpose. “It is a visit of ceremony from a bashaw,” says Dr. Russell, “or other person in power, a fine horse, sometimes with furniture, or some such valuable present, is made to him at his departure.” ‘As asses were esteemed no dishonourable beasts for the saddle, Sir J. Chardin, in his MS., supposes, that when Samuel disclaimed having taken the ass of any one, (1 Sa. xi, 3.) he is to be understood of not having taken any ass for his riding. In the same light he considers this similar declaration of Moses. His reason is, “asses being then esteemed very honourable creatures for riding on, (ch. xxii. 21, 30. Ju. v. 10. (1 Samuel 16:2).) as they are at this very time in Persia, being rode with saddles.” See Harmer, Observations. |—Bagster. Ver. 22. Spirits.—We have a striking instance of the manner in which the Jews distinguished between flesh and spirit, in the prophets of Isaiah, (Numbers 31:3). ‘‘The Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses are flesh, and not spirit.”’ Ver. 26. Depart, &c.—‘The rebels, with all that belonged to them, were, as an accursed thing, devoted to utter destruction.

((Leviticus 27:28-29). (Joshua 7:13-15). 23—26.) The people therefore were forbidden to touch any thing belonging to them; that they might enter a solemn protest against their wickedness, their punishment, and express their fear of being acknowledged the justice involved in it.’–Bagster Ver. 30, Make a new thing.—Hebrew, ‘Create a creation."’ It is probable this was the first earthquake, at least the first the Israelites had heard of. Ver. 33. Went down alive into the pit.—The Hebrew reads, into Sheol, commonly rendered hell, and sometimes the grave. But we are not hence to infer the eternal perdition of all their wives and children, though little hope is to be entertained of the principal transgressors, Ver.

41. On the morrow.—It is not unlikely, that the people persuaded themselves that Moses and Aaron had used some cunning in this business; and that the earthquake and fire were artificial; for, had they discerned the hand of God in the punishment, they would scarcely have dared the anger of the Lord in the very face of his justice. And while they thus absurdly imputed this judgment to Moses and Aaron, they impiously called the persons, thus perishing in their rebellion, ‘‘the people of the Lord!” — Bagster. Ver. 46. Plague is begun.—{God now punished them by a secret blast, so as to put the matter beyond dispute—his hand, and his alone, was seen, not only in the plague, but in the manner in which the mortality was arrested.

It was necessary that it should be done in this way, that the whole congregation might see that these men who had perished were not “the people of the Lord,” and that God, not Moses and Aaron, had destroyed them. ]—Bagster. Ver. 48. The plague was stayed.— What this plague was is not said; most likely a pestilential disease, communicated by a blast of air, and which was spreading so rapidly, that in the short time it raged, 14,700 died, beside those who had suffered the day before, by fire and earthquake.