Numbers 1
SIBThe Israelites had been numbered a few months before, when the ransom-money was collected for the service of the tabernacle, Exod. xxxviii
Numbers 1:26
Now (1) Moses, Aaron, and the twelve princes of their tribes, are appointed of God to number them again, in order to rank them into proper divisions in their camp, to distinguish them from others, and to manifest God’s fulfilment of his promises to the patriarchs in the multiplication of their seed; 1—16. (2) The number of fighting men in every tribe, and the sum of the whole are stated; 17—46. (3) The Levites are not numbered among them, as they were not to fight but to serve at the tabernacle; 47—54. And the LORD spake unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tabernacle of the congregation, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they were come out of the land of Egypt, saying, 2 Take ye the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel, after their families, by the house of their fathers, with the number of their names, every male by their polls; 3 From twenty years old and upward, all that are able to go forth to war in Israel: thou and Aaron shall number them by their armies. 4 And with you there shall be a man of every tribe; every one head of the house of his fathers. 5 ¶ And these are the names of the men that shall stand with you: Of the tribe of Reuben; Elizur the son of Shedeur. 6 Of Simeon; Shelumiel the son of Zerushaddai. 7 Of Judah; Nashon the son of Amminadab. 8 Of Issachar; Nethaneel the son of Zuar. 9 Of Zebulun; Eliab the son of Heion. 10 Of the children of Joseph: of Ephraim; Elishama the son of AmmiBefore Christ 1490. Ch. 26. 2. Deut. 24. 2 Son. 24. 9. 2 Ch. 26. 11. & 17. 13-18. Ver. 1-15. & 2-3. 1. & 5. 10-8. & 16. 14-27. & 34. 1-28. & 13. 2-15. 1 Chr. 27. 1-22. Ch. 2. 1-51. & 7. 10-3. & 10. 14-27. & 7. 18-28. with Col. 29. 32-5. & 36. 5-20. 22. 17-26. & 46. 8-24. & 51. Ex. 1. 2-5. Deut. 24. Rev. 7. 4-8. Ruth 4. 25. 1 Chr. 2. 10. 11. Mat. 1. 4. Luke 3. 29
REFLECTIONS UPON CHAP. I.—In this numbered people I discern the true Israel of God, numerous as the sand by the sea-shore; all numbered of Jesus, and written in his book of life; all under his government and laws, declared by his prophets and apostles; all ranked in goodly order in their respective generations, for the wars of the Lord; and all honourably distinguished from the world, that lieth in wickedness, and from the mixed multitude of hypocrites. Here likewise I may observe that ministers and magistrates ought to take heed to every one of the flocks over whom the Lord hath made them overseers: that the more honour any one hath conferred upon him, the more active he ought to be in well-doing, according to his station; and to do without delay whatever the Lord requires of him. When I see the numbers of the respective tribes so little proportioned to their families at their entrance into Egypt, about two hundred and fifteen years before, I cannot but think how little even outward things go by common probabilities, and how unstable all created comforts are. When I read the sum total, I see how truly and marvellously God, in a few years, fulfilled his promises in multiplying the patriarchs’ posterity, notwithstanding all that the Egyptians could do to diminish them. Who likewise but must admire the liberal kindness of God, in forty years’ miraculous maintenance of such multitudes of sinners; while he discerns the destructive nature of sin, which, in forty years, buried them all but two in the earth, and most of them in hell! When I see the Levites distinguished from the rest, let me think how honourably God rewarded their honest zeal against the worshippers of the golden calf; and that ministers ought to be more holy than ordinary saints, to exert themselves to the utmost to prevent the sins of others; and that, though they are not to entangle themselves in worldly business, or in intimacy with carnal men, yet they are not to be idle, but spiritual, soldiers of Christ, set for the defence of his church and gospel