Numbers26chapter 26

Numbers 26:1-4

The first census was taken by Moses and Aaron in the wilderness of Sinai. This one is taken by Moses and Eleazar in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho, because Aaron died at mount Hor in 20:28 and his son wears the garments now. The terms are word for word what chapter 1 used, from twenty years old and upward, all that are able to go to war. Counting begins again after the plague of chapter 25, which had taken twenty and four thousand men.

Numbers 26:5-11

The roll of Reuben stops in the middle of itself to tell a story. Dathan and Abiram are entered in their place in the family tree, and the text says what became of them, that the earth opened her mouth and they became a sign. Verse 11 then adds a line the narrative of chapter 16 never gave, that the children of Korah died not. That house sings afterward, since 1 Chronicles 6:22 and 6:33 run Samuel and Heman out of it and eleven psalms carry the sons of Korah in their titles.

Numbers 26:12-18

Simeon comes out of the wilderness at twenty and two thousand and two hundred, down from fifty and nine thousand and three hundred at Sinai. That is a loss of more than thirty seven thousand men and the heaviest fall of any tribe, and 25:14 had just named Zimri, the man slain at Peor, as a prince of a chief house among the Simeonites. Gad falls too, by about five thousand. The chapter reports both numbers and says nothing about either.

Numbers 26:19-22

The sons of Judah were Er and Onan: Er and Onan are written into Judah's roll and struck out of it in the same verse, since they died in the land of Canaan and left no family to carry a name. Genesis 38 is where that happened, and the son born afterward is Pharez, whose family stands here. Ruth 4:18-22 runs Pharez down to David and Matthew 1:3 runs him down to Christ. Judah is the largest tribe in both censuses, seventy and six thousand and five hundred here against seventy and four thousand and six hundred at Sinai.

Numbers 26:23-28

Issachar and Zebulun both grow, Issachar by nine thousand nine hundred and Zebulun by three thousand one hundred. The tribes are taken in the order chapter 1 used, with one change, that Manasseh is named before Ephraim. Jacob crossed his hands to set Ephraim first at Genesis 48:14, and the numbers in the verses that follow run the other way.

Numbers 26:29-34

Manasseh is counted through Machir and Gilead, and the six sons of Gilead give the six families of the tribe. The list reaches Hepher, then Zelophehad, and then records five names a muster roll had no need of, Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah and Tirzah. A daughter has no standing in a count of men able to go to war, and these five are written in anyway. Chapter 27 is where they come and ask for a share of the inheritance this census is being taken to divide.

Numbers 26:35-41

Ephraim loses eight thousand men and comes in at thirty and two thousand and five hundred, twenty thousand below Manasseh. Benjamin had ten sons at Genesis 46:21 and five of them head families here, and the chapter gives no reason for the other five. Benjamin has grown by ten thousand men since Sinai even so.

Numbers 26:42-47

Dan has one son, one family, and sixty and four thousand and four hundred men, second in size only to Judah. Ten sons of Benjamin produced fewer fighting men than the one son of Dan. Asher grows by nearly twelve thousand, and his roll closes on a woman, Sarah his daughter, whom the list of Genesis 46:17 calls Serah. She and the five daughters of Zelophehad are the only women this census names.

Numbers 26:48-51

Naphtali closes the tribes eight thousand men down. The whole comes to six hundred thousand and a thousand seven hundred and thirty, against six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty at Sinai in 1:46. Forty years, a plague, a rebellion swallowed by the ground and a generation buried, and the fighting strength of Israel is smaller by one thousand eight hundred and twenty men. Every man in this total is a different man from the men in that one.

Numbers 26:52-56

Here the chapter says what the counting was for. The land is divided according to the number of names, more to the many and less to the few, and it is also divided by lot. Two rules govern one act, the size of a tribe fixing how much ground it holds and the lot fixing which ground. Joshua 14 to 19 is where this is carried out, and Proverbs 16:33 gives the ground the lot stands on.

Numbers 26:57-62

Levi is counted apart, as in chapter 3, and by another rule, every male from a month old and upward rather than every man of twenty able to fight. Verse 62 gives the reason in the same breath, that there was no inheritance given them among the children of Israel. The roll stops at Amram's house to name Jochebed, and at Aaron's to record that Nadab and Abihu died when they offered strange fire, which Leviticus 10:1-2 tells. Levi comes to twenty and three thousand, a thousand more than at Sinai.

Numbers 26:63-65

This is the verse the book has been moving toward since Kadesh. Of the six hundred thousand men counted in the wilderness of Sinai there was not a man of them left, and the sentence passed at 14:29-30 is reported here as carried out. Two names are the exception, Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun, the two who brought back the other report. Deuteronomy 2:14-15 says the last of that generation was gone before Israel crossed the brook Zered.