1And these are the generations of Aaron and Moses on the day the LORD spoke with Moses on Mount Sinai. 2And these are the names of the sons of Aaron: the firstborn Nadab, and Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar. 3These are the names of the sons of Aaron, the anointed priests whom he installed to serve as priests. 4And Nadab and Abihu died before the LORD when they brought forward unfit fire before the LORD in the Wilderness of Sinai, and sons they did not have, and Eleazar and Ithamar served as priests in the lifetime of Aaron their father.
5And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 6“Bring forward the tribe of Levi, and set them before Aaron the priest, that they may serve him. 7And they shall keep his watch and the watch of all the community before the Tent of Meeting to do the work of the Tabernacle. 8And they shall keep watch over all the furnishings of the Tent of Meeting and the watch of the Israelites to do the work of the Tabernacle. 9And you shall give the Levites to Aaron and to his sons, wholly given shall they be from the Israelites. 10And Aaron and his sons you shall single out, that they keep their priesthood, and the stranger who draws near shall be put to death.” 11And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 12“And as for Me, look, I have taken the Levites from the midst of the Israelites in place of every firstborn womb-breach of the Israelites, that the Levites be Mine. 13For Mine is every firstborn. On the day I struck down every firstborn in the land of Egypt I consecrated to Me every firstborn in Israel from man to beast—Mine they shall be. I am the LORD.”
14And the LORD spoke to Moses in the Wilderness of Sinai, saying, 15“Reckon the Levites by their fathers’ houses, by their clans, every male from a month old and up you shall reckon them.” 16And Moses reckoned them according to the word of the LORD as he had been charged. 17And these were the Levites by their names: Gershon and Kohath and Merari. 18And these are the names of the sons of Gershon by their clans: Libni and Shimei. 19And the sons of Kohath by their clans: Amram and Izhar, Hebron and Uzziel. 20And the sons of Merari by their clans: Mahli and Mushi. These are the clans of Levi by their fathers’ houses. 21To Gershon, the Libnite clan and the Shimeite clan, these are the Gershonite clans. 22Their reckoning, in the number of every male from a month old and up, their reckoning is seven thousand five hundred. 23The Gershonite clans shall camp behind the Tabernacle to the west. 24And the chieftain of the father’s house for the Gershonite, Eliasaph son of Lael. 25And the watch of the Gershonites in the Tent of Meeting, the Tabernacle and the Tent, its cover and the screen of the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, 26and the hangings of the court and the screen of the entrance to the court which is around the Tabernacle and the altar and its cords for all its service. 27And to Kohath, the Amramite clan and the Izharite clan and the Hebronite clan and the Uzzielite clan, these are the Kohathite clans. 28In the number of every male from one month old and up, eight thousand six hundred, keepers of the watch of the sanctuary. 29The clans of the Kohathites shall camp on the side of the Tabernacle to the south. 30And the chieftain of the father’s house for the clans of the Kohathite, Elizaphan son of Uzziel. 31And their watch is the ark and the table and the lamp stand and the altars and the sacred vessels with which they shall serve and the screen and all its work. 32And the chieftain of the chieftains of the Levites is Eleazar son of Aaron the priest, the charge of those who keep the watch of the sanctuary. 33To the Merarite, the Mahlite clan and the Mushite clan, these are the Merarite clans. 34And their reckoning, in the number of every male from one month old and up, six thousand two hundred. 35And the chieftain of the father’s house for the clans of the Merarite, Zuriel son of Abihail. On the side of the Tabernacle they shall camp to the north. 36And the charge of the Merarites, the boards of the Tabernacle and its bars and its posts and its sockets and all its furnishings and all its work, 37and the posts of the court all around and their sockets and their pegs and their cords. 38And those who camped before the Tabernacle to the east before the Tent of Meeting to the east, Moses and Aaron and his sons, keeping the watch of the Tabernacle, for the watch of the Israelites, and the stranger who draws near shall be put to death. 39All the reckonings of the Levites that Moses and Aaron reckoned according to the word of the LORD by their clans, every male from a month old and up—twenty-two thousand.
40And the LORD said to Moses, “Reckon every firstborn male of the Israelites from a month old and up and count the number of their names. 41And you shall take the Levites for Me—I am the LORD—instead of every firstborn among the Israelites, and the cattle of the Levites instead of every firstborn among the cattle of the Israelites.” 42And Moses reckoned as the LORD had charged him every firstborn among the Israelites. 43And all the firstborn males in the number of names from a month old and up in their reckoning came to twenty-two thousand two hundred and seventy-three. 44And the LORD said to Moses, saying, 45“Take the Levites instead of every firstborn among the Israelites and the cattle of the Levites instead of their cattle, and the Levites shall be Mine. I am the LORD. 46And for the redemption of the two hundred seventy-three of the firstborn of the Israelites who exceed the number of the Levites, 47you shall take five shekels for each head, by the sanctuary shekel, you shall take, twenty gerahs to the shekel, 48and you shall give the silver to Aaron and his sons as redemption for those among them who exceed the number.” 49And Moses took the redemption silver from those who exceeded the number of those redeemed by the Levites. 50From the firstborn of the Israelites he took the silver, one thousand three hundred and sixty-five shekels, by the sanctuary shekel. 51And Moses gave the redemption silver to Aaron and to his sons according to the word of the LORD, as the LORD had charged Moses.
CHAPTER 3 NOTES
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1. And these are the generations of Aaron and Moses. Having completed the marching formation of the eleven tribes, the writer now turns to the tribe of Levi, listing its genealogy and its special duties. In keeping with his Priestly perspective, considerably more space is devoted to the Levites than to any of the other tribes.
4. brought forward. The Hebrew verb hiqriv has the overlapping meanings of “bring forward,” “bring near,” “present,” and “sacrifice.” In cultic contexts it suggests bringing before the divine presence or to the altar, and so it is appropriately followed here by “before the LORD.” Compare verse 6, “bring forward the tribe of Levi.”
unfit fire. Literally, “strange fire.” In relation to the cult, “strange” means “unconsecrated,” “unfit.” Compare “the stranger [the same word in the Hebrew] who draws near” in verse 10.
8. keep . . . the watch of the Israelites. The medieval commentators, like their modern heirs, are divided on the interpretation of “keep watch” (shamru mishmeret) and how it relates to the Israelites. Rashi prefers the unmartial sense of mishmeret as “maintenance” and explains that the sundry functions of the Tabernacle were necessarily the actions of the Levites on behalf of the entire community of Israelites. Abraham ibn Ezra, like the present translation, prefers the military sense: “they will keep watch that no Israelite touch the Tabernacle.” The likelihood that the meaning here is “to guard against” is supported by the recurrence in the next verse of the formula, “the stranger who draws near shall be put to death.”
9. wholly given shall they be. The literal sense of the Hebrew is “given, given shall they be.” “Given” in this context obviously means “dedicated,” “appointed,” but again the translation seeks to reflect the stylistic tendency of biblical Hebrew to use general terms for technical senses.
12. that the Levites be Mine. There may be an implicit etymological pun here. “Levite” (lewi) is the name of Jacob’s second son and hence of the tribe, but the name could suggest the verbal stem l-w-h, “to accompany,” “to attach to,” which is the role of the Levites vis-à-vis the deity.
15. every male from a month old and up. Unlike the other tribes, whose census is the vehicle of an explicit military conscription and hence based on the age of twenty and over, the Levites are dedicated to God for their whole lives. The count begins not from birth but from one month because given the prevalence of infant mortality, only after a month is the child regarded as a viable person (an explanation duly noted by several of the medieval commentators).
16. according to the word of the LORD. The literal meaning of the Hebrew is “by the mouth of the LORD.” Jacob Milgrom’s proposal that the phrase refers not to divine command but to oracle has not found general acceptance. In verse 51, this phrase appears to be in apposition with “as the LORD had charged.”
41. instead of every firstborn among the Israelites. This injunction picks up the idea enunciated in Exodus 13 and elsewhere that, after the rescue of the Israelite firstborn in Egypt, some form of “redemption” or substitution for the firstborn was owed to God. Here the Levites, dedicated from infancy to the divine cult, serve as substitutes. Behind this law stands an archaic background in which cultic functions were performed by the firstborn instead of by a priestly caste.
46. exceed the number. The concept of “number” is in this context implied by the Hebrew verb ‘adaf, which means to “go beyond the limit,” “spill over the edge,” “exceed.”
47. you shall take five shekels for each head. How would the Israelites know who were the 273 who exceeded the number of the Levites and hence had to pay this price of redemption? Several early rabbinic sources plausibly suggest that a lottery was conducted to select the 273.
by the sanctuary shekel. “Shekel” means “weight” and is not a coin, coinage coming into Israelite life only in the Late Biblical period. The sanctuary shekel, about 11.4 grams, was heavier than the commercial shekel.
48. the silver. Although this word has the approximate sense of “money” (the meaning it frequently has in later Hebrew), what is given to Aaron and his sons are weights of silver, so it is preferable to render the term as “silver.”