4/1/11
Numbers 33-34
The Stages of Israel’s Journey from Egypt
Numbers 33:1 These are the stages by which the Israelites went out of the land of Egypt in military formation under the leadership of Moses and Aaron. 2 Moses wrote down their starting points, stage by stage, by command of the Lord; and these are their stages according to their starting places. 3 They set out from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month; on the day after the passover the Israelites went out boldly in the sight of all the Egyptians, 4 while the Egyptians were burying all their firstborn, whom the Lord had struck down among them. The Lord executed judgments even against their gods.
5 So the Israelites set out from Rameses, and camped at Succoth. 6 They set out from Succoth, and camped at Etham, which is on the edge of the wilderness. 7 They set out from Etham, and turned back to Pi-hahiroth, which faces Baal-zephon; and they camped before Migdol. 8 They set out from Pi-hahiroth, passed through the sea into the wilderness, went a three days’ journey in the wilderness of Etham, and camped at Marah. 9 They set out from Marah and came to Elim; at Elim there were twelve springs of water and seventy palm trees, and they camped there. 10 They set out from Elim and camped by the Red Sea. 11 They set out from the Red Sea and camped in the wilderness of Sin. 12 They set out from the wilderness of Sin and camped at Dophkah. 13 They set out from Dophkah and camped at Alush. 14 They set out from Alush and camped at Rephidim, where there was no water for the people to drink. 15 They set out from Rephidim and camped in the wilderness of Sinai. 16 They set out from the wilderness of Sinai and camped at Kibroth-hattaavah. 17 They set out from Kibroth-hattaavah and camped at Hazeroth. 18 They set out from Hazeroth and camped at Rithmah. 19 They set out from Rithmah and camped at Rimmon-perez. 20 They set out from Rimmon-perez and camped at Libnah. 21 They set out from Libnah and camped at Rissah. 22 They set out from Rissah and camped at Kehelathah. 23 They set out from Kehelathah and camped at Mount Shepher. 24 They set out from Mount Shepher and camped at Haradah. 25 They set out from Haradah and camped at Makheloth. 26 They set out from Makheloth and camped at Tahath.
27 They set out from Tahath and camped at Terah. 28 They set out from Terah and camped at Mithkah. 29 They set out from Mithkah and camped at Hashmonah. 30 They set out from Hashmonah and camped at Moseroth. 31 They set out from Moseroth and camped at Bene-jaakan. 32 They set out from Bene-jaakan and camped at Hor-haggidgad. 33 They set out from Hor-haggidgad and camped at Jotbathah. 34 They set out from Jotbathah and camped at Abronah. 35 They set out from Abronah and camped at Ezion-geber. 36 They set out from Ezion-geber and camped in the wilderness of Zin (that is, Kadesh). 37 They set out from Kadesh and camped at Mount Hor, on the edge of the land of Edom.
38 Aaron the priest went up Mount Hor at the command of the Lord and died there in the fortieth year after the Israelites had come out of the land of Egypt, on the first day of the fifth month. 39 Aaron was one hundred twenty-three years old when he died on Mount Hor.
40 The Canaanite, the king of Arad, who lived in the Negeb in the land of Canaan, heard of the coming of the Israelites.
41 They set out from Mount Hor and camped at Zalmonah. 42 They set out from Zalmonah and camped at Punon. 43 They set out from Punon and camped at Oboth. 44 They set out from Oboth and camped at Iye-abarim, in the territory of Moab. 45 They set out from Iyim and camped at Dibon-gad. 46 They set out from Dibon-gad and camped at Almon-diblathaim. 47 They set out from Almon-diblathaim and camped in the mountains of Abarim, before Nebo. 48 They set out from the mountains of Abarim and camped in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho; 49 they camped by the Jordan from Beth-jeshimoth as far as Abel-shittim in the plains of Moab.
If counted correctly then, the Israelites broke camp forty-one times. They had forty-two stations from Ramses to the edge of the promised land on the other side of the Jordan River from that most famous and ancient of cities, Jericho. Moses listed all of these at the instruction of the Lord. It is reminiscent of how the ancient kings would record the cities and peoples they conquered. It is a slow path from bondage to freedom, not because of the people's faithfulness, but despite their faithlessness. What God says God will bring about, not because of anything we do or don't do, but because God said so.Directions for the Conquest of Canaan
50 In the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 51 Speak to the Israelites, and say to them: When you cross over the Jordan into the land of Canaan, 52 you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, destroy all their figured stones, destroy all their cast images, and demolish all their high places. 53 You shall take possession of the land and settle in it, for I have given you the land to possess. 54 You shall apportion the land by lot according to your clans; to a large one you shall give a large inheritance, and to a small one you shall give a small inheritance; the inheritance shall belong to the person on whom the lot falls; according to your ancestral tribes you shall inherit. 55 But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those whom you let remain shall be as barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides; they shall trouble you in the land where you are settling. 56 And I will do to you as I thought to do to them.
Ver. 56.—I shall do unto you as I thought to do unto them, i. e. I shall execute by other hands upon you the sentence of dispossession which ye shall have refused to execute upon the Canaanites. The threat (although in fact fulfilled) does not necessarily involve any prophecy, since to settle down among the remnants of the heathen was a course of action which would obviously and for many reasons commend itself to the Israelites. Indolence and cowardice were consulted by such a policy as much as the natural feelings of pity towards vanquished and apparently harmless foes. The command to extirpate was certainly justified in this case (if it could be in any) by the unhappy consequences of its neglect. Israel being what he was, and so little severed in anything but religion from the ancient heathen, his only chance of future happiness lay in keeping himself from any contact with them. On the morality of the command itself, see on the passages referred to, and on the slaughter of the Midianites. As a fact, the extirpation of the conquered did not offend the moral sense of the Jews then any more than it did that of our heathen Saxon ancestors. Where both races could not dwell in security, it was a matter of course that the weaker was destroyed. Such a command was therefore justified at that time by the end to be attained, because it was not contrary to the moral law as then revealed, or to the moral sense as then educated. Being in itself a lawful proceeding, it was made a religious proceeding, and taken out of the category of selfish violence by being made a direct command of God. The Pulpit Commentary : Numbers / Edited by the Very Rev. H. D. M. Spence ... and by the Rev. Joseph S. Exell
The Boundaries of the Land
Numbers 34:1 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 2 Command the Israelites, and say to them: When you enter the land of Canaan (this is the land that shall fall to you for an inheritance, the land of Canaan, defined by its boundaries), 3 your south sector shall extend from the wilderness of Zin along the side of Edom. Your southern boundary shall begin from the end of the Dead Sea on the east; 4 your boundary shall turn south of the ascent of Akrabbim, and cross to Zin, and its outer limit shall be south of Kadesh-barnea; then it shall go on to Hazar-addar, and cross to Azmon; 5 the boundary shall turn from Azmon to the Wadi of Egypt, and its termination shall be at the Sea.
6 For the western boundary, you shall have the Great Sea and its coast; this shall be your western boundary.
7 This shall be your northern boundary: from the Great Sea you shall mark out your line to Mount Hor; 8 from Mount Hor you shall mark it out to Lebo-hamath, and the outer limit of the boundary shall be at Zedad; 9 then the boundary shall extend to Ziphron, and its end shall be at Hazar-enan; this shall be your northern boundary.
10 You shall mark out your eastern boundary from Hazar-enan to Shepham; 11 and the boundary shall continue down from Shepham to Riblah on the east side of Ain; and the boundary shall go down, and reach the eastern slope of the sea of Chinnereth; 12 and the boundary shall go down to the Jordan, and its end shall be at the Dead Sea. This shall be your land with its boundaries all around.
13 Moses commanded the Israelites, saying: This is the land that you shall inherit by lot, which the Lord has commanded to give to the nine tribes and to the half-tribe; 14 for the tribe of the Reubenites by their ancestral houses and the tribe of the Gadites by their ancestral houses have taken their inheritance, and also the half-tribe of Manasseh; 15 the two tribes and the half-tribe have taken their inheritance beyond the Jordan at Jericho eastward, toward the sunrise.
Tribal Leaders
16 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 17 These are the names of the men who shall apportion the land to you for inheritance: the priest Eleazar and Joshua son of Nun. 18 You shall take one leader of every tribe to apportion the land for inheritance. 19 These are the names of the men: Of the tribe of Judah, Caleb son of Jephunneh. 20 Of the tribe of the Simeonites, Shemuel son of Ammihud. 21 Of the tribe of Benjamin, Elidad son of Chislon. 22 Of the tribe of the Danites a leader, Bukki son of Jogli. 23 Of the Josephites: of the tribe of the Manassites a leader, Hanniel son of Ephod, 24 and of the tribe of the Ephraimites a leader, Kemuel son of Shiphtan. 25 Of the tribe of the Zebulunites a leader, Eli-zaphan son of Parnach. 26 Of the tribe of the Issacharites a leader, Paltiel son of Azzan. 27 And of the tribe of the Asherites a leader, Ahihud son of Shelomi. 28 Of the tribe of the Naphtalites a leader, Pedahel son of Ammihud. 29 These were the ones whom the Lord commanded to apportion the inheritance for the Israelites in the land of Canaan.
Devotionals, Videos and more ...
by Bill Federer
60,000 U.S. troops landed on the Island of Okinawa this day, April 1, 1945, in the largest amphibious attack mounted by the Americans in the Pacific war. One of the bloodiest campaigns, it cost Americans 12,000 dead, 36,000 wounded and 400 ships sunk or damaged. Though Japan’s losses exceeded 100,000, their kamikaze suicide attacks grew more intense, not relenting until the bombing of Hiroshima. After receiving Japan’s surrender in Tokyo Bay, General Douglas MacArthur stated: “Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always.”
Federer, B. (2003). American minute. St. Louis, MO.: Amerisearch, Inc.
by D.H. Stern
Thorns and snares beset the way of the stubborn;
he who values his life
keeps his distance from them.
Train a child in the way he [should] go;
and, even when old, he will not swerve from it.
Stern, D. H. (1998). Complete Jewish Bible-OE
: An English version of the Tanakh (OT) and
B'rit Hadashah (NT) (1st ed.). Clarksville, Md.: Jewish
New Testament Publications.
by Oswald Chambers
Heartiness v. heartlessness towards others
It is Christ … who also maketh intercession for us … The Spirit … maketh intercession for the saints. --- Romans 8:34, 27. Chambers, O. (1993). My Utmost for His Highest
Do we need any more argument than this to become intercessors—that Christ “ever liveth to make intercession”; that the Holy Spirit “maketh intercession for the saints”? Are we living in such vital relationship to our fellow men that we do the work of intercession as the Spirit-taught children of God? Begin with the circumstances we are in—our homes, our business, our country, the present crisis as it touches us and others—are these things crushing us? Are they badgering us out of the presence of God and leaving us no time for worship? Then let us call a halt, and get into such living relationship with God that our relationship to others may be maintained on the line of intercession whereby God works His marvels.
Beware of outstripping God by your very longing to do His will. We run ahead of Him in a thousand and one activities, consequently we get so burdened with persons and with difficulties that we do not worship God, we do not intercede. If once the burden and the pressure come upon us and we are not in the worshipping attitude, it will produce not only hardness toward God but despair in our own souls. God continually introduces us to people for whom we have no affinity, and unless we are worshipping God, the most natural thing to do is to treat them heartlessly, to give them a text like the jab of a spear, or leave them with a rapped-out counsel of God and go. A heartless Christian must be a terrible grief to Our Lord.
Are we in the direct line of the intercession of our Lord and of the Holy Spirit?
the Poetry of R.S. Thomas
The Untamed
My garden is the wild
Sea of the grass. Her garden
Shelters between walls.
The tide could break in;
I should be sorry for this.
There is peace there of a kind,
Though not the deep peace
Of wild places. Her care
For green life has enabled
The weak things to grow.
Despite my first love,
I take sometimes her hand,
Following strait paths
Between flowers, the nostril
Clogged with their thick scent.
The old softness of lawns
Persuading the slow foot
Leads to defection: the silence
Holds with its gloved hand
The wild hawk of the mind.
But not for long, windows,
Opening in the trees
Call the mind back
To its true eyrie: I stoop
Here only in play.
Thomas, R. S.
Sukkah 31a–b
The letter carrier delivers the mail and among the letters and bills is a summons to come down to city hall; you have been picked for jury duty. Few people enjoy such a duty. For many it is a real burden, economic and otherwise. Yet we all understand that it is one of the obligations of citizenship. Without it, our justice system simply could not function. Despite the hardships, most people go and do their civic duty. Some people try to get out of serving, but the judges are often unsympathetic. Nevertheless, government recognizes that there are instances when an individual has other pressing obligations that would make serving on a jury an unbearable hardship. A parent with an infant is given an exemption; so is a spouse who serves as caretaker for a disabled husband or wife. It is as if the city is saying: “One who is doing one mitzvah is freed from doing another mitzvah.”
The Rabbis, however, did not teach: “One who has something else to do is freed from doing a mitzvah.” It is important to recognize that the word “mitzvah” comes on both sides of the equation. We are not freed from our obligations to do a mitzvah or to perform a duty simply because we’d rather be doing something else.
The SAT exams are administered to high school students on Saturdays. A special Sunday sitting of the test is offered, but only to those who can produce a letter from a clergyperson attesting that as Sabbath observers they cannot take the test on Saturday. The Sunday date is not available for those who simply find it more convenient.
Many airlines levy a special fee for passengers who cancel or change their flight reservations. The penalty can be waived, but only if the individual sends an official note, for example from a physician, that explains that there were extenuating circumstances for the change. Illness or a death in the family are seen as acceptable excuses; a preference for another date or flight is not.
It is only a mitzvah—observing Shabbat, caring for the sick, mourning the death of a relative—that exempts one from obligations and commitments. Too often, we confuse convenience for obligation. The Rabbis force us to confront the nature of the excuses we frequently give. The Talmud reminds us that exemptions are given only when we are involved in doing another mitzvah.
An emergency situation does not constitute proof.
Text / If he did not find an etrog, he may not bring a quince or a pomegranate or anything else. Withered ones are kosher; dried-up ones are invalid. Rabbi Yehudah says: “Even the dried-up [are kosher].” Rabbi Yehudah said: “There is the case of city-people who would bequeath their lulavs to their grandchildren.” They said to him: “You bring proof from that? An emergency situation does not constitute proof.”
Context / The notion of serving God in an aesthetically pleasing manner is called hidur mitzvah, beautifying the commandments. It is based on a rabbinic interpretation of a verse in the Torah: This is my God and I will glorify Him,
The God of my father, and I will exalt Him.
(Exodus 15:2, author’s translation)
“And I will glorify Him”—Beautify yourself before Him with mitzvot. Make a beautiful Sukkah, a beautiful lulav, beautiful fringes [for a tallit], a beautiful Torah scroll. (Shabbat 133b)
To celebrate the festival of Sukkot (the Feast of Tabernacles), the Torah commands: “On the first day you shall take the product of hadar trees, branches of palm trees, boughs of leafy trees, and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days” (Leviticus 23:40). These “four species” are identified as the etrog (a citron), the lulav (a palm branch), a myrtle, and willow branches. These species are held and shaken during certain parts of the morning services on Sukkot.
Here, the Rabbis are discussing how the quality of the four species determines whether they are kasher (kosher, fit or valid for use in the ritual) or pasul (invalid). One should always strive to find the best and most beautiful item that is available for use in worship of God. At times, such quality items may not be available, or they may be beyond the worshiper’s means. The question is raised about lesser quality and imperfect items, and if they are acceptable for use.
Rabbi Yehudah bases the view that even a dried-up etrog or lulav is kosher on precedent: He recounts that urban dwellers who did not have access to orchards and fresh palm branches used to hand down their lulavs to their grandchildren. Over the course of the years, these palms not only withered, they dried out completely. Yet they were still used, generation after generation. This seems to prove that the use of inferior branches and fruits was deemed acceptable. The Rabbis, however, do not agree. While conceding that this practice was common among some urban dwellers, it was an unusual situation. These were people who had no other choice. To them, the use of the dried-out lulav or etrog was an emergency. But the law, and general practice, cannot be based upon what is permitted in an extreme and unusual situation.
Katz, M., & Schwartz, G. (1998). Swimming in the Sea of Talmud: Lessons for Everyday LIving
. Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society.by Diana Wallis
You are the light of the world.… Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. --- Matthew 5:14, 16
There is enough affliction in the world to try the Christian.91 Nor is there any of us who will not have trial, bereavement, and woe. God designs that there the Christian principle will triumph, fully equal to all the pains that we may endure. He varies those afflictions to bring us fully and fairly out. Now he takes away our health, to see how we will bear protracted disease. Now he removes our property, to see how we will bear the loss of an idol. Now he cuts down the child of our hopes and tries whether we will be still and know that he is God. Now he opens before our view our own death, to try whether we have confidence enough in him to commit our departing spirits to his unseen hand. In all these scenes, it is designed that our piety should shine forth, bright and burning.
God has placed us in a world exceptionally adapted to call forth the principles of the Christian—a world where, if those principles are not called forth, it is full proof that they do not exist.
Christians, you hold in your hands that gospel which will send peace around the globe—that gospel of God that can enlighten all nations, alleviate every sorrow, comfort every mourner, and change the outlook of every kingdom and tribe. Nor can you be inactive or undecided. Every time this great question is presented to you, in whatever form, it calls on you to act. Every plan of benevolence that is submitted to you affords an opportunity to test your character and will actually develop that character.
It was precisely this state of things that called forth the ardor of Paul. More, it was the view of the guilt and woes of suffering people that moved the Son of God with compassion and led to the self-denial of his ministry and the agonies of the garden and the cross.
I need not add that if human woes and dangers found their way to God’s own Son, it is not to be wondered at that they should find their way also to all his followers. Can any be Christians whose hearts do not respond in this to the feelings of the Lord Jesus? If I have read the oracles of religion aright, they cannot. --- Albert Barnes
(27). Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications.The Mystery of the Tabernacles.
Wherefore, above all other things, I say to those who love contests, and who are strong-minded, that without delay they should honour chastity, as a thing the most useful and glorious. For in the new and indissoluble creation, whoever shall not be found decorated with the boughs of chastity, shall neither obtain rest, because he has not fulfilled the command of God according to the law, nor shall he enter into the land of promise, because he has not previously celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles. For they only who have celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles come to the Holy Land, setting out from those dwellings which are called tabernacles, until they come to enter into the temple and city of God, advancing to a greater and more glorious joy, as the Jewish types indicate. For like as the Israelites, having left the borders of Egypt, first came to the Tabernacles, (In Hebrew, Succoth. Num. xxxiii. 5.) and from hence, having again set forth, came into the land of promise, so also do we. For I also, taking my journey, and going forth from the Egypt of this life, came first to the resurrection, which is the true Feast of the Tabernacles, and there having set up my tabernacle, adorned with the fruits of virtue, on the first day of the resurrection, which is the day of judgment, celebrate with Christ the millennium of rest, which is called the seventh day, even the true Sabbath. Then again from thence I, a follower of Jesus, “who hath entered into the heavens,” (Heb. iv. 14.) as they also, after the rest of the Feast of Tabernacles, came into the laud of promise, come into the heavens, not continuing to remain in tabernacles—that is, my body not remaining as it was before, but, after the space of a thousand years, changed from a human and corruptible form into angelic size and beauty, where at last we virgins, when the festival of the resurrection is consummated, shall pass froth the wonderful place of the tabernacle to greater and better things, ascending into the very house of God above the heavens, as, says the Psalmist, “in the voice of praise and thanksgiving, among such as keep holy day.” (Ps. xlii. 4.) I, O Arete, my mistress, offer as a gift to thee this robe, adorned according to my ability.