Numbers 4:19

4:19 but in order that they will live ¹  and not die when they approach the most holy things, do this for them: Aaron and his sons will go in and appoint ²  each man ³  to his service and his responsibility.

Numbers 11:18

11:18 “And say to the people, ‘Sanctify yourselves ⁴  for tomorrow, and you will eat meat, for you have wept in the hearing ⁵  of the Lord, saying, “Who will give us meat to eat, ⁶  for life ⁷  was good for us in Egypt?” Therefore the Lord will give you meat, and you will eat.

Numbers 16:5

16:5 Then he said to Korah and to all his company, “In the morning the Lord will make known who are his, and who is holy. He will cause that person ⁸  to approach him; the person he has chosen he will cause to approach him.

Numbers 16:26

16:26 And he said to the community, “Move away from the tents of these wicked ⁹  men, and do not touch anything they have, lest you be destroyed because ¹⁰  of all their sins.” ¹¹ 

Numbers 18:3

18:3 They must be responsible to care for you and to care for the entire tabernacle. However, they must not come near the furnishings of the sanctuary and the altar, or both they and you will die.

Numbers 18:26

18:26 “You are to speak to the Levites, and you must tell them, ‘When you receive from the Israelites the tithe that I have given you from them as your inheritance, then you are to offer up ¹²  from it as a raised offering to the Lord a tenth of the tithe.

Numbers 20:12

The Lord’s Judgment

20:12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me enough ¹³  to show me as holy ¹⁴  before ¹⁵  the Israelites, therefore you will not bring this community into the land I have given them.” ¹⁶ 

¹ tn The word order is different in the Hebrew text: Do this…and they will live. Consequently, the verb “and they will live” is a perfect tense with a vav (ו) consecutive to express the future consequence of “doing this” for them.

² tn The perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive continues the instruction for Aaron.

³ tn The distributive sense is obtained by the repetition, “a man” and “a man.”

⁴ tn The Hitpael is used to stress that they are to prepare for a holy appearance. The day was going to be special and so required their being set apart for it. But it is a holy day in the sense of the judgment that was to follow.

⁵ tn Heb “in the ears.”

⁶ tn Possibly this could be given an optative translation, to reflect the earlier one: “O that someone would give….” But the verb is not the same; here it is the Hiphil of the verb “to eat” – “who will make us eat” (i.e., provide meat for us to eat).

⁷ tn The word “life” is not in the text. The expression is simply “it was for us,” or “we had good,” meaning “we had it good,” or “life was good.”

⁷ tn Heb “him.”

¹⁰ tn The word רָשָׁע (rasha’) has the sense of a guilty criminal. The word “wicked” sometimes gives the wrong connotation. These men were opposing the Lord, and so were condemned as criminals – they were guilty. The idea of “wickedness” therefore applies in that sense.

¹¹ tn The preposition bet (בְּ) in this line is causal – “on account of their sins.”

¹² sn The impression is that the people did not hear what the Lord said to Moses, but only what Moses said to the people as a result. They saw the brilliant cloud, and perhaps heard the sound of his voice, but the relaying of the instructions indicates they did not hear the actual instruction from the Lord himself.

¹³ tn The verb in this clause is the Hiphil perfect with a vav (ו) consecutive; it has the same force as an imperfect of instruction: “when…then you are to offer up.”

¹⁶ tn Or “to sanctify me.”

¹⁷ sn Using the basic meaning of the word קָדַשׁ (qadash, “to be separate, distinct, set apart”), we can understand better what Moses failed to do. He was supposed to have acted in a way that would have shown God to be distinct, different, holy. Instead, he gave the impression that God was capricious and hostile – very human. The leader has to be aware of what image he is conveying to the people.

¹⁸ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

¹⁹ tn There is debate as to exactly what the sin of Moses was. Some interpreters think that the real sin might have been that he refused to do this at first, but that fact has been suppressed from the text. Some think the text was deliberately vague to explain why they could not enter the land without demeaning them. Others simply, and more likely, note that in Moses there was unbelief, pride, anger, impatience – disobedience.