Exodus 6:16-20

6:16 Now these are the names of the sons of Levi, according to their records: ¹  Gershon, Kohath, and Merari. (The length of Levi’s life was 137 years.)

6:17 The sons of Gershon, by their families, were Libni and Shimei.

6:18 The sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel. (The length of Kohath’s life was 133 years.)

6:19 The sons of Merari were Mahli and Mushi. These were the clans of Levi, according to their records.

6:20 Amram married ²  his father’s sister Jochebed, and she bore him Aaron and Moses. (The length of Amram’s life was 137 years.)

Numbers 26:59

26:59 Now the name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, daughter of Levi, who was born ³  to Levi in Egypt. And to Amram she bore Aaron, Moses, and Miriam their sister.

Numbers 26:1

A Second Census Required

26:1 ⁴ After the plague the Lord said to Moses and to Eleazar son of Aaron the priest, ⁵ 

Numbers 6:1-3

The Nazirite Vow

6:1 ⁶ Then the Lord spoke to Moses: 6:2 “Speak to the Israelites, and tell them, ‘When either a man or a woman ⁷  takes a special vow, ⁸  to take a vow ⁹  as a Nazirite, ¹⁰  to separate ¹¹  himself to the Lord, 6:3 he must separate ¹²  himself from wine and strong drink, he must drink neither vinegar ¹³  made from wine nor vinegar made from strong drink, nor may he drink any juice ¹⁴  of grapes, nor eat fresh grapes or raisins. ¹⁵ 

Numbers 23:12-14

23:12 Balaam replied, ¹⁶  “Must I not be careful ¹⁷  to speak what the Lord has put in my mouth?” ¹⁸  23:13 Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place from which you can observe them. You will see only a part of them, but you will not see all of them. Curse them for me from there.”

23:14 So Balak brought Balaam ¹⁹  to the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, ²⁰  where ²¹  he built seven altars and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.

[6:16]  ¹ tn Or “generations.”

[6:20]  ² tn Heb “took for a wife” (also in vv. 23, 25).

[26:59]  ³ tn Heb “who she bore him to Levi.” The verb has no expressed subject. Either one could be supplied, such as “her mother,” or it could be treated as a passive.

[26:1]  ⁴ sn The breakdown of ch. 26 for outlining purposes will be essentially according to the tribes of Israel. The format and structure is similar to the first census, and so less comment is necessary here.

[26:1]  ⁵ tc The MT has also “saying.”

[6:1]  ⁶ sn This chapter can be divided into five sections: The vow is described in vv. 1-8, then the contingencies for defilement are enumerated in vv. 9-12, then there is a discussion of discharging the vows in vv. 13-20, and then a summary in v. 21; after this is the high priestly blessing (vv. 22-27). For information on the vow, see G. B. Gray, “The Nazirite,” JTS 1 (1899-1900): 201-11; Z. Weisman, “The Biblical Nazirite, Its Types and Roots,” Tarbiz 36 (1967): 207-20; and W. Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament (OTL), 1:303-6.

[6:2]  ⁷ tn The formula is used here again: “a man or a woman – when he takes.” The vow is open to both men and women.

[6:2]  ⁸ tn The vow is considered special in view of the use of the verb יַפְלִא (yafli’), the Hiphil imperfect of the verb “to be wonderful, extraordinary.”

[6:2]  ⁹ tn The construction uses the infinitive construct followed by the cognate accusative: “to vow a vow.” This intensifies the idea that the vow is being taken carefully.

[6:2]  ¹⁰ tn The name of the vow is taken from the verb that follows; נָזַר (nazar) means “to consecrate oneself,” and so the Nazirite is a consecrated one. These are folks who would make a decision to take an oath for a time or for a lifetime to be committed to the Lord and show signs of separation from the world. Samuel was to be a Nazirite, as the fragment of the text from Qumran confirms – “he will be a נָזִיר (nazir) forever” (1 Sam 1:22).

[6:2]  ¹¹ tn The form of the verb is an Hiphil infinitive construct, forming the wordplay and explanation for the name Nazirite. The Hiphil is here an internal causative, having the meaning of “consecrate oneself” or just “consecrate to the Lord.”

[6:3]  ¹² tn The operative verb now will be the Hiphil of נָזַר (nazar); the consecration to the Lord meant separation from certain things in the world. The first will be wine and strong drink – barley beer (from Akkadian sikaru, a fermented beer). But the second word may be somewhat wider in its application than beer. The Nazirite, then, was to avoid all intoxicants as a sign of his commitment to the Lord. The restriction may have proved a hardship in the daily diet of the one taking the vow, but it spoke a protest to the corrupt religious and social world that used alcohol to excess.

[6:3]  ¹³ tn The “vinegar” (חֹמֶץ, homets) is some kind of drink preparation that has been allowed to go sour.

[6:3]  ¹⁴ tn This word occurs only here. It may come from the word “to water, to be moist,” and so refer to juice.

[6:3]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “dried” (so KJV, ASV, NRSV).

[23:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “he answered and said.” The referent (Balaam) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[23:12]  ¹⁷ tn The verb שָׁמַר (shamar) means “to guard, watch, observe” and so here with a sense of “be careful” or even “take heed” (so KJV, ASV). The nuance of the imperfect tense would be obligatory: “I must be careful” – to do what? to speak what the Lord has put in my mouth. The infinitive construct “to speak” is therefore serving as the direct object of שָׁמַר.

[23:12]  ¹⁸ tn The clause is a noun clause serving as the direct object of “to speak.” It begins with the sign of the accusative, and then the relative pronoun that indicates the whole clause is the accusative.

[23:14]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “he brought him”; the referents (Balak and Balaam) have been specified in the translation for clarity.

[23:14]  ²⁰ tn Some scholars do not translate this word as “Pisgah,” but rather as a “lookout post” or an “elevated place.”

[23:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “and he built.”