Numbers 16:3

16:3 And they assembled against Moses and Aaron, saying to them, “You take too much upon yourselves, ¹  seeing that the whole community is holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you exalt yourselves above the community of the Lord?”

Numbers 16:47

16:47 So Aaron did ²  as Moses commanded ³  and ran into the middle of the assembly, where the plague was just beginning among the people. So he placed incense on the coals and made atonement for the people.

Numbers 19:20

19:20 But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person must be cut off from among the community, because he has polluted the sanctuary of the Lord; the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, so he is unclean.

Numbers 20:10

20:10 Then Moses and Aaron gathered the community together in front of the rock, and he said to them, “Listen, you rebels, ⁴  must we bring ⁵  water out of this rock for you?”

Numbers 20:12

The Lord’s Judgment

20:12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me enough ⁶  to show me as holy ⁷  before ⁸  the Israelites, therefore you will not bring this community into the land I have given them.” ⁹ 

Numbers 22:4

22:4 So the Moabites said to the elders of Midian, “Now this mass of people ¹⁰  will lick up everything around us, as the bull devours the grass of the field. Now Balak son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at this time.

[16:3]  ¹ tn The meaning of רַב־לָכֶם (rab-lakhem) is something like “you have assumed far too much authority.” It simply means “much to you,” perhaps “you have gone to far,” or “you are overreaching yourselves” (M. Noth, Numbers [OTL], 123). He is objecting to the exclusiveness of the system that Moses has been introducing.

[16:47]  ² tn Heb “took.”

[16:47]  ³ tn Or “had spoken” (NASB); NRSV “had ordered.”

[20:10]  ³ tn The word is הַמֹּרִים (hammorim, “the rebels”), but here as a vocative: “you rebels.” It was a harsh address, although well-earned.

[20:10]  ⁴ tn The word order and the emphasis of the tense are important to this passage. The word order is “from this rock must we bring out to you water?” The emphasis is clearly on “from this rock!” The verb is the imperfect tense; it has one of the modal nuances here, probably obligatory – “must we do this?”

[20:12]  ⁴ tn Or “to sanctify me.”

[20:12]  ⁵ 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.

[20:12]  ⁶ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

[20:12]  ⁷ 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.

[22:4]  ⁵ tn The word is simply “company,” but in the context he must mean a vast company – a horde of people.