Numbers 18:29-30

18:29 From all your gifts you must offer up every raised offering due ¹  the Lord, from all the best of it, and the holiest part of it.’ ² 

18:30 “Therefore you will say to them, ³  ‘When you offer up ⁴  the best of it, then it will be credited to the Levites as the product of the threshing floor and as the product of the winepress.

Numbers 24:7

24:7 He will pour the water out of his buckets, ⁵ 

and their descendants will be like abundant ⁶  water; ⁷ 

their king will be greater than Agag, ⁸ 

and their kingdom will be exalted.

[18:29]  ¹ tn The construction is “every raised offering of the Lord”; the genitive here is probably to be taken as a genitive of worth – the offering that is due the Lord.

[18:29]  ² tn Or “its hallowed thing.”

[18:30]  ³ tn The wording of this verse is confusing; it may be that it is addressed to the priests, telling them how to deal with the offerings of the Levites.

[18:30]  ⁴ tn The clause begins with the infinitive construct with its preposition and suffixed subject serving to indicate the temporal clause.

[24:7]  ⁵ tc For this colon the LXX has “a man shall come out of his seed.” Cf. the Syriac Peshitta and Targum.

[24:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “many.”

[24:7]  ⁷ sn These two lines are difficult, but the general sense is that of irrigation buckets and a well-watered land. The point is that Israel will be prosperous and fruitful.

[24:7]  ⁸ sn Many commentators see this as a reference to Agag of 1 Sam 15:32-33, the Amalekite king slain by Samuel, for that is the one we know. But that is by no means clear, for this text does not identify this Agag. If it is that king, then this poem, or this line in this poem, would have to be later, unless one were to try to argue for a specific prophecy. Whoever this Agag is, he is a symbol of power.