Numbers 21:4

Fiery Serpents

21:4 Then they traveled from Mount Hor by the road to the Red Sea, ¹  to go around the land of Edom, but the people ²  became impatient along the way.

Numbers 31:35

31:35 and 32,000 young women who had never had sexual intercourse with a man. ³ 

Numbers 35:11

35:11 you must then designate some towns as towns of refuge for you, to which a person who has killed someone unintentionally may flee.

Numbers 35:15

35:15 These six towns will be places of refuge for the Israelites, and for the foreigner, and for the settler among them, so that anyone who kills any person accidentally may flee there.

Numbers 35:30

35:30 “Whoever kills any person, the murderer must be put to death by the testimony ⁴  of witnesses; but one witness cannot ⁵  testify against any person to cause him to be put to death.

[21:4]  ¹ tn The “Red Sea” is the general designation for the bodies of water on either side of the Sinai peninsula, even though they are technically gulfs from the Red Sea.

[21:4]  ² tn Heb “the soul of the people,” expressing the innermost being of the people as they became frustrated.

[31:35]  ³ sn Here again we encounter one of the difficulties of the book, the use of the large numbers. Only twelve thousand soldiers fought the Midianites, but they brought back this amount of plunder, including 32,000 girls. Until a solution for numbers in the book can be found, or the current translation confirmed, one must remain cautious in interpretation.

[35:30]  ⁵ tn Heb “ at the mouth of”; the metonymy stresses it is at their report.

[35:30]  ⁶ tn The verb should be given the nuance of imperfect of potentiality.