These are the Israelites, numbered according to their families. All those numbered in the camps, by their divisions, are 603,550.

And they are responsible for all the furnishings of the tent of meeting, and for the needs of the Israelites, as they serve in the tabernacle.

Counting every male from a month old and upward, there were 8,600. They were responsible for the care of the sanctuary.

Now the leader of the clan of the families of Merari was Zuriel son of Abihail. These were to camp on the north side of the tabernacle.

The appointed responsibilities of the Merarites included the frames of the tabernacle, its crossbars, its posts, its sockets, its utensils, plus all the service connected with these things,

And all the firstborn males, by the number of the names from a month old and upward, totaled 22,273.

“Take the Levites instead of all the firstborn males among the Israelites, and the livestock of the Levites instead of their livestock. And the Levites will be mine. I am the Lord.

From the firstborn males of the Israelites he collected the money, 1,365 shekels, according to the sanctuary shekel.

Moses gave the redemption money to Aaron and his sons, according to the word of the Lord, as the Lord had commanded Moses.

When it is time for the camp to journey, Aaron and his sons must come and take down the screening curtain and cover the ark of the testimony with it.

These were those numbered from the families of the Gershonites, everyone who served in the tent of meeting, whom Moses and Aaron numbered according to the word of the Lord.

These are those numbered from the families of the Merarites, whom Moses and Aaron numbered according to the word of the Lord by the authority of Moses.

“Command the Israelites to expel from the camp every leper, everyone who has a discharge, and whoever becomes defiled by a corpse.

“Tell the Israelites, ‘When a man or a woman commits any sin that people commit, thereby breaking faith with the Lord, and that person is found guilty,

“Speak to the Israelites and tell them, ‘If any man’s wife goes astray and behaves unfaithfully toward him,

“Speak to the Israelites, and tell them, ‘When either a man or a woman takes a special vow, to take a vow as a Nazirite, to separate himself to the Lord,

On the eighth day he is to bring two turtledoves or two young pigeons to the priest, to the entrance to the tent of meeting.

He must rededicate to the Lord the days of his separation and bring a male lamb in its first year as a reparation offering, but the former days will not be counted because his separation was defiled.

and Aaron is to offer the Levites before the Lord as a wave offering from the Israelites, that they may do the work of the Lord.

For all the firstborn males among the Israelites are mine, both humans and animals; when I destroyed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt I set them apart for myself.