- 1 Numbers 1 Α′ The English title 'Numbers' descends from the LXX caption ΑΡΙΘΜΟΙ, itself drawn from the great military census that opens the book here: on the first day of the second month of the second year after the Exodus, in the wilderness of Sinai and at the tent of testimony, the LORD commands Moses and Aaron to take a head-count (λάβετε ἀρχήν … κατὰ ἀριθμόν) of all males twenty years old and upward 'able to go out in the army' (πᾶς ὁ ἐκπορευόμενος ἐν δυνάμει), organised by clans and ancestral houses. PDF
- 2 Numbers 2 Β′ Numbers 2 is the great camp-ordinance: after the census of chapter 1, YHWH dictates the spatial arrangement of the twelve tribes encamped 'opposite, round about the tent of meeting' (ἐναντίοι κύκλῳ τῆς σκηνῆς τοῦ μαρτυρίου, v. PDF
- 3 Numbers 3 Γ′ Numbers 3 (LXX ΑΡΙΘΜΟΙ Γ′) is the great Levite charter: it opens with the γενέσεις of Aaron and Moses and the roll of Aaron's sons, recording the death of Ναδαβ and Αβιουδ who offered πῦρ ἀλλότριον ('strange fire') before the LORD (vv. PDF
- 4 Numbers 4 Δ′ Numbers 4 in the LXX is a long, carefully structured administrative chapter that registers the three Levitical clans — Kohath (Κααθ), Gershon (Γεδσων), and Merari (Μεραρι) — for tabernacle service and assigns each its transport-charge. PDF
- 5 Numbers 5 Ε′ Numbers 5 is a tripartite legislative chapter governing the holiness of the wilderness camp around the tabernacle. PDF
- 6 Numbers 6 Ϛ′ Numbers 6 falls into two great legal blocks: the law of the Nazirite vow (vv. 1–21) and the priestly Benediction (vv. PDF
- 7 Numbers 7 Ζ′ Numbers 7 is the longest single chapter in the Pentateuch (89 verses) and one of the most relentlessly formulaic passages in the entire LXX: after a narrative frame describing the day the tabernacle was raised and anointed (v. PDF
- 8 Numbers 8 Η′ Numbers 8 falls into three movements: the mounting of the seven lamps to give light κατὰ πρόσωπον τῆς λυχνίας ('toward the front of the lampstand,' vv. PDF
- 9 Numbers 9 Θ′ Numbers 9 falls into two clearly demarcated panels. The first (vv. PDF
- 10 Numbers 10 Ι′ Numbers 10 is the great hinge of the book: it closes the long Sinai legislation (Num 1–9) and opens the wilderness march toward the land. It falls into four movements. PDF
- 11 Numbers 11 ΙΑ′ Numbers 11 is one of the great wilderness murmuring narratives, structurally a diptych of two complaints punished by fire and plague and bridged by the gift of the Spirit. PDF
- 12 Numbers 12 ΙΒ′ Numbers 12 is a tightly constructed prophet-vindication narrative: the complaint of Miriam and Aaron against Moses on account of his Cushite wife (vv. PDF
- 13 Numbers 13 ΙΓ′ Numbers 13 LXX (= MT 13:1–33; note that the LXX and MT verse-counts run parallel here, both giving thirty-three verses) narrates the reconnaissance of Canaan by twelve tribal chiefs. PDF
- 14 Numbers 14 ΙΔ′ Numbers 14 is the theological pivot of the wilderness narrative: the people, terrified by the spies' report (ch. 13), weep through the night and propose appointing a leader (ἀρχηγόν) to return to Egypt (vv. PDF
- 15 Numbers 15 ΙΕ′ Numbers 15 stands as a deliberate cultic and legal interlude after the rebellion of the spies (ch. 13–14) and before the rebellion of Korah (ch. PDF
- 16 Numbers 16 ΙϚ′ IMPORTANT VERSIFICATION NOTE: the Rahlfs/Hebrew chapter division differs from the English Bible here. Rahlfs–Hanhart Numbers 16 runs to 35 verses and closes with the fire from the LORD consuming the 250 men who offered incense (v. PDF
- 17 Numbers 17 ΙΖ′ IMPORTANT NUMBERING NOTE: the LXX (with the Hebrew Masoretic Text) divides this material differently from most English Bibles. In Rahlfs, Numbers 17 contains TWO originally distinct episodes: (1) vv. PDF
- 18 Numbers 18 ΙΗ′ Numbers 18 is the LORD's direct answer to the people's terror at the close of chapter 17 ('Behold, we are perishing, we are destroyed, we are all destroyed! PDF
- 19 Numbers 19 ΙΘ′ Numbers 19 is the ordinance (διαστολὴ τοῦ νόμου, v. 2; νόμιμον αἰώνιον, vv. PDF
- 20 Numbers 20 Κ′ Numbers 20 is a hinge-chapter in the wilderness narrative, marking the passage from the first wilderness generation to the second: it opens with the death of Miriam at Kadesh (v. PDF
- 21 Numbers 21 ΚΑ′ Numbers 21 is one of the most theologically consequential chapters of the LXX Pentateuch, gathering four distinct units. PDF
- 22 Numbers 22 ΚΒ′ Numbers 22 opens the Balaam pericope (chs. 22–24), one of the most theologically and narratively dramatic units in the Pentateuch. PDF
- 23 Numbers 23 ΚΓ′ Numbers 23 contains the first two of Balaam's four oracles, delivered in the hire of Balak king of Moab, who has summoned the seer from Mesopotamia (ἐκ Μεσοποταμίας, v. PDF
- 24 Numbers 24 ΚΔ′ Numbers 24 contains the third and fourth of Balaam's oracles, the climax of the whole Balaam cycle (chs. 22–24). PDF
- 25 Numbers 25 ΚΕ′ Numbers 25 narrates the apostasy of Israel at Baal-Peor and the zeal of Phinehas: while encamped ἐν Σαττιν (Shittim) the people 'are profaned' (ἐβεβηλώθη) by harlotry (ἐκπορνεῦσαι) with the daughters of Moab, eat their sacrifices, bow to their idols, and are 'consecrated/joined' to Baal-Peor (ἐτελέσθη Ισραηλ τῷ Βεελφεγωρ, v. PDF
- 26 Numbers 26 ΚϚ′ Numbers 26 is the long census-narrative of the second numbering of Israel on the plains of Moab (Αραβωθ Μωαβ), undertaken after the plague (μετὰ τὴν πληγήν, v. PDF
- 27 Numbers 27 ΚΖ′ Numbers 27 falls into two clearly demarcated legal-narrative units. The first (vv. PDF
- 28 Numbers 28 ΚΗ′ Numbers 28 opens the festal-offering appendix (chs. 28–29) that fixes the calendar of public, communal sacrifices to be presented 'in their appointed times' (ἐν ταῖς ἑορταῖς μου, v. PDF
- 29 Numbers 29 ΚΘ′ Numbers 29 continues the festal-offering calendar of chapter 28, prescribing the public sacrifices of the seventh month — the autumn cluster of Israel's holiest convocations. PDF
- 30 Numbers 30 Λ′ Numbers 30 (so Rahlfs and the Hebrew; many English Bibles number these verses 30:1–16) is the law of vows: a tightly structured legal pericope on the binding force of a vow (εὐχή) and a self-imposed obligation (ὁρισμός, 'a definite obligation by which one binds the soul'). PDF
- 31 Numbers 31 ΛΑ′ Numbers 31 is a long (54-verse) campaign narrative recounting the holy war against Midian, commanded by YHWH as the ἐκδίκησις ('vengeance / vindication', vv. PDF
- 32 Numbers 32 ΛΒ′ Numbers 32 is the longest legal-narrative negotiation in the book: the Transjordan settlement of the tribes of Reuben and Gad (and, by the chapter's close, half of Manasseh). PDF
- 33 Numbers 33 ΛΓ′ Numbers 33 is the great itinerary-chapter of the Pentateuch: a recapitulating travel-log (αἱ ἀπάρσεις, 'the departures/stages') of Israel's forty-year journey from Rameses to the plains of Moab, explicitly composed by Moses 'by the command (διὰ ῥήματος / διὰ προστάγματος) of the LORD' (vv. PDF
- 34 Numbers 34 ΛΔ′ Numbers 34 is a survey-document: YHWH dictates to Moses the four cardinal boundaries of the land of Canaan that Israel is to inherit ἐν κλήρῳ ('by lot') — the south border running from the wilderness of Zin past Edom and the Salt Sea up by the Ascent of Akrabbim through Kadesh-barnea to the Wadi of Egypt (vv. PDF
- 35 Numbers 35 ΛΕ′ Numbers 35 is the great legislative chapter on the Levitical cities and the cities of refuge, delivered on the plains of Moab by the Jordan near Jericho (v. PDF
- 36 Numbers 36 ΛϚ′ Numbers 36 is the final chapter of the book and forms a legal appendix that closes the inheritance arc opened in chapter 27. The heads of the clan of Gilead (of the tribe of Manasseh, son of Joseph) raise a follow-up objection (vv. PDF