Numbers 11:24

24 Moshe went out and told the people what ADONAI had said. Then he collected seventy of the leaders of the people and placed them all around the tent.

Numbers 11:24 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 11:24

And Moses went out
Either out of his own tent, about which the people assembled, complaining and weeping, ( Numbers 11:10 ) ; or rather, as Aben Ezra, out of the tabernacle of the congregation, and the sanctuary where he had been conversing with God, about the affairs complained of both by the people and by himself; so the Targum of Jonathan says, he went out of the tabernacle, the house of the Shechinah or divine Majesty:

and told the people of the words of the Lord;
what he had ordered him to do for his ease in the government of them, and how he had promised to give them flesh on the morrow:

and gathered the seventy men of the elders of Israel;
sent for them by name, and ordered them to assemble at such a time and place; and though two of them came not, after mentioned, ( Numbers 11:26 ) , yet the full number of seventy is given:

and set them round about the tabernacle;
they seem to be set not promiscuously in a body together, but distinctly, one by another, in a circular form; that they might be seen, observed, and taken notice of by the people that came about the tabernacle, who they were, what were done to them, and what befell them.

Numbers 11:24 In-Context

22 If whole flocks and herds were slaughtered for them, would it be enough? If all the fish in the sea were collected for them, would even that be enough?"

23 ADONAI answered Moshe, "Has ADONAI's arm grown short? Now you will see whether what I said will happen or not!"

24 Moshe went out and told the people what ADONAI had said. Then he collected seventy of the leaders of the people and placed them all around the tent.

25 ADONAI came down in the cloud, spoke to him, took some of the Spirit that was on him and put it on the seventy leaders. When the Spirit came to rest on them, they prophesied -then but not afterwards.

26 There were two men who stayed in the camp, one named Eldad and the other Medad, and the Spirit came to rest on them. They were among those listed to go out to the tent, but they hadn't done so, and they prophesied in the camp.