Numbers 3:1

The Levites

1 Here is the story of the family of Aaron and Moses. It belongs to the time when the LORD talked with Moses on Mount Sinai.

Numbers 3:1 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 3:1

These also [are] the generations of Aaron and Moses
The descendants of them, those of the former, who is named first, because the eldest, were priests, and those of the latter Levites, and who are not very plainly pointed at, but are included among the Amramites, ( Numbers 3:27 ) ; the posterity of Moses being very obscure, only Levites, and these not particularly named but swallowed up among the Kohathites: find the following account was as it stood,

in the day [that] the Lord spoke with Moses in mount Sinai;
and not, altogether as it then, was when he spoke to him in the wilderness, of Sinai, for then Aaron had four sons, but now two of them were dead as is after observed; and it seems to be for the sake of this circumstance chiefly that this clause is so put.

Numbers 3:1 In-Context

1 Here is the story of the family of Aaron and Moses. It belongs to the time when the LORD talked with Moses on Mount Sinai.

2 Aaron's oldest son was Nadab. His other sons were Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.

3 Those were the names of Aaron's sons. They were the anointed priests. They were prepared to serve the LORD as priests.

4 But Nadab and Abihu made an offering to the LORD by using fire that wasn't allowed. So they fell dead in front of him. That happened in the Desert of Sinai. They didn't have any sons. Only Eleazar and Ithamar served as priests while their father Aaron was living.

5 The LORD spoke to Moses. He said,