Numbers 11:15

15 If you deal thus with me, please kill me out of hand, if I have found favor in your sight; and let me not see my wretchedness.

Numbers 11:15 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 11:15

And if thou deal thus with me
Let the whole weight of government lie upon me, and leave the alone to bear it:

kill me, I pray thee, out of hand;
take me out of the world at once, or "kill me now, in killing" F14; dispatch me immediately, and make a thorough end of me directly:

if I have found favour in thy sight;
if thou hast any love for me, or art willing to show me a kindness, to remove me by death, I shall take as one:

and let me not see my wretchedness;
or live to be the unhappy man I shall be; pressed with such a weight of government, affected and afflicted with the wants of a people I cannot relieve, or seeing them bore down with judgments and punishments inflicted on them for their sins and transgressions I am not able to prevail upon them to abstain from: so the Targum of Jerusalem,

``that I may not see their evil, who are thy people;''

so Abendana, and in the margin of some Hebrew copies, it is read,

``this is one of the eighteen words, the correction of the scribes;''

who, instead of "my wretchedness" or evil, corrected it, "their wretchedness" or evil; but Aben Ezra says there is no need of this correction.


FOOTNOTES:

F14 (grh an yngrh) "occide me nunc occidendo", Drusius; "occide me jam, occide", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

Numbers 11:15 In-Context

13 Whence should I have flesh to give to all this people? for they weep to me, saying, Give us flesh, that we may eat.
14 I am not able to bear all this people alone, because it is too heavy for me.
15 If you deal thus with me, please kill me out of hand, if I have found favor in your sight; and let me not see my wretchedness.
16 Yahweh said to Moses, Gather to me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people, and officers over them; and bring them to the tent of meeting, that they may stand there with you.
17 I will come down and talk with you there: and I will take of the Spirit which is on you, and will put it on them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, that you not bear it yourself alone.
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