Numbers 1:2

2 Take ye the sum, or the number, of all the congregation of the sons of Israel, by their kindreds, and families, and all their names each by themselves, whatever thing of male kind, (Take ye the sum, or the number, of all the congregation of the people of Israel, by their kindreds, and families, and list, or register, all their names, whoever is a male,)

Numbers 1:2 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 1:2

Take ye the sum of all the congregation of the children of
Israel
Excepting the Levites; nor were any account taken of the mixed multitude that came out of Egypt with the children of Israel, only of them; and this account was taken, partly to observe the fulfilment of the divine promise to Abraham concerning the multiplication of his seed, and partly that it might be observed, that at the end of thirty eight years from hence, when they were numbered again, there were but three left of this large number, their carcasses falling in the wilderness because of their sins; and chiefly, as Aben Ezra observes, this sum was now taken to fix their standards, and for their better and more orderly journeying and encampment; for on the twentieth of this month they set forward on their journey from hence, ( Numbers 10:11 Numbers 10:12 ) ; the word for the order is in the plural number, take ye, being given both to Moses and Aaron, who were to take the number, and did, ( Numbers 1:3 ) ;

after their families;
into which their tribes were divided:

by the house of their fathers;
for if the mother was of one tribe, and the father of another, the family was according to the tribe of the father, as Jarchi notes, a mother's family being never called a family, as Aben Ezra observes:

with the number of [their] names;
of every particular person, whose name was inserted in a list or register:

every male by their poll;
or head ^F2; for none but males were numbered: the Lord's spiritual Israel are a numbered people, written in the book of life, placed into the hand of Christ, and exactly known by him, even by name; yea, all that belong to him are numbered, and the very airs of their heads,

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FOOTNOTES:

F2 (Mtlglgl) "per capita sua", Pagninus, &c,

Numbers 1:2 In-Context

1 And the Lord spake to Moses in the desert of Sinai, in the tabernacle of the bond of peace , in the first day of the second month, in the tother year of their going out of Egypt, and said, (And the Lord spoke to Moses in the Sinai Desert, in the Tabernacle of the Covenant, that is, the Tabernacle of the Witnessing, on the first day of the second month, in the second year of their going out of Egypt, and said,)

2 Take ye the sum, or the number, of all the congregation of the sons of Israel, by their kindreds, and families, and all their names each by themselves, whatever thing of male kind, (Take ye the sum, or the number, of all the congregation of the people of Israel, by their kindreds, and families, and list, or register, all their names, whoever is a male,)

3 from the twentieth year and above, of all the strong men of Israel (from twenty years of age and older, of all the strong men in Israel); and thou and Aaron shall number them by their companies.

4 And the princes of the lineages (And the leaders of the tribes), and of the families, in their kindreds, shall be with you,

5 of which princes, these be the names (of which leaders, these be the names); of Reuben, Elizur, the son of Shedeur;