Numbers 9:21

21 Sometimes the cloud remained only from evening until morning, and they moved on as soon as the cloud lifted. Whenever the cloud lifted, they moved on.

Numbers 9:21 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 9:21

And [so] it was when the cloud abode from even unto the
morning
The whole night, during which time they rested in their beds:

and [that] the cloud was taken up in the morning, then they journeyed;
whether [it was] by day or night that the cloud was taken up, they
journeyed;
whether at morning or midnight; for sometimes, as Aben Ezra observes, they travelled in the night; whensoever their sentinels gave notice that the cloud was taken up, even though at midnight, they arose and prepared for their journey; and by this it is evident, that the appearance by day and night was the same body called the cloud, though beheld in a different view, in the daytime as a cloud, in the nighttime as fire.

Numbers 9:21 In-Context

19 When the cloud stayed over the Tent for a long time, they obeyed the Lord and did not move on.

20 Sometimes the cloud remained over the Tent for only a few days; in any case, they remained in camp or moved, according to the command of the Lord.

21 Sometimes the cloud remained only from evening until morning, and they moved on as soon as the cloud lifted. Whenever the cloud lifted, they moved on.

22 Whether it was two days, a month, a year, or longer, as long as the cloud remained over the Tent, they did not move on; but when it lifted, they moved.

23 They set up camp and broke camp in obedience to the commands which the Lord gave through Moses.