Numbers 16:30

30 But if the LORD does something totally new--if the ground opens up, swallows them and everything that belongs to them, and they go down alive to their graves--then you'll know that these men have treated the LORD with contempt."

Numbers 16:30 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 16:30

But if the Lord make a new thing
Or "create a creation", or "creature" F19, what never was before, or put those persons to a death that none ever in the world died of yet; what that is he means is next expressed:

and the earth open her mouth and swallow them up, with all that
[appertain] unto them;
their persons, their wives, children and substance:

and they go down quick into the pit;
alive into the grave the opening earth makes for them; this is the new thing created; though the Rabbins say F20, the mouth of the earth, or the opening of the earth, was created from the days of the creation, that is, it was determined or decreed so early that it should be:

then ye shall understated that these men have provoked the Lord;
by rising up against Moses and Aaron, and so against the Lord; by falsely accusing his servants, and endeavouring to set the people against them, and so alter the constitution of things in church and state.


FOOTNOTES:

F19 (arby hayrb) "creationem, creaverit", Pagninus, Montanus, Munster, Fagius; "creaturam", Vatablus, Drusius.
F20 Pirke Abot, c. 5. sect. 6. Pirke Eliezer, c. 19.

Numbers 16:30 In-Context

28 Moses said, "This is how you will know that the LORD sent me to do all these things and that it wasn't my idea:
29 If these men die like all other people--if they die a natural death--then the LORD hasn't sent me.
30 But if the LORD does something totally new--if the ground opens up, swallows them and everything that belongs to them, and they go down alive to their graves--then you'll know that these men have treated the LORD with contempt."
31 As soon as he had finished saying all this, the ground under them split,
32 and the earth opened up to swallow them, their families, the followers of Korah, and all their property.
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