Numbers 1:47

47 The Levites from their ancestors'^[a] tribe were not mustered^[b] in their midst.

Numbers 1:47 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 1:47

But the Levites
The tribe of Levi were excepted from this muster, they being employed in a kind of warfare, and therefore not to be engaged in another:

after the tribe of their fathers, were not numbered among them:
the rest of the tribes; the reason follows.

Numbers 1:47 In-Context

45 So all those who were counted from the {Israelites} according to {their families}, from {those twenty years old} and above, everyone in Israel who [is able] to go to war.

46 All of the ones counted were six hundred and three thousand, five hundred and fifty.

47 The Levites from their ancestors' tribe were not mustered in their midst.

48 And Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,

49 "You will not muster the tribe of Levi, and you will not {take a census of} them in the midst of the {Israelites}.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "fathers'"
• [b]. Or "counted," or "summoned," or "enrolled"