Numbers 1:50

50 You will {appoint}^[a] them over the tabernacle of the testimony,^[b] over all its vessels, and over all that belongs to it. They will carry the tabernacle and all its vessels, and they will care for it; and they will camp around the tabernacle.

Numbers 1:50 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 1:50

But thou shalt appoint the Levites over the tabernacle of
testimony
So called from the ark in it, in which was the law of God, which was a testimony of the will of God to his people:

and over all the vessels thereof;
the candlestick, table: and altars, as Aben Ezra notes:

and over all things that [belong] to it;
the vessels of vessels, as the same writer calls them; for the candlestick, shewbread table, and the two altars of incense and burnt offering had vessels appertaining to them:

they shall bear the tabernacle, and all the vessels thereof;
carry them from place to place when needful:

and they shall minister unto it;
by taking care of the instruments of it and the vessels in it, but not by doing any part of the priestly office in it, as offering sacrifice, burning incense, and the like:

and shall encamp round about the tabernacle;
they were a sort of camp or army of themselves, and their station was around the tabernacle, which was a kind of royal palace to God the King of kings; so that as they were the king's legion, and to be numbered alone, as Jarchi observes, in ( Numbers 1:49 ) , so they were a guard about his palace, and were placed between that and the camp of Israel.

Numbers 1:50 In-Context

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}.

50 You will {appoint} them over the tabernacle of the testimony, over all its vessels, and over all that belongs to it. They will carry the tabernacle and all its vessels, and they will care for it; and they will camp around the tabernacle.

51 And when the tabernacle is set out, the Levites will {take it down}, and when encamping the tabernacle the Levites will set it up; the stranger that approaches [it] will be put to death.

52 The {Israelites} will encamp, each in their own camp, and each by their own banner according to their divisions.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "count," or "summon," or "enroll"
• [b]. Other modern translations read "tabernacle of the covenant"