Numbers 26:2

2 "{Take a census} of the community of the {Israelites} from {those twenty years old} and above, according to {their families}, all who are able to go out to war in Israel."

Numbers 26:2 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 26:2

Take the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel,
&c.] Excepting the Levites, who were to be numbered by themselves, and at a different age; this sum was to be taken, that it might appear that all of the old generation that came out of Egypt, of the age at which this sum was taken, were now dead, excepting two, as the Lord had threatened; and partly that as they were now about to enter the land of Canaan, it might be divided to them according to their number; as well as to show the faithfulness of God to his word and promise, that he would multiply and make them fruitful, notwithstanding all their provoking sins and transgressions:

from twenty years old and upwards, throughout their father's house;
all of that age in every tribe, house, and family:

all that are able to go to war in Israel;
for which they must prepare, being about to enter the land of Canaan, and dispossess and drive out the inhabitants of it.

Numbers 26:2 In-Context

1 And it happened after the plague, Yahweh said to Moses and to Eleazar son of Aaron the priest, saying,

2 "{Take a census} of the community of the {Israelites} from {those twenty years old} and above, according to {their families}, all who are able to go out to war in Israel."

3 So Moses and Eleazar the priest spoke with them on the desert-plateau of Moab by [the] Jordan [across from] Jericho, saying,

4 "[Take a census of the community] from {those twenty years old} and above, just as Yahweh commanded Moses." The Israelites who went out from the land of Egypt [were]:

5 Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, the descendants of Reuben: [of] Hanoch, the clan of the Hanochites; of Pallu, the clan of the Palluites;

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "Lift up the head[s]"
• [b]. Literally "sons/children of Israel"
• [c]. Literally "a son of twenty years"
• [d]. Literally "the house of their fathers"