Numbers 3:40

40 And Yahweh said to Moses, "Muster every firstborn male from the {Israelites} from {one month} and above and {count} their names.

Numbers 3:40 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 3:40

And the Lord said unto Moses
After he had taken the number of the Levites:

number all the firstborn of the children of Israel, from a month old
and upward, and take the number of their names;
that they might be compared with the number of the Levites, and the difference between them observed.

Numbers 3:40 In-Context

38 Those encamped before the tabernacle to the east--before the tent of assembly to the east--[were] Moses and Aaron and his sons; they will keep the responsibility of the sanctuary {for the Israelites}; and the stranger who approaches will be put to death.

39 All those counted from the Levites whom Moses and Aaron mustered according to {the word of Yahweh}, according to their clans, every male from {one month} and above [were] twenty-two thousand.

40 And Yahweh said to Moses, "Muster every firstborn male from the {Israelites} from {one month} and above and {count} their names.

41 And you will receive the Levites for me--I [am] Yahweh--in the place of all [the] firstborn among the {Israelites}, and the animals of the Levites in the place of all [the] firstborn among the animals among the {Israelites}."

42 So Moses mustered all the firstborn among the {Israelites} just as Yahweh commanded him.

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "sons/children of Israel"
• [b]. Literally "the son of a month"
• [c]. Literally "and lift up the number of"