Numbers 16:34

34 And all Israel round about them fled from the sound of them, for they said, Lest the earth swallow us up .

Numbers 16:34 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 16:34

And all Israel that were round about them fled at the cry of
them
Or because of it, as Aben Ezra; their cry was so loud, their shrieks so dreadful and piercing, that the Israelites about them fled to get out of the sound of them, as well as for their own safety. The Targum of Jonathan not only represents their cry as terrible, but gives the words they expressed at it;

``and all Israel that were round about them fled, because of the terror of their voice, when they cried and said, the Lord is righteous and his judgments truth, and truth are the words of Moses his servant, but we are wicked who have rebelled against him:''

for they said, lest the earth swallow us up [also];
which they might fear, since they had provoked the Lord, by associating with these men, and countenancing them by their presence, as they had done; who would have consumed them in a moment at first, had it not been for the intercession of Moses and Aaron.

Numbers 16:34 In-Context

32 And the ground opened, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that were with Core, and their cattle.

33 And they went down and all that they had, alive into Hades; and the ground covered them, and they perished from the midst of the congregation.

34 And all Israel round about them fled from the sound of them, for they said, Lest the earth swallow us up .

35 And fire went forth from the Lord, and devoured the two hundred and fifty men that offered incense.

36 And the Lord said to Moses,

Footnotes

• [a] saying.