Whosoever cometh anything near unto the tabernacle of
the
Lord shall die
They who before were so bold and daring as to think the
priesthood was common to them with Aaron, or they had as good a
right to it, and might go into the sanctuary of the Lord where he
did, are now so frightened at the rod being laid up as a token
against them, that they thought they must not come near the
tabernacle at all, and, if they did, would be in the utmost
danger of death:
shall we be consumed with dying?
such violent deaths, until there are none left of us? but the
Syriac and Arabic versions render the words affirmatively; we are
near or about to be consumed; and so the Targum of Onkelos, lo,
we are to be consumed; which agrees best with the preceding
clause, for they would scarcely make a question of what they had
affirmed.