Numbers 9:16

16 So it was always: by day the cloud covered it, and by night as it were the appearance of fire.

Numbers 9:16 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 9:16

So it was alway
Night and day, as long as the people of Israel were in the wilderness, see ( Exodus 13:21 Exodus 13:22 ) ( Nehemiah 9:19 ) ;

the cloud covered it [by day]:
the phrase, "by day", is not in the text, but is easily and necessarily supplied from ( Exodus 40:38 ) ; and as it is in the Targum of Jonathan, and in the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions, and which the following clause requires:

and the appearance of fire by night;
when as a cloud it could not be because of the darkness of the night; as in the daytime it could not be discerned as a body of fire or light, because of the light of the sun; but being seen under these different forms, was serviceable both by day and night, for the following purposes.

Numbers 9:16 In-Context

14 The sojourner also and the stranger if they be among you, shall make the phase to the Lord according to the ceremonies and justifications thereof. The same ordinances shall be with you both for the stranger, and for him that was born in the land.

15 Now on the day that the tabernacle was reared up, a cloud covered it. But from the evening there was over the tabernacle, as it were, the appearance of fire until the morning.

16 So it was always: by day the cloud covered it, and by night as it were the appearance of fire.

17 And when the cloud that covered the tabernacle was taken up, then the children of Israel marched forward: and in the place where the cloud stood still, there they camped.

18 At the commandment of the Lord they marched, and at his commandment they pitched the tabernacle. All the days that the cloud abode over the tabernacle, they remained in the same place: