Numbers 3

More literally, they “died in the presence of the LORD.” But the details are reported in Leviticus 10:2.

Moses and Aaron were both Levites, born into the tribe descended from Levi, who was one of Jacob’s 12 sons.

It took people with expertise in many areas to maintain and run the tent worship center, and later the Jerusalem Temple: tentmakers, metalworkers, carpenters. Some would eventually serve as security officers. Temple police helped arrest Jesus (John 18:3).

God didn’t require the Israelites to sacrifice their firstborn children, as some other religions in the region apparently did. But God had each family, in a sense, buy back the children by substituting them with animal sacrifices instead. That’s how Exodus 22:29 reports it. Some scholars say a different writer here in Numbers—someone with ties to the Jewish priesthood—told a different story. He said God has subbed out the firstborn children and subbed in the Levites. Perhaps another possibility is to consider the story as an illustration of how uniquely devoted to God the Levites would become. They would serve the emerging nation of Israel as the ministry tribe, as Israel’s worship leaders, and as the ancient version of today’s church bishop, with the pastors or priests under the bishop’s care, along with all of the local church ministry teams.

There were two rooms inside the tent sanctuary. The Sacred Room was the largest room. It’s where most of the activity inside the tent took place. Priests would go into this room every day and present God with incense offerings. And they would maintain the lamps and perform worship rituals, such as eating sacred bread. The high priest and Moses were the only ones allowed in the other room, the Most Sacred Room, sometimes called the Holy of Holies. This is where Israelites kept their most sacred object, the gold-plated box known as the Ark of the Covenant, which contained the Ten Commandments etched into stone. These two rooms are also known in other Bible translations and paraphrases as the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place.

Ark of the Covenant.

See the relevant note for Numbers 3:12.

Some scholars argue that this, too, was a symbolic way of expressing the uniqueness of the Levites. Sacrifices of firstborn animals did seem to continue, as did the dedication of firstborn children such as the prophet Samuel (1 Samuel 1:21-28) and Jesus (Luke 2:23-24).

Roughly two ounces or 57 grams. See the note below about different weights in shekels.

Shekels came in different kinds of metal and different weights. It’s unclear what kind of shekel the writer was describing, or how much it weighed. There was a heavy shekel that weighed about 11.5 grams or .4 ounces. This was sometimes called the King’s Shekel or the Royal Shekel. Some scholars say this was also the weight used in the Israelite tent worship center and later in the Jerusalem Temple. The lighter shekel weighed about 9.5 grams or .33 ounces. Some scholars say this was probably the shekel accepted at the worship center. So, flip a coin.

Depending on the size of the shekel coin, Moses collected somewhere between 29-35 pounds (13-16  kg) of silver.