Numbers 1 Bible study: Counted by name

Numbers opens with a date: "The LORD spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they had come out of the land of Egypt" (1:1). Near the end of Exodus, one month earlier: "In the first month in the second year, on the first day of the month, the tabernacle was raised up" (Exodus 40:17). Israel had come into the wilderness of Sinai "In the third month" after leaving Egypt (Exodus 19:1). The count began that same day: "They assembled all the congregation together on the first day of the second month" (1:18). Nineteen days later, "in the second month, on the twentieth day of the month" (Numbers 10:11), the cloud was taken up and the camp set out from the wilderness of Sinai (Numbers 10:12).

Numbers 1:7→leads toMatthew 1:4

The man who stands for Judah at the census is "Nahshon the son of Amminadab" (1:7). 1 Chronicles gives him the title Numbers gives him, "prince of the children of Judah" (Numbers 2:3): "Amminadab became the father of Nahshon, prince of the children of Judah" (1 Chronicles 2:10). Ruth's list of the line of Perez names him: "Amminadab became the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon became the father of Salmon" (Ruth 4:20). Matthew's "book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ" (Matthew 1:1) runs through him: "Amminadab became the father of Nahshon. Nahshon became the father of Salmon" (Matthew 1:4). Luke's list has him as well: "the son of Salmon, the son of Nahshon" (Luke 3:32).

פָּקַדpaqadsay pa-KAD

Brown-Driver-Briggs: "attend to, visit, muster, appoint". Strong's: "to visit (with friendly or hostile intent); by analogy, to oversee, muster". It is this chapter's key word, used 22 times in 54 verses. The WEB gives it as "count" (1:3) and "counted" (1:19, 1:21, 1:46), and for the Levites, "were not counted" (1:47) and "you shall not count" (1:49). In the very next verse the same verb is "appoint the Levites over the Tabernacle of the Testimony" (1:50), the sense Brown-Driver-Briggs gives as "set (over), make overseer". Numbers uses it 103 times, more than any other book of the Hebrew Bible. It is also the verb of God visiting his people: "The LORD visited Sarah as he had said" (Genesis 21:1), and "God will surely visit you" (Genesis 50:24).