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Numbers 8 Bible study: Waved before the LORD
Numbers 8 is the only place in the Hebrew Bible where the wave offering is people: the children of Israel laid their hands on the Levites (8:10), and Aaron waved them before the LORD (8:11, 8:21). The Levites were cleansed, not anointed (8:7), and the lamp stand's seven lamps were set to shine in front of it (8:2).
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“Thus you shall separate the Levites from among the children of Israel, and the Levites shall be mine.”
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“In Numbers 8, Aaron offered the Levites themselves as a wave offering before the LORD.”
Is that in Numbers 8, or not? Make your call.
What's really going on
Lamps that shine forward
The chapter opens with one instruction for Aaron: "When you light the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light in front of the lamp stand" (8:2). "Aaron did so. He lit its lamps to light the area in front of the lamp stand, as the LORD commanded Moses" (8:3). It is what Exodus had said when the lamp stand was first described: "they shall light its lamps to give light to the space in front of it" (Exodus 25:37). Then Numbers looks back at how it was made: "beaten work of gold. From its base to its flowers, it was beaten work. He made the lamp stand according to the pattern which the LORD had shown Moses" (8:4). Just before, Moses had gone into the Tent of Meeting and heard the LORD's voice "from above the mercy seat" (Numbers 7:89). The next words the LORD speaks are about the lamps (8:1-2).
Where it leads to Jesus
A lamp on a stand
Numbers 8:2leads toMatthew 5:14-16
The LORD tells Aaron, "When you light the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light in front of the lamp stand" (8:2). Jesus spoke of a lamp and its stand: "Neither do you light a lamp and put it under a measuring basket, but on a stand; and it shines to all who are in the house" (Matthew 5:15). Before that he said, "You are the light of the world" (Matthew 5:14), and after it, "Even so, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:16). Jesus doesn't mention the tabernacle's lamp stand, and the New Testament doesn't link the two. These are his own words about a lamp lit and set on a stand to give light to others, set beside this chapter, not a fulfillment of it.
Honest questions
Questions people ask about Numbers 8
That was a taste
The rest of Numbers 8 is waiting in Favor
- Cleansed, not anointed
- Offered by the whole people
- What Numbers 3 said, and what it adds
- Moses lit them first
- So that there will be no plague
- Waved, then given
- 14 questions as you read
- 11 more Hebrew words
- A short check at the end
- Your notes, saved as you go
Favor reads the Bible in order, so you'll reach Numbers 8 with everything before it in view. First week free, then $10 a month per person.
The Hebrew word behind it
תְּנוּפָהtenufahsay te-noo-FAH
Brown-Driver-Briggs: "a swinging, waving, wave-offering, offering". Strong's: "the official undulation of sacrificial offerings". It comes four times in this chapter (8:11, 8:13, 8:15, 8:21), and each time what is waved is the Levites. Of its 30 uses in the Hebrew Bible, these four are the only ones where what is waved is people. Elsewhere it is the breast of a peace offering (Leviticus 7:30), a lamb and a log of oil (Leviticus 14:12), two loaves (Leviticus 23:17), or gold given for the tabernacle (Exodus 35:22); and twice, in Isaiah, it isn't an offering at all, as in "the shaking of the LORD of Armies's hand" (Isaiah 19:16). In 8:11 the WEB's "offer" is the verb it comes from (Strong's: "from 5130"), nuf, which Brown-Driver-Briggs gives as "move to and fro, wave": in Hebrew, Aaron waves the Levites as a wave offering.
For your group
Numbers 8 Bible study questions
- 1The lamps were set to give light "in front of the lamp stand" (8:2). Who is in front of you this week, and what would it look like for your light to fall on them?
- 2The children of Israel laid their hands on the Levites (8:10), who were offered "on the behalf of the children of Israel" (8:11). Who serves on your behalf, and how could you stand with them?
- 3At fifty the Levites stopped the heavy work but went on assisting their brothers (8:25-26). How has the way you serve changed with the seasons of your life, and what might it look like next?
Leading a group? In Favor, everyone reads Numbers 8 during the week and answers these questions privately. Answers stay sealed until you meet, then appear together, and you can print the week's sheet.
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Questions
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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Hebrew and Greek words are checked against the original-language texts and public-domain lexicons. What we believe · Favor home