Numbers 26
(1) God Requests Israeli Census
Then after the killing wave, the Existing One told Moses and Aaron’s son, Eleazar,
“Take a census of all of Israel’s descendants who are at least 20 years old, grouping them by their patriarchs’ families. Count whoever would be draftable if Israel were to go to war.”
So Moses and Priest Eleazer talked to the population in the plains of Moab by the Jordan River at Jericho, saying,
“Take a census of everyone who is 20 years old and up, like the Existing One told Moses to do.”
(4b) Number of Israelites
Israel’s descendants who came from Egypt were:
Those are all of Israel’s descendants, which total 601,730 people.
(52) Property Given to Each Group
Then the Existing One told Moses,
“You’ll need to divide up the land and distribute it to all those people as their property. Do it according to that list of names. Give bigger pieces of land to the bigger groups and smaller pieces of land to the smaller groups. Everyone will be given an amount of land according to the size of their group. The land should be divided up systematically. They’ll each get a piece of property proportionate to the size of their forefathers’ tribes. The land will be divided up proportionately between the smaller and larger groups.”
(57) Number of Levites
Here are the Levites who were counted:
The Levites weren’t counted with the rest of Israel’s descendants, since they weren’t given property like the rest.
(63) The Old Generation had Died Out
That’s everyone who was counted by Moses and Priest Eleazar when they counted Israel’s descendants in the plains of Moab near the Jordan River by Jericho. Not a single person who had been counted for this census was present in the previous census that had been conducted by Moses and Aaron in the Sinai desert. The reason for that is because the Existing One had said, “They will die in the desert.” Not a single person from that first group was left, except for Caleb (Jephunneh’s son) and Joshua (Nun’s son).
