1Yahweh spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, saying,2“Command the children of Israel to give to the Levites cities to dwell in out of their inheritance. You shall give pasture lands for the cities around them to the Levites.3They shall have the cities to dwell in. Their pasture lands shall be for their livestock, and for their possessions, and for all their animals.
4“The pasture lands of the cities, which you shall give to the Levites, shall be from the wall of the city and outward one thousand cubits around it.5You shall measure outside of the city for the east side two thousand cubits, and for the south side two thousand cubits, and for the west side two thousand cubits, and for the north side two thousand cubits, the city being in the middle. This shall be the pasture lands of their cities.
1 Yahweh spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, saying,
2 “Command the children of Israel to give to the Levites cities to dwell in out of their inheritance. You shall give pasture lands for the cities around them to the Levites.
3 They shall have the cities to dwell in. Their pasture lands shall be for their livestock, and for their possessions, and for all their animals.
4 “The pasture lands of the cities, which you shall give to the Levites, shall be from the wall of the city and outward one thousand cubits around it.
5 You shall measure outside of the city for the east side two thousand cubits, and for the south side two thousand cubits, and for the west side two thousand cubits, and for the north side two thousand cubits, the city being in the middle. This shall be the pasture lands of their cities.
KJVKing James Version
1 And the LORD spake unto Moses in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho, saying,
2 Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites of the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them.
3 And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and the suburbs of them shall be for their cattle, and for their goods, and for all their beasts.
4 And the suburbs of the cities, which ye shall give unto the Levites, shall reach from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about.
5 And ye shall measure from without the city on the east side two thousand cubits, and on the south side two thousand cubits, and on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst: this shall be to them the suburbs of the cities.
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JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
1 And the LORD spoke unto Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, saying:
2 'Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites of the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in; and open land round about the cities shall ye give unto the Levites.
3 And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and their open land shall be for their cattle, and for their substance, and for all their beasts.
4 And the open land about the cities, which ye shall give unto the Levites, shall be from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about.
5 And ye shall measure without the city for the east side two thousand cubits, and for the south side two thousand cubits, and for the west side two thousand cubits, and for the north side two thousand cubits, the city being in the midst. This shall be to them the open land about the cities.
Joshua 14:3-4(v2)For Moses had given the inheritance of the two tribes and the half-tribe beyond the Jordan; but to the Levites he gave no inheritance among…
Numbers 22:1(v1)The children of Israel traveled, and encamped in the plains of Moab beyond the Jordan at Jericho.
Ezekiel 48:8(v2)“By the border of Judah, from the east side to the west side, shall be the offering which you shall offer, twenty-five thousand reeds in…
Leviticus 25:32-34(v2)“ ‘Nevertheless, in the cities of the Levites, the Levites may redeem the houses in the cities of their possession at any time. The Levites…
Numbers 26:63(v1)These are those who were counted by Moses and Eleazar the priest, who counted the children of Israel in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at…
Show all 15 cross-references
Numbers 31:12(v1)They brought the captives with the prey and the plunder, to Moses, and to Eleazar the priest, and to the congregation of the children of…
Numbers 33:50(v1)Yahweh spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, saying,
Numbers 36:13(v1)These are the commandments and the ordinances which Yahweh commanded by Moses to the children of Israel in the plains of Moab by the Jordan…
Joshua 21:2-42(v2)They spoke to them at Shiloh in the land of Canaan, saying, “Yahweh commanded through Moses to give us cities to dwell in, with their…
Joshua 21:11(v3)They gave them Kiriath Arba, named after the father of Anak (also called Hebron), in the hill country of Judah, with its pasture lands…
2 Chronicles 11:14(v3)For the Levites left their pasture lands and their possession, and came to Judah and Jerusalem; for Jeroboam and his sons cast them off,…
Ezekiel 45:1-8(v2)“ ‘ “Moreover, when you divide by lot the land for inheritance, you shall offer an offering to Yahweh, a holy portion of the land. The…
Ezekiel 45:2(v3)Of this there shall be a five hundred by five hundred square for the holy place; and fifty cubits for its pasture lands all around.
Ezekiel 48:22(v2)Moreover from the possession of the Levites, and from the possession of the city, being in the middle of that which is the prince’s,…
1 Corinthians 9:10-14(v2)or does he say it assuredly for our sake? Yes, it was written for our sake, because he who plows ought to plow in hope, and he who threshes…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (23 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv2, 5Because they had no inheritance assigned them in the…
Because they had no inheritance assigned them in the land of Canaan.
God would have them scattered through all the land, because the people might be preserved by them in the obedience of God and his Law.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn v2Num 35:2 Command the children of Israel, that they…
Num 35:2 Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites of the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in; and ye shall give [also] unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them.
Ver. 2. Suburbs.] These were for pasture, pleasure, and other country commodities, not for tillage; for the Levites were to have no such employment. {Num 18:20; Num 18:24}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv3–4For their cattle; for pasturage for their cattle; where…
For their cattle; for pasturage for their cattle; where they might not build houses, nor plant gardens, orchards, or vineyards, no, nor sow corn, for which they were abundantly provided out of the first-fruits and tithes. And these suburbs did not belong to the Levites in common, but were distributed to them in convenient proportions, as may appear from Jos 21:18; 1Ch 6:60.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv1–5And the Lord spake to Moses,.... After he had…
And the Lord spake to Moses,.... After he had described the borders of the land, and given instructions about the division of it among the several tribes, and named the persons that should be concerned in parting and putting it into the possession of the Israelites, he makes a provision for the Levites; for though they had no inheritance in the land as a tribe, yet it was proper they should have cities and houses to dwell in; for it would not be suitable that they should be always about the tabernacle, as they were in the wilderness; and it is concerning this the Lord is said to speak to Moses:
in the plains of Moab by Jordan, near Jericho: where the Israelites now were, and had been for some time:
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saying; as follows.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv1, 3, 4Forty eight cities assigned to the Levites, of which…
Forty eight cities assigned to the Levites, of which six were cities of refuge, ver. 1-15. In what cases it was not allowed to flee to these, ver. 16-21. In what cases it was allowed, ver. 22- 24. Laws concerning them, ver. 25-34.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv1, 4, 5The Israelites are commanded to give the Levites, out…
CHAPTER XXXV
The Israelites are commanded to give the Levites, out of their
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inheritances, cities and their suburbs for themselves and for
their cattle, goods, c., 1-3.
The suburbs to be 3,000 cubits round about from the wall of the
city, 4, 5.
The cities to be forty-two, to which six cities of refuge should
be added, in all forty-eight cities, 6, 7.
Each tribe shall give of these cities in proportion to its
possessions, 8.
These cities to be appointed for the person who might slay his
neighbour unawares, 9-12.
Of these six cities there shall be three on each side Jordan,
13, 14.
The cities to be places of refuge for all who kill a person
unawares, whether they be Israelites, strangers, or sojourners,
15.
Cases of murder to which the benefit of the cities of refuge
shall not extend, 16-21.
Cases of manslaughter to which the benefits of the cities of
refuge shall extend, 22, 23.
How the congregation shall act between the manslayer and the
avenger of blood, 24, 25.
The manslayer shall abide in the city of refuge till the death
of the high priest he shall then return to the land of his
possession, 26-28.
Two witnesses must attest a murder before a murderer can be put
to death, 29, 30.
Every murderer to be put to death, 31.
The manslayer is not to be permitted to come to the land of his
inheritance till the death of the high priest, 32.
The land must not be polluted with blood, for the Lord dwells
in it, 33, 34.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXXV
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv2–4Num 35:2. That they give unto the Levites —…
Num 35:2. That they give unto the Levites — cities — The reason of this appointment was, that the Levites, being a body of people distinct from the rest of the nation, had no share in the division of the country. It is to be observed that the priests, the sons of Aaron, being also of the tribe of Levi, are here comprehended under the common name of Levites, as well as those inferior ministers of religion generally signified by that term.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv2, 5Suburbs - Rather, “pasture-grounds,” required for their large cattle,…
Suburbs - Rather, “pasture-grounds,” required for their large cattle, for their sheep and goats, and for all their beasts whatever they might be Num 35:3.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary1859 · Public DomainOn vv3–5Cities, in all forty-eight, with a thousand paces round…
Cities, in all forty-eight, with a thousand paces round them. This land belonged to the community: but some built upon it, Josue xxi. 18., and 1 Paralipomenon vi. 60. The burial place for the Levites lay behind it. (Drusius) --- In these cities alone, the Levites had houses and gardens of their own; other might live with them, and indeed the cities acknowledged other lords, as Hebron belonged to Caleb, Josue xiv. 14. The Levites were dispersed throughout the land, that they might instruct the people both by word and by example, Deuteronomy xxxiii. 10. They had a clear revenue without labour of husbandry, equivalent to any two of the other tribes. (Abulensis.) --- Six of their cities were assigned for places of refuge, as they were the proper judges of the cases, in which murder may be excused, and to remind them that hey ought to be very merciful. Hence arose the privileges, granted to some churches, of protecting those who fled to them for an asylum. That none might be hindered from enjoying this benefit, three of these cities were situated on each side of the Jordan, and at equal distances. (Salien)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures1864 · Public DomainOn v1Regulations for the Levitical Cities and the Cities of…
THIRTEENTH SECTION
Regulations for the Levitical Cities and the Cities of Refuge
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Numbers 35
1And the Lord spake unto Moses in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho, saying, 2Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites, of the inheritance of their possession, cities to dwell in; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them. 3And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and the suburbs of them shall be for their cattle, and for their goods, and for all their beasts. 4And the suburbs of the cities, which ye shall give unto the Levites, shall reach from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about. 5And ye shall measure from without the city on the east side two thousand cubits, and on the south side two thousand cubits, and on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst: this shall be to them the suburbs of the cities. 6And among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites there shall be six cities for refuge, which ye shall appoint for the manslayer, that he may flee thither: and 1to them ye shall 7add forty and two cities. So all the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities: them shall ye give with their suburbs. 8And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel: from them that have many ye shall give many; but from them that have few ye shall give few: every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites according to his inheritance which 2he inheriteth.
9And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 10Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come over Jordan into the land of Canaan, 11Then ye shall appoint you cities to be cities of refuge for you; that the slayer may flee thither, which killeth any person at 3unawares. 12And they shall be unto you cities for refuge from the avenger; that the manslayer die not, until he stand before the 13congregation in judgment. And of these cities which ye shall give, six cities shall ye have for refuge. 14Ye shall give three cities on this side Jordan, and three cities shall ye give in the land of Canaan, which shall be cities of refuge. 15These six cities shall be a refuge, both for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them; that every one that killeth any person unawares may flee thither. 16And if he smite him with an instrument of iron, so that he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death. 17And if he smite him with throwing a 4stone wherewith he may die, and he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall 18surely be put to death. Or if he smite him with a hand weapon of wood, wherewith he may die, and he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death. 19The revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer: when he meeteth him, he shall slay him. 20But if he thrust him of hatred, or hurl at him by laying of wait, that he die; 21Or in enmity smite him with his hand, that he die: he that smote him shall surely be put to death; for he is a murderer: the revenger of blood shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him. 22But if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or have cast upon him any thing without laying of wait, 23Or with any stone, wherewith a man may die, seeing him not, and cast it upon him, that he die, and was not his enemy, neither sought his harm; 24Then the congregation shall judge between the slayer and the revenger of blood according to these judgments: 25And the congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the revenger of blood, and the congregation shall restore him to the city of his refuge, whither he was fled: and he shall abide in it unto the death of the high priest, which was anointed with the holy oil. 26But if the slayer shall at any time come without the border of the city of his refuge, whither he was fled; 27And the revenger of blood find him without the borders of the city of his refuge, and the revenger of blood kill the slayer: he shall not be guilty of 5blood: 28Because he should have remained in the city of his refuge until the death of the high priest: but after the death of the high priest 29the slayer shall return into the land of his possession. So these things shall be for a statute of judgment unto you throughout your generations in all your dwellings. 30Whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die. 31Moreover, ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer, which Isaiah 6 guilty of death: but he shall be surely put to death. 32And ye shall take no satisfaction for him that is fled to the city of his refuge, that he should come again to dwell in the land, until the death of the priest. 33So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are: for blood it defileth the land: and the 7land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it. 34Defile not therefore the land which ye shall inhabit, wherein I dwell: for I the Lord dwell among the children of Israel.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
ž[Num_35:3. לִרְכֻשָׁם not the ordinary term for sheep and goats or small cattle. Here it designates that which they had acquired—their movable or driven possessions—and so flocks as driven together.—A. G.]
[Num_35:4. מְגְרָשׁ from גָרַשׁ to drive—place to which cattle were driven.—A. G.]
[Num_35:5. Omit shall be.]
[Num_35:6. The preposition is not in the original. Render with Lange: And the cities which ye shall give to the Levites are the six—supply the verb; or better, as to the cities which ye shall give, etc. Six cities shall be for, etc.—A. G.]
[Num_35:11. De Wette: Convenient cities—those easy, ready of access, and so fit.]
[Num_35:11. בּשְׁגָגָה. By his error or wandering; by inadvertence.—A. G.]
[Num_35:12. מגאל from גָאַל to redeem, buy back. Connected with דָּם redeemer of blood, avenger, and so the redeemer of blood was the next of kin, a kinsman.—A. G.]
[Num_35:12. הָּעֵרָח not the word ordinarily used for the congregation, but the local court of the city to which he fled. See Num_35:24-25.—A. G.]
[Num_35:19. In his lighting upon him, wherever he meets him; the word includes even an undesigned meeting.—A. G.]
[Num_35:23. Who willed him no evil.—Luther.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Comp. Joshua 21. After the directions for the purifying of the holy land from all heathen defilement, and its division among the people of Jehovah in a just and equitable manner, a positive consecration is now imparted to it, by the distribution of the Levitical cities throughout the entire land. This gleam of Levitical sanctity over the land, which takes the place of the dark or frivolous image-worship, becomes broader and brighter through the asylums for fugitives, who were pursued for the unintentional shedding of blood; places of refuge which were located among the Levitical cities, and were thus passed under the protection of the Levites, but by the law under which they were appointed, were not only bulwarks of justice and its enforcement, but also of grace and its dispensation, and thus glorified the holy land.
This mingling of the Levitical cities with the places of refuge for those pursued by the revenger of blood, was in the first place peculiarly significant. It expresses the inward connection of righteousness and grace, and also the sharp distinction between the unintentional shedding of blood by the parricide, and the intentional and criminal shedding of blood by the murderer, between expiation by the loss of liberty and expiation by death, and thus the development from the natural thirst for vengeance, to the sacred law of justice and right. The reconciliation between justice and grace gives to this institution the morning rays of the New Testament principles and relations. Its natural basis is the relation between the blood revenger and the right of asylum among the ancients, its ecclesiastical form the refuge to the sanctuary and altars of the Church in the Middle Ages, its Christian development the idea of pardon consistent with right, a legal pardon, its caricature the radical excuse of guilt and the liberalistic dilution of the rights of the slain, or the law of murder.
1. The Levitical cities, Num_35:1-5. The Levites receive no inheritance, no lot in Canaan; their lot and inheritance is Jehovah. But the tribes shall give them cities out of their inheritance, and in addition pasturage for their cattle; the cities only in a conditional sense, i. e., for dwellings in connection with those who were not Levites, but with their own houses and with special rights. The pastures, lay around the cities, for their cattle and their possession (their flocks and herds), and for all their animals generally.8 For an inalienable possession, Lev_25:34. The clear conception and location of the pastures which were to be given to the Levites in the environs of their cities is very difficult. We are not inclined, however, to accept the designation which Keil, after (Michaelis and Knobel) adopts and favors. In the first place, it is not probable that the cities should all be four-square; and then it is hardly supposable that the cities should all be enclosed by pastures exclusively Levite, and indeed an environ of one by two thousand cubits, so that no pasture land should have been left for the other inhabitants of the cities, unless they looked for it, outside of the Levite pastures. Then further, it would barely have been possible to lay out pastures one thousand cubits broad on every side of every city. The description is entirely clear so far, that the Levite pastures should extend one thousand cubits from the city into the fields around; then two thousand cubits, from the outer border of the one thousand (מחוצ) on every side of the city should be set apart for Levite pastures, thus in all eight thousand cubits. There was still room for the gardens near the city walls, and between the measured Levite pastures there was room also for the pastures of the other dwellers in the city. The eight thousand cubits appear to form a plus or minus, an indefinite quantity, to be determined in concrete cases according to the demands and number of their cattle and flocks. Thus the Levites were scattered in Israel according to the prediction—or curse—of Jacob (Genesis 49). But the dispersion, which in another form hung as a doom over the Simeonites, became now, not only a blessing to the Levites, whom the whole broad country had to support, viz., by the payment of the tithes that could not be carried far, but also for Israel, since the Levites, as teachers of the law, consecrated because of the name of Jehovah, were to be the salt of the land and people. But still they should not, as Keil rightly observes, lose their power, by too great a disintegration and dispersion through the whole land, or become burdensome to individual tribes by too great concentration. [“From without. The demarcation here intended would run parallel to the wall of the city outside of which it was made. The object was apparently to secure that the preceding provision should be fairly and fully carried out. The suburb would thus extend for a thousand cubits, or nearly one-third of a mile from the wall. There might be danger, especially with the irregular forms which the cities might assume, and with the physical obstacles presented by the surrounding ground, that neighboring proprietors would deem the suburb sufficient, if it measured a thousand cubits in some directions, not in others, in which case it might occasionally be restricted to a very small area. To guard against this, it was ordained that the suburb should alike on north, south, east and west, present at a thousand cubits’ distance from the wall, a front not less than two thousand cubits in length.” Bib. Com. This is better than Keil’s view (which implies that every Levitical city lay four-square, within the area enclosed by the four sides of a square), because it seems flexible. The two things which seem essential, are to retain the precision and definiteness of the description of the text, and yet allow for the diversity in shape and location which was sure to exist. It is very generally agreed that the first suburb was a thousand cubits broad all round the city in whatever shape its walls may have been constructed. If we regard the enumeration of the Bides north, south, east and west as used to indicate all directions, and not merely four sides, we may conceive of the outer and broader suburb—two thousand cubits deep—conformed in its shape to the walls of the city, and the configuration of the surrounding ground.—A. G.]
2. The Free cities, Num_35:6-16 sqq. The number of free cities is limited to six, which added to the remaining Levitical cities, makes the entire number forty-eight. That the number of the cities occurs here for the first time proves the importance of the free cities. The provision, too, that the Levitical cities should be distributed among the tribes according to their strength, appears here for the first time. The most important Levitical cities, i. e., the cities of the priests, thirteen in number, were divided among the tribes, who later were nearest the sanctuary, Judah, Simeon and Benjamin. No less care appears in the selection of the free, or refuge cities. The location of those on the farther side of Jordan, and those on this side (in Canaan) made the escape to them possible to all. These asylums were announced already in the first giving of the law (Exo_21:13), these regulations were also fixed before this (Lev_4:2), and the law with respect to them was more widely developed later (Deu_19:1-13.)
These were to be located on three circuits of the land, on both sides of the Jordan; and the roads leading to them should be well kept, so that the avenger of blood should not be able to overtake and slay the innocent fugitive through a long and wearisome and difficult road. [The Jewish tradition held that the cities east and west of the Jordan must correspond with each other; that the three on each side must be equally distant from each other; that the cities must be unwalled—of considerable size, have all the necessaries and conveniences of life, both material as water, markets, etc., and moral as teachers’ schools; in short, be a complete little world. Hirsch says that the שׁגגה or error did not include mistakes occurring through their carelessness, but only cases which could not have been calculated upon, or which could not have been avoided by ordinary human foresight. He adds that their protective character belonged in a secondary sense to the Levitical cities, but was the prominent characteristic of these six cities. Levitical or priestly cities were chosen partly because they would be first resorted to in the administration of justice, and partly also because the land and the people were the Lord’s, and the priests were His representatives; and the crime of shedding blood was pre-eminently offensive to Him, and left its stain upon His land; and therefore those charged with this crime and yet innocent, were to seek refuge in His cities and under His protection. The right and duty of revenge for violations of justice was universally recognized among the ancients. It was exercised at first by every member of the family. It was later restricted in its exercise to some one member, generally the next of kin. It was greatly modified in its application by this Mosaic institution and its attendant features. The Goel—“is that particular relation whose special duty it was to restore the violated family integrity, who had not only to redeem landed property that had been alienated from the family (Lev_25:25 sq.), or a member of the family who had fallen into slavery (Lev_25:47), but also the blood that had been taken away from the family by murder.” Oehler in Keil’s Com.—A. G.]
The right of asylum created also, according to Num_35:15, for the stranger, even those who were merely sojourners in the land. But it was only a free city actually to those who had committed manslaughter, and that without design. The murderer, on the contrary, who fled to it for refuge, ran directly to the bar of judgment and to death. Even the homicide was only protected at first from the rage and violence of the avenger.9 His ultimate freedom from the penalty of death depends upon a variety of conditions. The fugitive must at first stand before the gates of the city of refuge, and state his case to the elders, in order to secure admission into the city, and its protection against the avenger. He had thus to vindicate himself before a judicial investigation.10 Then he could not leave the city of refuge until a fixed terminus was reached. If he wandered from its jurisdiction, the avenger might slay him. As he thus stood, on the one side, under the protection of the free city, the authority of the Levites, and the special protection of Jehovah, to whom the Levite cities as peculiarly holy belonged, so he was, on the other hand, in a certain measure banished from his hearth and home. The terminus moreover for the close of this exile is very remarkable. When the high-priest dies, who is anointed with the sacred oil, he may return to his inheritance in safely. This entirely peculiar method of atonement, rests truly upon the idea that the great event of the death of the high priest covers with respect to God, a mass of sins which have risen from ignorance or mistakes, and causes them to be forgotten by men, and thus forms a terminus or bound which even the avenger of blood must respect. Thus even in a moral sense great national calamities—such as the death of the high priest would be regarded in Israel—have something expiatory in their nature; old enmities and dissensions are lost in the national sorrow. In the interval moreover the hope of the fugitive was kept alive awaiting this terminus, while the passion of the avenger was abated. Keil holds especially from the statement that the high priest was anointed with the holy oil that the death of the earthly high priest, typified that of the heavenly, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God (Heb_9:14). It is definitely declared that the priests had to bear the sins of the people; the high priest especially making an atonement stood with his censer between the dead and the living, and his intercession, as his priestly steadfastness when in peril of death, had a somewhat atoning character, as probably also his death. Still we must emphasize the fact that this dynamic or moral efficacy of his death is not mentioned among the definite types of the Old Testament, and could not be so mentioned, since the death of the high priest was not always edifying. [Keil: “In these regulations all the rigor of divine justice is manifested in the most beautiful concord with His mercy. Through the destruction of life, even when not wilful, human blood had been shed and demanded expiation. Yet this expiation did not consist in the death of the offender himself, because he had not sinned wilfully. Hence an asylum was provided for him in the free city to which he might flee, and where he might remain, not as an exile, but under the protection of God, until his sin was expiated by the death of the high priest. The fact that the death of the high priest was regarded as expiatory is evident from the clause, “who has been anointed with the holy oil,” which would appear unmeaning and superfluous on any other view. The anointing with the holy oil was a symbol of the communication of the Holy Ghost, by which the high priest was empowered to act as mediator and representative of the nation before God, so that he alone could carry out the yearly and general expiation for the whole nation on the great day of atonement. But as his life and work acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Ghost, his death might also be regarded as a death for the Sins of the people, by virtue of the Holy Ghost imputed to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sins before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town without further exposure to the avenger of blood. But inasmuch as, according to this view, the death of the high priest had the same result in a certain sense, in relation to his line of office, as his function on the day of atonement had had every year, the death of the earthly high priest became thereby a type of that of the heavenly One, who through the eternal (holy) Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions, and receive the promised eternal inheritance. Just as the blood of Christ wrought out eternal redemption only, because through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God, so the death of the high priest of the Old Testament secured the complete deliverance of the manslayer from his sin, only because he had been anointed with the holy oil, the symbol of the Holy Ghost.” The death of Christ our High Priest avails to release those who have fled for refuge to Him from all the penalty which their sins deserve. And as the high priest was a type of Christ, his death, as the anointed one, and anointed with the Spirit of life and holiness, had a typical efficacy, and released those who had fled for refuge from the avenger to the priestly cities, and representatively at least, to the city of the high priest. That it is not expressly mentioned as a type by no means excludes it from that relation, nor does the mode or features of the high priest’s death affect its typical any more than its real efficacy.—A. G.]
As the acquittal of the unintentional homicide was not unconditioned, so also the restraints of the avenger are not unlimited. The Goel was legally the nearest relative, or in his default the relative next removed (see the book of Ruth), and ultimately the whole family. In actual life however it was that relative of the slain person who felt most deeply the injury which had been inflicted upon him, and would rather die with the slain, than not to claim back his blood, i. e., leave it unavenged. The impulse of blood revenge was therefore, and still is, the original natural impulse of retributive justice, the source of all criminal jurisprudence. But since the avenger is blinded with passion—and unrestrained pursuit of revenge as a passion always engenders fresh revenges, as is seen, to this day among certain tribes and peoples, e.g., in Arabia—so the law steps in between the avenger and his victim, restrains him in the exercise of his right (and duty) by the judgment of the community, in order that the more natural form of revenge may pass more and more into the unimpassioned decision of the public court and justice. Thus the right of refuge and of revenge stand over against each other, and each exerting a modifying and shaping influence upon the other. In a legal point of view the avenger may still kill the homicide with impunity; and is indeed the executioner of the sentence of the court, if the congregation, or the court of the congregation (i. e., the local court of the city of refuge, or perhaps the highest tribunal of the whole community), should adjudge the homicide a murderer. [The order seems to have been this. The manslayer presented himself to the elders of the city of refuge and stated his case; upon that they received him, and if the charge of crime was pressed, he was to be handed over to the community to which he belonged, and then fully tried. If they found him innocent of intentional murder, he was remitted to the protection of the city of refuge; if otherwise, he was delivered to the avenger.—A. G.]
3. The distinction between homicide and murder.
Num_35:16-28. The signs of murder as to the mode. The use of a deadly weapon of iron, or, if heavy enough to cause death, a stone, or of a heavy piece of wood (Cain’s club). [The use of such weapons dangerous to life would imply some evil intent—were presumably proof of a malicious purpose.—A. G.] The motives are hatred and enmity. The means employed an artful plan. Unintentional homicide, on the other hand, might occur from “sudden thrust, a hunting around of a weapon, without enmity; or the casting of a stone without a purpose to injure, or in ignorance of any one in danger, and in cases in which it could then be known that no enmity, no ill-will existed. [See the cases illustrated Deu_19:4-5.—A. G.] In the former case the avenger takes his course, but in the latter the congregation shall judge, i. e., actually determine, and so rescue the manslayer from his pursuer. As to the manslayer even the sentence the avenger may kill him whenever and wherever he meets him, lights upon him, comes under legal limitations, because otherwise the revenger might designate every homicide as a murderer.11
4. The judgment upon the murderer and his motive.
Num_35:29-34. The manslayer can only be convicted of murder by the evidence of several (Deut.: two or three) witnesses. The testimony of a single witness is not sufficient. But if convicted, then he was not to be released upon any expiation, or ransom, or sacrifice, as was done among the heathen nations, by the old Germans, and even in the church of the middle ages. Even the mere manslayer cannot be released from his sentence, that he must remain in the city of refuge until the death of the high priest. For whoever is guilty of blood has defiled and desecrated the land; he has stained it with blood, and there is no atonement for these but the blood of the murderer. If he remains unpunished, then the judicatory itself appointed to administer retributive justice defiles the land, the holy land, in which Jehovah dwells with His people—Jehovah as the sacred personality among His people, whom He has trained to a life of sanctified personality. Thus here too the law forms a sacred pedagogic—a method of training by which men are led upwards from the merely natural to the spiritual life. As Moses thus provides for or regulates the oath, the offering, marriage, divorce, the vow, the revenge of jealousy, so now also the blood revenge, in order to lead it to the ideal goal, where the whole society of the people, the entire community, is made responsible for the execution of the penalty or curse resting upon the shedding of human blood. Comp. this Comm. Gen_9:5-6. [No satisfaction.
Num_35:31-32. “The permission to make compensation for murder undoubtedly mitigates in practice the system of private retaliation, but it does so by sacrificing the principle which is the basis of that retaliation itself. Resting ultimately upon that law of God, “that whosoever sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed,” it bids men rest content with a convenient evasion of that law, and connects the authority given to men to act as God’s ministers in taking life for life, with a warrant for enabling the kinsmen of a murdered man to make gain out of his murder. For I the Lord dwell—an emphatic protest against all enactment or relaxation of laws by men for their own private convenience.” Bib. Com. These words too contain the very principle and sum of the whole law above, viz.: this sacredness of human blood or life—since man is made in the image of God.—A. G.]
For the literature see Winer’s Real-Worterbuch, art. “Freistatt.” Dann: Ueber den Ursprung des Asylrechts, etc., Leipsic, 1840. Cowles on the Pentateuch, pp. 280–284. J. D. Michaelis, Laws of Moses. Smith’s Bib. Dict. arts. “Cities of Refuge” and “Revenger of Blood.”
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
The Levites were specially cared for. They are to be, on the one hand, without large possessions, and, on the other, without care, but, above all, intimately connected with the people; an ideal for an ecclesiastical and spiritual class for all time. The hierarchy of the middle ages did not observe this. It took the tithes, but took with them also the landed property. It reversed the Old Testament relations. It did not dwell with the people, but left them to dwell by themselves. And while men who were pursued for an unintentional crime found safety among the Levites in the cities of refuge, under the hierarchy men who were more innocent than unintentional homicides ran directly to their death, into the very tortures of the inquisition. But the right of sanctuary which the churches offered them was a faint reflection of the Old Testament cities of refuge.
The refuge opened in the bosom of the Levitical cities for those who were pursued by the revenger of blood; how great and true a preparation to the New Testament was this union of holiness and mercy.
But the sharp distinctions which are made with respect to these fugitives, between actual murderers and real homicides, are a divine testimony against the fatuities of modern liberalism, and especially against the abominable lie of materialism, which strips all crimes of their guilt.
[“The atoning death of the Saviour casts its shadow before on the statute book of the law, and on the annals of Jewish history. The High Priest as the head and representative of the whole chosen family of sacerdotal mediators, as exclusively entrusted with some of the chief priestly functions, as alone privileged to make yearly atonement within the Holy of Holies, was pre-eminently a type of Christ. And then the death of each successive high-priest presignified that death of Christ by which the captives were to be freed, and the remembrance of transgressions made to cease.” Bib. Com.—A. G.]
HOMILETICAL HINTS
The beautiful and suggestive union of the Levitical cities and the cities of Refuge, the instructive element in the regulation of the Levitical cities. The sense of justice is consecrated and sanctified in the establishment of the cities of refuge. The wisdom which shines in the union of the two institutions. The distinction between the murderer and the homicide, a fundamental distinction in all criminal jurisprudence. The justice in the limitations of the right of Asylum. Blood revenge as the root of the courts of law, and these courts as abolishing the blood revenge, just as jealousy is the root of marriage, and marriage is the destruction of jealousy. The difficult and ever new and repeated effort for the reconciliation of judgment and mercy, or even of equity and grace. The reconciliation between the rights of the dead and the rights of the living. The rights of the dead or slain one. The rights of the living. The atoning element in the occurrence of great catastrophes upon the land or on the people. Illustrated in the death of the High Priest. [The sacredness of human life in its relations to society and in its relations to God. How God guards and restrains the working of mere blind revenge, and yet cherishes and gives exercise to the sense of justice. Crimes unpunished bring guilt upon the authorities and courts. Henry: “Here is a great deal of good law and of good gospel. It is here enacted, 1. That wilful murder should be punished with death, and in that case no sanctuary should be allowed, no ransom taken nor any commutation of the punishment accepted; the murderer shall surely be put to death. The redemption of the life is so precious that it cannot be obtained by the multitude of riches. 2. That if the slaying was not voluntary, nor done designedly, there was safety in the city of refuge. The protection was under law. It was a remedial law, and all its provisions must be strictly observed. There is here a great deal of good gospel couched under the type and figures of the cities of refuge. (See Heb_6:18.) As, 1. There were several cities, so that the manslayer might easily reach them, so although there is but one Christ, yet He is a refuge at hand. 2. The manslayer was safe in any of these cities, so all who have fled to Christ are safe, Rom_8:1. 3. Even strangers and sojourners might have the benefit of these cities, so in Christ Jesus there is no difference between Greek and Jew. 4. If the manslayer left the city to return to his own home, he lay exposed to the avenger of blood, so those that are in Christ must abide in Christ; it is at their peril if they forsake Him or wander from Him. Drawing back is to perdition.” Wordsworth: “Not only does blood pollute the land, but they also who connive at murder when they ought to punish it, are said here to pollute it. Is it then competent to man to abolish capital punishment for murder?”—A. G.]
Footnotes:
[1]Marg. above them ye shall give.
[2]Heb. they inherit.
[3]Heb. by error.
[4]Heb. a stone of the hand.
[5]Heb. no blood shall be to him.
[6]Heb. faulty to die.
[7]Heb. there can be no expiation for the blood.
[8][וּלְכֹל הַיָּתָם animals generally. So Keil, Bib. Com., Wordsworth; but Hirsch suggests that the phrase is used here, not to supplement the enumeration of the pasture animals, but rather to denote every purifying arrangement necessary for health. No grave could be made in the Levite city or region, unless in the cases of those who had fled to them for refuge.—A. G.]
[9][Jewish Rabbis held that in cases of this crime—where there was no kinsman upon whom the duty fell to revenge the blood shed—the court would appoint one—A. G.]
[10][So strictly was this interpreted by the Jewish doctors, that even when committed in the presence of the court, the crime could not be punished until a judicial examination. In such a case, however, the court which was to sit and adjudicate the case must be a different one from that before which the offence was committed. The functions of a judge and a witness were in their view not lodged in the same person.—A. G.]
[11][Hirsch: At the death of the high priest, the homicide returned to his home and possessions, but not to his social position and official honor, even where these were hereditary. All other transgressors, when they were atoned for, were restored to the honors and offices they enjoyed before, and were qualified to hold new positions but the unintentional murderers were excluded.—A. G.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv1, 4THE LEVITE CITIES, Num_35:1-5.
THE LEVITE CITIES, Num_35:1-5.
1. The plains of Moab — Num_22:1, note.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv1–21–8. The Levitical cities
1–8. The Levitical cities
The Levites are to receive 48 cities with their surrounding land (E.VV. ‘suburbs’), six of which are to be ‘cities of refuge.’ The cities are to be contributed by each tribe in numbers proportionate to its size. Each plot of land is to be a square of 2,000 cubits (c. 1,000 yards). The carrying out of this law is related in fuller detail in Joshua 21, where the allotment is as follows: the Kohathite Levites were given 10 towns in Ephraim, Dan and western Manasseh, the Gershonites 13 in Issachar, Asher, Naphtali and eastern Manasseh, the Merarites 12 in Reuben, Gad and Zebulun, while the priests had 10 in Judah, Simeon and Benjamin.
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Two considerations, however, shew that this is a purely ideal arrangement, which could never have been actually brought about: 1st, In a hilly country like Palestine, cut with deep ravines, it would be impossible to find 48 square plots of land of such a size. 2nd, It is at variance with statements in earlier passages, (a) In Deuteronomy the Levites are classed with widows, orphans and strangers, as poor people who are commended to the charity of Israel; cf. Deu_12:12; Deu_12:18 f., Num_14:27; Num_14:29, Num_16:11; Num_16:14, Num_26:11 ff. In a few cases, indeed, priests settled in communities, and appear to have owned property, e.g. at Anathoth (1Ki_2:26, Jer_32:6 ff.), Nob (1Sa_21:1; 1Sa_22:19) and Bethel (Amo_7:10); but the two latter towns are not included in the list in Joshua 21. Deu_18:8 b may imply that some Levitical priests owned private property, but the passage is uncertain. (b) In Numbers 18, which must belong to an earlier stage of P than the present passage, the offerings to be made to the priests are expressly stated to be due to them because they have no landed property. Ezekiel (ch. 48) puts forward another ideal scheme for providing priests and Levites with land.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv2, 3, 5(2) Cities to dwell in.—The object of the dispersion…
XXXV.
(2) Cities to dwell in.—The object of the dispersion of the Levites throughout the other tribes seems to have been primarily with a view to the instruction of their brethren in the law of the Lord (Deu_33:10). It is probable that the Levites also discharged all those other functions which are now discharged by the learned professions.
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And ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs . . . —The word migrash, “suburb,” denotes, probably, pasture ground into which flocks are driven.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. H. Mackintosh1880 · Public DomainOn v1Numbers 35
Numbers 35
The opening lines of this most interesting chapter set before us the gracious provision which Jehovah made for His servants the Levites. Each of the tribes of Israel was privileged - that we say not bound - to furnish the Levites with a certain number of cities with their suburbs, according to their ability. "All the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities: them shall ye give with their suburbs. And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel: from them that have many ye shall give many; But from them that have few ye shall give few: every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites, according to his inheritance which he inheriteth." Verses 7, 8.
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The Lord’s servants were wholly cast upon Him for their portion. They had no inheritance or possession saving himself. Blessed inheritance! Precious portion! None like it, in the judgement of faith. Blessed are all those who can truly say to the Lord, "Thou art the portion of my cup, and the lot of my inheritance." God took care of His dependent servants, and permitted the whole congregation of Israel to taste the hallowed privilege - for such it most assuredly was - of being co-workers with Him in providing for those who had willingly devoted themselves to His work, abandoning all besides.
Thus, then, we learn that, out of the twelve tribes of Israel, forty and eight cities, with their suburbs, were to be given over to the Levites; and out of these again, the Levites had the privilege of furnishing six cities to be a refuge for the poor manslayer. Most lovely provision! Lovely in its origin! Lovely in its object!
The cities of refuge were situated, three on the eastern and three on the western side of Jordan. whether Reuben and Gad were right or wrong in settling east of that significant boundary, God in His mercy would not leave the slayer without a refuge from the avenger of blood. On the contrary, like Himself, He ordained that those cities which were designed as a merciful provision for the slayer should be so situated that wherever there was need of a shelter that shelter might be near at hand. There was always a city within reach of any who might be exposed to the sword of the avenger. This was worthy of our God. If any slayer happened to fall into the hands of the avenger of blood, it was not for want of a refuge near at hand, but because he had failed to avail himself of it. All necessary provision was made; the cities were named, and well defined, and publicly known. Everything was made as plain, as simple, and as easy as possible. Such was God’s gracious way.
No doubt, the slayer was responsible to put forth all his energy to reach the sacred precincts; and, no doubt, he would. It is not at all likely that any one would be so blind or so infatuated as to fold his arms, in cool indifference, and say, "If I am fated to escape, I shall escape, my efforts are not needed. If I am not fated to escape, I cannot escape, my efforts are of no use." We cannot fancy a manslayer using such silly language, or being guilty of such blind fatality as this. He knew too well that if the avenger could but lay his hand upon him, all such notions would be of small account. There was but the one thing to be done, and that was to escape for his life - to flee from impending judgement to find his safe abode within the gates of the city of refuge. Once there, he could breathe freely. No evil could overtake him there. The moment He crossed the threshold of the gate, he was as safe as God’s provision could make him. if a hair of his head could be touched, within the bounds of the city, it could but be a dishonour and a reproach upon the ordinance of God. True, he had to keep close. He dared not venture outside the gate. Within, he was perfectly safe. Without, he was thoroughly exposed. He could not even visit his friends. He was an exile from his Father’s house. He was a prisoner of hope. Absent from the home of his heart’s affections, he waited for the death of the high priest, which was to set him perfectly free and restore him, once more, to his inheritance and to his people.
Now, we believe that this beautiful ordinance had special reference to Israel. They have killed the Prince of life; but the question is, As which are they viewed by God, as the murderer or as the slayer? If the former, there is no refuge, no hope. No murderer could be sheltered within the city of refuge. Here is the law of the case, as stated in Joshua 20, "The Lord also spake unto Joshua, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, saying, Appoint out for you cities of refuge, whereof I spake unto you by the hand of Moses: that the slayer that killeth any person unawares and unwittingly may flee thither: and they shall be your refuge from the avenger of blood. And when he that doth flee unto one of those cities shall stand at the entering of the gate of the city, and shall declare his cause in the ears of the elders of that city, they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place, that he may dwell among them. And if the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver the slayer up into his hand; because he smote his neighbour unwittingly, and hated him not beforetime, And he shall dwell in that city, until he stand before the congregation for judgement, and until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days: then shall the slayer return, and come unto his own city, and unto his own house, unto the city from whence he fled." Vv 1-6.
But with respect to the murderer; the law was rigid and unbending "The murderer shall surely be put to death. The revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him." Numbers 35.
Israel, then, through the marvellous grace of God, will be treated as a slayer and not as a murderer. "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." These potent words ascended to the ear and to the heart of the God of Israel. They were heard and answered; nor are we to suppose that the answer was exhausted in its application on the day of Pentecost. No; it still holds good, and its efficacy will be illustrated in the future history of the house of Israel. That people are now under God’s keeping. They are exiles from the land and the home of their fathers. But the time is coming when they shall be restored to their own land, not by the death of the high priest - blessed be His deathless name! He can never die - but He will leave His present position, and come forth, in a new character, as the Royal Priest, to sit upon His throne. Then shall the exile return to his long-lost home, and his forfeited inheritance. But not till then, else it would be ignoring the fact that they killed the Prince of life, which were impossible. The manslayer mast remain out of his possession until the appointed time; but he is not to be treated as a murderer, because he did it unwittingly. "I obtained mercy" - says the Apostle Paul, speaking as a pattern to Israel because I did it ignorantly in unbelief." "And now, brethren," says Peter, "I wot that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers."
These passages, together with the precious intercession of the slain One, do, in the most distinct manner, place Israel on the ground of the manslayer, and not on the ground of the murderer. God has provided a refuge and a shelter for His much-loved people, and in due time they shall return to their long-lost dwellings, in that land which Jehovah gave as a gift to Abraham his friend for ever.
Such we believe to be the true interpretation of the ordinance of the city of refuge. Were we to view it as bearing upon the case of a sinner taking refuge in Christ, it could only be in a very exceptional way, inasmuch as we should find ourselves surrounded, on all hands, by points of contrast rather than by points of similarity. For in the first place, the manslayer, in the city of refuge, was not exempt from judgement, as we learn from Joshua 20: 6. But for the believer in Jesus there is and can be no judgement, for the simplest of all reasons, that Christ has borne the judgement instead.
Again, there was a possibility of the slayer’s falling into the hands of the avenger, if he ventured outside the gates of the city. The believer in Jesus can never perish; he is as safe as the Saviour himself.
Finally, as regards the slayer, it was a question of temporal safety and life in this world. As regards the believer in Jesus, it is a question of eternal salvation and life everlasting in the world to come. In fact, in almost every particular, it is striking contrast rather than similarity.
One grand point there is common to both, and that is, the point of exposure to imminent danger and the urgent need of fleeing for refuge. If it would have been wild folly on the part of the slayer to linger or hesitate for a moment, until he found himself safely lodged in the city of refuge, it is surely still wilder folly, yea, the very height of madness, on the part of the sinner, to linger or hesitate in coming to Christ. The avenger might perhaps fail to lay hold on the slayer even though he were not in the city; But judgement must overtake the sinner out of Christ. There is no possibility of escape, if there is the thickness of a gold leaf between the soul and Christ. Solemn thought! May it have its due weight in the heart of the reader who is yet in his sins! May he find no rest - not one moment’s rest, until he has fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before him in the gospel. Judgement impends, certain, solemn judgement. It is not only that the avenger may come, but judgement must come upon all who are out of Christ.
Oh! unconverted, thoughtless, careless reader - should this volume fall into the hands of such - hear the warning voice! Flee for thy life! Tarry not, we entreat thee! Delay is madness. Every moment is precious. You know not the hour in the which you may be cut down, and consigned to that place in the which a single ray of hope, not even the faintest glimmer, can ever visit you - the place of eternal night, eternal woe, eternal torment - the place of a deathless worm and an unquenchable flame. Beloved friend, do let us entreat thee, in these few closing lines of our volume, to come now, just as thou art, to Jesus, who stands with open arms and loving heart, ready to receive thee, to shelter, to save, and to bless, according to all the love of His heart, and the perfect efficacy of His name and His sacrifice. May God the Holy Spirit, by His own resistless energy, lead thee, just now, to come. "Come unto me," says the loving Lord and Saviour, "all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." Precious words! May they fall, with divine power, upon many a weary heart!
Here we close our meditations upon this marvellous section of the volume of God;* and, in doing so, we are impressed with a profound sense of the depth and richness of the mine to which we have sought to conduct the reader, and also of the excessive feebleness and poverty of the suggestions which we have been enabled to offer. However, our confidence is in the living God, that He will, by His Holy Spirit, lead the heart and mind of the Christian reader into the enjoyment of His own precious truth, and thus fit him, more and more, for His service in these last evil days, that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be magnified, and His truth maintained in living power. May God, in His abounding mercy, grant this, for Jesus Christ’s sake!
{*Chapter 36 has been referred to in our meditation on chapter 17}
C. H. M.
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The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 5THE LEVITICAL CITIES, AND CITIES OF REFUGE, AND LAWS…
THE LEVITICAL CITIES, AND CITIES OF REFUGE, AND LAWS AS TO HOMICIDE (verses Num_33:50 Num_36:13.
Vers. 1-34. The dwelling of the faithful: the Redeemer: the sanctity of life.
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There are in this chapter three things closely connected historically, and therefore closely consecutive in the narrative, but distinct in their spiritual application. We have, therefore, separately to consider
I THE PROVISION WHICH GOD MAKES FOR HIS OWN, AND THEIR DISPERSION;
II THE REFUGE SET BEFORE HIM THAT IS GUILTY OF BLOOD;
III THE SANCTITY OF LIFE.
I In the regulations made for the habitation of the Levites and their cattle we have some sort of precedent for religious endowments; but this precedent loses all value in argument when we consider that the old dispensation was essentially temporal, which ours is not; moreover, the Levites do not correspond to the clergy, but rather to the inner circle of the faithful, who are more emphatically the "salt of the earth." Consider, therefore, as to the habitation of the Levites
1. That it was the will of God to disperse them as widely as possible throughout Israel a thing which might have been looked upon as a punishment to them, (Gen_49:7) but was really for the common good. Even so it is his will that his own, who are more especially his own, should be scattered far and wide among the mass of imperfect or nominal Christians; not gathered together in one corner of Christendom, but everywhere found as the few among the many. And note that this is the very law of "salt," which must be scattered and diffused to exercise its antiseptic functions.
2. That the Levites, although dispersed, yet lived in communities, and this no doubt that they might set forth the life of holiness according to the law. Even so there is, beside the law of dispersion, a counter-law of aggregation for "the spiritual," which makes mightily for holiness. For Christianity is a life, and life is complex, and therefore can only be lived by many who agree. There should be centers of high religious influence everywhere, but those centers should be strong.
3. That the allotments of the Levites, though Sufficient, were far from being extensive, on any understanding of the text. Even so, for those who would be an example to Christ"s flock, sufficiency is the rule, and nothing more. (1Ti_6:8) God does not design poverty for his own, (Luk_12:31) unless voluntarily embraced, (ibid. Luk_12:33) but assuredly not wealth. (Luk_6:24)
4. That the object aimed at in the allotment of their cities was to give each tribe, and even each tribesman, a personal and local interest in the Levites. Even so it is the will of God that those who specially follow after him should be identified as strongly as possible with those around them, in order that these may love and reverence them. Every Christian land has its "saints," by whom it is the more edified in that it feels them to be specially its own.
Consider also, mystically
1. That the Levitical cities numbered forty-eight, i.e., 12 4 the first being the symbol of the universal (apostolic see Rev_21:14) Church, the second of the whole earth, (Mat_8:11 Rev_21:13) the whole signifying diffusion throughout the world. Even so the religious life is universal in all parts of the Church of God, even in those which seem to us most remote.
2. That the enclosures round the Levitical cities measured the same every way lay foursquare as far as possible. Even so it is the ideal of the religious life that it be not one-sided, or unequal, but attain its full-development in all directions; if not it must be starved to some extent.
II The law of refuge from the goel is one of the most striking, and yet difficult, of the foreshadowings of the gospel. It is complicated, in the spiritual interpretation, by the fact that Christ is the Victim with whose blood our hands are stained, and our only Refuge, while he is also typified as Redeemer by the goel, and as Messiah by the anointed priest. Consider, however
1. That the law presupposed and provided for a state of blood-guiltiness, which brought after it the sentence of death. (Gen_9:6) Even so the gospel presupposes that all have sinned, and have become guilty of the death of Christ, who died for our sins, and have incurred the sentence of eternal death. David said, "Deliver me from blood-guiltiness", (Psa_51:14) but he had already incurred it; (2Sa_12:9) and so have we. (cf. Heb_6:6 Heb_10:29)
2. That it provided for such blood-guiltiness as was unwittingly incurred. Even so Christ"s excuse for us is that we "know not what we do" (Luke 24), and our hope is that we have not willfully and deliberately preferred sin as such. (Act_3:17 1Ti_1:13)
3. That it presupposed that the avenger was on foot to take the life of the manslayer. Even so the gospel testifies by its very offers of mercy that the Divine justice is surely gone forth with the edict of death against every soul that hath sinned, and that it is a mere matter of time when that justice shall overtake the sinner. (Gen_3:3 Eze_18:4 Rom_3:9, Rom_3:19, &c.);
4. That it pleased God to open a door of safety to the fugitive without staying the avenger. For the mission of the goel was very needful for that age, and yet it was the will of God to spare the unwitting homicide. Even so it has pleased God in a wonderful manner to provide a refuge for the sinner without compromising the Divine justice. The wrath of God against sin and the necessary punishment of sin are declared by the very means which bring salvation to the sinner. (Rom_3:26, &c.);
5. That this refuge was so distributed in six cities, three on each side Jordan, that it was everywhere accessible. Even so the sinner"s refuge in Jesus Christ is everywhere and by all accessible, if they will without delay flee into it. (Heb_6:18, &c.); And note that whereas almost all other religious privilege and promise was concentrated at Jerusalem, this refuge was distributed to all quarters of Jewish settlement, intimating that salvation in Christ is attainable wherever men call upon his name. (Rom_9:33, &c.);
6. That in order to be safe the manslayer must flee to the city of refuge, which was a Levitical city (not a solitary post or a mere sanctuary), and there must take up his abode among the Levites. Even so the sinner who desires to escape from the sentence of Divine justice must flee for refuge unto Christ to take hold on his merits; but in doing so he does ipso facto find a home in the society of the truly faithful, and in that society he will abide. The life of one that is escaped from wrath is not a solitary-walk with God, but a dwelling in a populous city. (Act_2:42Co Act_3:15 Heb_12:22, Heb_12:23; cf. Psa_31:21, &c.);
7. That the manslayer must never stir outside his refuge at risk of his life; if he did, the goel was at liberty to slay him. Even so the sinner must never quit his refuge in Christ for one hour, lest he perish; neither may he (which is part of the same thing) withdraw from the society of the faithful, for that is his (outward) protection. At whatever risk and less of things temporal, he must abide under the shelter of the atonement.
Consider again, with respect to the death of the high priest, and the staying of blood-feuds
1. That the high priest typified Christ, not in that he died by virtue of individual mortality, but in that he lived by virtue of official immortality; (see on Num_20:28 Heb_7:24, Heb_7:25) wherefore it is contrary to the whole analogy of Scripture to attribute any power of atonement to the death of the high priest.
2. That the high priest was not only the mediator and intercessor for Israel, but was also the chief minister of the law of God, and therefore the avenger of all iniquity against Israel, especially of all blood-guiltiness; in a word, he represented Divine justice as well as Divine compassion.
3. That the death of the high priest, which set the escaped manslayer free from all constraints and restrictions, must be taken to represent the passing away (as far as we are concerned) of the law of God as directed against sin. But this will only be when sin itself shall have wholly ceased, i.e. , at the resurrection of the just; then, and only then, will all restraints, all constraints, all necessities for sacrifice and renunciation, all penalties for forsaking the society of the faithful, be for ever abolished as no longer needful.
Consider also, in connection with this
1. That the word goel is translated avenger, kinsman, and redeemer; the same personage sustaining in fact all these characters, and that by a natural law due to the circumstances of the age.
2. That our Lord is unquestionably our God, in that he is our Kinsman, who has made himself our nearest blood relation, and in that he is our Redeemer, who hath redeemed for us our forfeited possession in the kingdom of heaven.
3. That he is also our Goel in that he is in readiness to avenge as Judge all wrongs done unto the temporal or spiritual lives of his own. This is indeed little considered, but is certainly true, since he alone wields all power in heaven and in earth. (see Mat_28:18 Heb_4:12, Heb_4:13, where the "Word of God" is evidently the personal Word; Luk_18:7 2Th_1:6 Rev_6:10 Rev_19:2, &c.);
4. That the work and office of Christ as Avenger and Defender of his own will cease and determine with the final end of all wickedness, and then he will be Goel no longer in this sense. (see 1Co_15:24-28 compared with Rev_7:17, &c.); And this change, whereby the Avenger will be wholly swallowed up in the Kinsman and Redeemer, seems to be symbolized by the death of the high priest (see above).
III The laws of manslaughter here declared have rather a moral than a spiritual value. The one thing which they uphold as a principle is the sanctity of human life, and the duty of inflicting capital punishment for murder, as laid down in Genesis 9. It is difficult to see that this duty is less under the gospel, because the bringing in of the gospel has not changed the fundamental relations of man to his Maker as based upon creation; rather it would seem to have added to the sanctity of human life by adding to the ties which knit that life to the life of God. (cf. Act_9:4, 5 1Co_6:15 2Pe_1:4) Whatever may be held, however, as touching the duties of civil governors, we may consider
1. That the sin against God involved in murder is enormous, and this guilt is incurred by every one that hateth his brother. (1Jn_3:15)
2. That the guilt of murder lay before God in the intention to kill, wherefore murders also proceed out of the heart. (Mar_7:21)
3. That it was laid upon the congregation to show by prompt and righteous procedure that they had no sympathy with the murderer.
4. That in the absence of such vindication of justice the land was polluted with blood in the eyes of God, who dwelt therein.
5. That there is a crime which is murder, but is worse than any killing of the body, i.e., the destroying of the soul by leading it into sin.
6. That it is laid upon all the faithful to show their horror and detestation of this crime by their treatment of seducers and tempters. (1Co_5:11 Eph_5:11 2Ti_2:21 2Jn_1:11)
7. That indulgence and sympathy extended to destroyers of souls that have not repented brings down the wrath of God upon a Church, and makes it hateful in his eyes. (see Isa_1:21, &c.);
8. That this sinful indulgence of seducers is excused by human considerations, in forgetfulness that God is in the midst of his people, and that every sin so lightly excused or ignored stares him in the face. (2Co_6:16 Rev_2:1)
9. That if the blood of Abel cried to him from the ground, and if the land of Canaan could not be cleansed from the blood of its slain, how much more will he be moved by that destruction of immortal souls which is wrought by the wicked lives and solicitations of bad Christians!
HOMILIES BY W. BINNIE Vers. 1-8. The Levites to be distributed in certain cities throughout the whole land.
Unlike the other tribes, the Levites were to have no inheritance in the land. The names of Judah, Ephraim, Manasseh, Reuben figure on the map of Palestine, each giving name to a province or county of its own; but the map knows no tribe of Levi. The Lord was the inheritance of this tribe. For their subsistence the Levites were to depend partly on the tithe, partly on certain dues and perquisites, supplemented by the free-will offerings of the faithful. But although they were landless, it was never the Lord"s will that they should be houseless. A vagabond ministry could not have failed to be a scandalous ministry. Accordingly, the law here provides dwellings for the sacred tribe in forty-eight Levitical cities.
I In this law TWO POINTS CLAIM NOTICE.
1. That the forty-eight cities, although denominated "Levitical cities," were not denoted exclusively to members of this tribe. For example, Hebron, which was perhaps the most noted of the forty-eight, being the city of refuge for what was afterwards the whole kingdom of Judah, formed part of the inheritance of Caleb the Kenezite. (Jos_14:14) Doubtless many families of Judah would also be found among the residents; for the city belonged to Judah. What the Levites obtained was not, in any instance, exclusive possession of the city, but certain houses within the walls, and certain pasture grounds ("glebe lands") adjoining. The houses and glebes thus set apart became the inalienable inheritance of the respective Levitical families. They were as strictly entailed as the lands which constituted the patrimony of the other families in Israel. If at any time they were sold for debt, they reverted to the family at the Jubilee.
2. The Levitical cities were scattered up and down the whole country. The arrangement was a remarkable one. At first sight, indeed, it looks awkward and unnatural. For were not the Levites set apart to do the service of the sanctuary? Would it not have been more convenient to have had them located where they would have been within easy reach of the sanctuary? In the ideal arrangement sketched in Ezekiel"s vision, the Levitical families are seen located in the vicinity of Jerusalem. The circumstance that the law ordained an arrangement so different was meant, I cannot doubt, to suggest to the Levites that they had other duties to discharge in Israel besides doing the service of the sanctuary. It was the will of God that they should, in their several districts, be the stated teachers of the people in the Divine law. (Deu_33:10 Mal_2:4-8) This office and calling of the Levites being so honourable, it has often been thought strange that their dispersion throughout Israel should have been predicted by Jacob as a curse upon the tribe for their father"s sin. (Gen_49:7) In itself it was honourable; nevertheless the words of the patriarch were fulfilled in the end. When the ten tribes revolted from the house of David, they fell away also from the sanctuary; and the Levites dwelling within those tribes had to choose between forfeiting their cities or being cut off from the sanctuary. In either case they found how bitter it was to be divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel.
II WHAT MAY WE LEARN FROM THIS LAW?
1. It has been usual to see in the distribution of the Levites over the whole land a type, and prelude of the arrangement which, in Christendom, assigns to every parish and every congregation its own pastor. The apostles "ordained elders in every city." Ministers of the gospel are not to be massed together in the great cities, but to be scattered everywhere, so that no family in God"s Israel may be beyond reach of one "at whose mouth they may seek the law." Of the institutions which have co-operated to make society what it is in the Christian nations, it would not be easy to name one which has been more influential for good than this.
2. The arrangement may be regarded as representing the principle according to which the lot of Christ"s people in this world is ordered. The faithful do not live apart from other men in towns and provinces of their own. Separation from the world, in this literal sense, has been often the dream of Christian reformers, and not seldom have societies been organized for the purpose of realizing it. But the well-meant schemes have in every case failed. They were bound to fail, for they ran counter to our Lord"s great prayer and rule: "I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil". (Joh_17:15) Nor is the reason of the rule doubtful. Christ"s people are the salt of the earth; and salt, to do its work, must be mingled with that which it is to preserve. The godly must be content to have ungodly persons, more or fewer, for neighbours so long as they abide in this world. An unmixed "congregation of the righteous" belongs to the felicities of the world to come. But if Christ"s people are like the Levites in regard to dispersion, they are like them also in respect to the provision made for their brotherly communion. As the Levites dwelt in their cities with other Levites, so Christians are to be gathered into Churches for mutual comfort and for common work. "We believe in the communion of saints. B.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG Vers. 1-8. God provides places for the Levites to dwell in.
God had laid upon the tribe of Levi many and onerous services, such as gave full occupation for their time (chapters 1, 3, 4, 8, 28, 29); he had also made abundant provision for their support in the matter of food; (Nu 18) it remained that he should give a clear indication of where they were to find a place of abode in Canaan. If their particular place of settlement was important to the other tribes, it was surely of peculiar importance to the tribe which in a representative aspect stood nearer to God than any of the rest. Levi, with all its solemn responsibilities, would assuredly not have been tolerated in such an assertion of self-will as came from Reuben and Gad. As we examine the mode of settlement indicated in this passage, we perceive how God points out the golden mean between too much concentration and too much diffusion.
I THE LEVITES WERE SO SETTLED AS TO AVOID THE GREAT EVILS CONSEQUENT ON UNDUE CONCENTRATION. They might have had the tabernacle fixed up in a certain tribal allotment of their own, and then what would have happened? Those living at a distance from the territory of Levi would have been debarred from many privileges belonging to those in immediate proximity. God is no respecter of persons. He did all that was possible to put every tribe in Israel in a position of religious equality. The proportion of land and the proportion of Levitical service was to be according to the needs of each tribe.
1. Thus, by a judicious diffusion, the unity of the nation was promoted. Different circumstances require different means for the same end. While the Israelites were encamped in the wilderness, the tribe of Levi was all together, in the midst of the camp, and immediately around the tabernacle. But when the Israelites became distributed in Canaan, the Levites were distributed also, thus acting still as a principle of unity, although in a different way. And this distribution had been made all the more necessary since two tribes and a half had chosen to dwell on the east of Jordan. That the Israelites themselves were not supremely conscious of the need of unity had been shown only too clearly by the conduct of Reuben and Gad. Much more was wanted than to lie side by side within the same borders. A mere geographical unity was a mockery, a delusion, and a snare.
2. This judicious diffusion also helped in promoting the knowledge of all that needed to be known in Israel. The Levites were privileged to become and the privilege was a very high one the guides, instructors, counselors, and monitors of the people. That which God had made known to Moses needed to be brought down very patiently and carefully to individual, private, daily life. The Levites had ample opportunities to explain the commandments of God and the significance of the types, the rites and ceremonies, and the great historic commemorations. And as the history of Israel grew, there grew with it opportunities to stimulate and warn by pointing out the mingled glory and shame of the nation"s career, and the lessons to be learnt front considering the men who had been conspicuous in that career. (2Ch_35:3) But these opportunities of instruction only came because God had sufficiently distributed the instructors throughout the land. If a house is to be fully lighted up there must be a light in every room. Those who are already instructed must be where they can firmly lay hold of the ignorant, for the ignorant in the things of God need not only to be instructed, but first of all thoroughly wakened out of sleep.
3. This diffusion also indicated the service which all Israel was to render to the world. What Levi was to Israel, that Israel was to become to all mankind. Levi was diffused through the whole nation, and only kept its individuality as a tribe in proportion as it kept its fidelity to God. Other tribes were distinguished by their territory; Levi by being specially engaged in the holy service of the tabernacle and the temple. Thus what a benefit has been produced more real perhaps than exactly appreciated by the dispersion of Israel among all nations to bear their own peculiar, solemn, and pathetic testimony to Israel"s God, and to the historic verity of the Old Testament! Thus also does God make his own gracious and comprehensive arrangements to diffuse believers in his Son throughout the world, according to the spiritual needs of the world. In one sense they are rigorously separated from the world, even as Israel was by the hard and fast lines of the national borders; in another sense they are meant to be so diffused that wherever there is a dark place, there the light of the truth as it is in Jesus may brightly shine. The gospel is debtor to all nations and all ranks, to both sexes and to all ages. We find the true Israelite in every society where a man has any right to be at all among the highest and the lowest; in Parliaments, in courts of justice, in commerce, in literature, in science, and in art.
II CARE WAS ALSO TAKEN IN THE SETTLEMENT OF THE LEVITES THAT THE NECESSARY DIFFUSION SHOULD NOT BE PUSHED TOO FAR. They were to be distributed through all Israel, but not according to the free choice of the individual Levite. Forty-eight cities, with sufficient accompanying land, were set apart for them. Thus, by fixing a limit of diffusion, God conferred a benefit both on them and on the whole people. Those who are engaged in a special work of such incalculable importance as the work of the Levites was, need to be where they can frequently counsel, comfort, and encourage one another. It was not good for the Levites to be alone. To be isolated was in itself a sore temptation.
And though the work of God is only truly done where there is individual consecration, energy, and initiative, yet he is not a wise Christian who sets lightly by the advantage he gains from frequent recourse to those like-minded with himself. A certain measure of coherence among the Levites was needed for a healthy and profitable state of the official life. You shall have a fire blazing brightly in the grate, and if you leave it so it will go on for a long time giving out its flame, heat, and light. But take the pieces of coal and range them separately on the hearth, and very quickly the glowing fragments will become a dull red and soon die out altogether. The limits which God fixes are wise and loving limits; he ever keeps us from all the dangers of extremes. The Levites were neither to be too much separated from the people nor too much mingled with them. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn v1Give unto the Levites . . . cities to…
Num_35:1-8
Give unto the Levites . . . cities to dwell in.
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The Levites inheritance
1. Cities were allowed them with their suburbs (Num_35:2). They were not to have any ground for tillage; they needed not to sow or reap, or gather into barns, for their heavenly Father fed them with the tithe of the increase of other peoples labours, that they might the more closely attend the study of the law, and might have more leisure to teach the people; for they were not fed thus easily that they might live in idleness, but that they might give themselves wholly to the business of their profession and not be entangled in the affairs of this life.
(1) Cities were allotted them that they might live near together, and converse with one another about the law, to their mutual edification; and that, in doubtful cases, they might consult one another, and in all cases strengthen one anothers hands.
(2) These cities had suburbs annexed to them for their cattle (Num_35:3); a thousand cubits from the wall was allowed them for out-housing to keep their cattle in, and then two thousand and more for fields to graze their cattle in (Num_35:4-5). Thus was care taken that they should not only live, but live plentifully, and have all desirable conveniences about them, that they might not be looked upon with contempt by their neighbours.
2. These cities were to be assigned to them out of the possessions of each tribe (Num_35:8).
(1) That each tribe might thus make a grateful acknowledgment to God out of their real as well as out of their personal estates; for what was given to the Levites was accepted as given to the Lord, and thus their possessions were sanctified to them.
(2) That each tribe might have the benefits of the Levites dwelling among them to teach them the good knowledge of the Lord. Thus that light was diffused through all parts of the country, and none left to sit in darkness (Deu_33:10). They shall teach Jacob Thy judgments. Jacobs curse on Levis anger was, I will scatter them in Israel (Gen_44:7); but that curse was turned into a blessing, and the Levites, by being thus scattered, were put into a capacity of doing so much the more good. It is a great mercy to a country to be replenished in all parts with faithful ministers. (Matthew Henry, D. D.)
The Levites home
The history of this tribe of Levi is fraught with many lessons for Christian workers. They were selected for the priesthood of the children of Israel, and on that account were separated from the rest of their brethren, and God ordained that they should have no inheritance among the children of Israel, and reminded them that God was their inheritance. But it is well for us to remember that it was not always so. At the commencement of their history this tribe of Levi lay underneath a curse (Gen_49:5). But there came in the history of the tribe a crisis. Moses had ascended to the top of the hill, and during his forty days absence the children of Israel made a molten calf, and bowed down to the idol. Moses came down from the hill-top, and at once standing amid the camp he shouted, Who is on the Lords side, let him come over to me; and all the tribe of Levi gathered themselves together unto Moses. It was the turning-point in their lives, they seized their opportunity, and from that time they were the tribe whom God chose for His service. But the call to Levi was not simply a call to privilege, it was a call to work. God calls not to idleness. When once you feel the consecrated hand of God laid upon you, you may be sure that He has work for you, and He has already commanded the help you need. And from that time that special characteristic of the tribe of Levi, which had in former times led them into sin, now is purified by God for His own special service. What was that characteristic? If I were to sum it up in one phrase, it would be this--intense sociability. Their very name, Levi, signifies the joined ones. It was this yearning for companionship which led Levi to join himself to the bloodthirsty Simeon, and to reap the vengeance which Jacob perpetuates upon his death-bed. It is a very important characteristic; it is a characteristic which the Christian ministry needs, which every individual Christian ought to possess. A Christian man should be a man of intense sympathy, and have his tendrils going forth to all around him. But there is another characteristic which is equally necessary to a true and faithful servant of God. And it is to produce this characteristic that Gods dealing with the children of Levi seems to be bent, namely, the power to stand alone. And not until these two characteristics are blended together is the Levite fit for the service of God. These are the true Christian servants--men who are ready to go forth to all, and yet men who are able, bravely, to take their stand alone, because they are joined to God. And now I want you to think of this one ordinance laid down with regard to these men, namely, the provision God had made in this chapter for their homes. We might have imagined it would have been better, as God had appointed this tribe to be workers for Him, for them to live about the temple of Jerusalem, so that they might be at hand to minister within its sacred courts. But no, God lays down the distinct command that this tribe of Levi, which He has chosen for His own peculiar service, should be scattered among the tribes. There were four or five centres in every tribe where these Levites were to dwell. What is the reason of this strange provision? I think it was made partly for the sake of the people, and partly for the sake of the Levites. It was in the first place, because of the people. In the wilderness the children of Israel were not likely to forget God. They had the tabernacle in their centre ; the pillar of cloud or file was always to be seen in the very middle of the camp. But when they became settled down in the promised land, and received their promised inheritance, then indeed they would be scattered abroad, and then would arise the danger lest they should forget the Lord their God. And, therefore, God ordained that their teachers should go and live in the very midst of them, because He wanted to bring religion to their homes. And this, I believe, is Gods law, that His people should go and scatter themselves; not simply settle down in some place, but actually go and let their light shine before men even in the very darkest places of the earth. But if the provision was made for the tribes, I think it was actually made for the Levites. If they had all been gathered together at Jerusalem, these Levites would consider that their work began, continued, and ended in their attendance at the ordinances of the sanctuary; and God wanted to show them, as His ministers, they were not simply to deal with the sanctuary, but with the home life of His people--to carry His religion into their various towns and villages. Further than that, by thus scattering them in these different tribes, God provides here that they may learn that their homes are not to be simply for themselves, but they are to be, as it were, cities of refuge. And this ought to be a picture of our homes. Not only would God scatter us as Christian men and women throughout the nations of the world, but each one of you has your home, and you want it to be a place where there shall be fellowship--a true Hebron. True, the Christian mans home is in the midst of this world with all its defilements; but it is a home of fellowship, it is a royal city, where Jesus Christ reigns as King. (E. A. Stuart, M. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible1887 · Public DomainOn v1Numbers 35; Numbers 36
THE CITIES OF REFUGE
Numbers 35; Numbers 36
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1. THE INHERITANCE OF THE LEVITES
The order relating to the Levitical cities may be said to describe an ideal settlement. We have, at all events, no evidence that the command was ever fully carried out. It was to the effect that in forty-eight cities, scattered throughout the whole of the tribes in proportion to their population, dwellings were to be allotted to the Levites, who were also to have the suburbs of those cities; that is to say, the fields lying immediately about them, "for their cattle, and for their substance, and for all their beasts." It is assumed that closely surrounding each of the cities there shall be pasturage, and that a regular or fairly regular boundary can be made at the distance of one thousand cubits from the city. Singularly, nothing whatever is said as to the duties of the Levites thus distributed throughout the land on both sides Jordan, from Kedesh Naphtali in the north, to Debir in the south, according to Joshua 21. It is not said that they were to perform any ecclesiastical functions or instruct the people in the Divine Law. Yet something of the kind must have been intended, since many of them were at a great and inconvenient distance from Shiloh and other places at which the ark was stationed.
According to this statute, there is, for one thing, to be no seclusion of the Levites from the rest of the people. If clergy and laity, as we say, are distinguished, the distinction is made as small as possible. From the terms of the present order {Num_35:2, ff.} it might appear that the towns given to the Levites were to be occupied by them exclusively. In parallel passages, however, it is clear that the Levites dwelt along with others in the cities; and in this way, as well as by engaging in pastoral work, they were kept closely in touch with the men of the tribes. The land allotted to them was not sufficient for farms; but the tithes and offerings were to a large extent for their support. And the arrangement thus sketched is held with some reason to be an ideal for every order of men called to similar duty. The Levites, indeed, were not at first spiritual. Neither the nature of their work at the sanctuary, nor the conditions of their life, implied any special consecration of heart. But the general tone of a religious ministry advances; and even in Davids time there were Levites who served God in no mere routine, but with earnest mind, with a measure of inspiration. The ordinance here is in behalf of a consecrated order devoted to the service of God.
The suburbs, or pasture lands about the cities, are measured a thousand cubits broad, and are to be two thousand cubits along each of the four boundaries. If the figures given are correct it would seem that, although the wall of the city is spoken of, the measurement must really have begun in the centre of the city; otherwise there could never have been a square of land, cities not taking that form; nor could a boundary of two thousand cubits on each aspect, north, south, east, and west, be made out. The cities must often have been small, a cluster of poor huts built of clay or rude brick, with a wall of similar material. We need imagine no stately dwellings or fine pleasure grounds when we read here of the provision for the Levites. Within the wall they had their bare, mean cottages; outside, there might be a breadth of perhaps four hundred yards of poor enough ground which they could claim. But as the tithes were not always paid, so the dwellings and the pasturage may not always have been allotted. There is not much reason to wonder that in a short time after the settlement in Canaan the Levites, finding no special work at the sanctuary, and obtaining little support from the offerings, gradually became part of the tribes in which they happened to have their abode. Hence we read in Jdg_17:7 of "a young man out of Bethlehem-judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite."
The main purpose of the present statute, so far as it refers to the dwellings of the Levites, would appear to have been economic, not religious. It was that all the tribes might have their share of maintaining the servants of the sanctuary. But it seems likely that a class half priestly would, in lack of other duty, attach itself to the high places, and set up a worship not contemplated by the law. And if this is to be regarded as a misfortune, the choice of the Levitical cities is in some cases difficult to account for. Kedesh in Naphtali had been a famous holy place of the Canaanites; so probably were others, as Gibeon, Shechem, Gath-rimmon. The special symbol of Jehovah was the ark; and where the ark was the principal national rites were always performed. But in a time of pioneer work and constant alarms the central sanctuary could not always be visited, and the Levites appear to have lent themselves to worship of a local kind.
An ecclesiastical order needs great faithfulness if it is not to become irreligious through poverty, or proud and domineering through assumption of power with God. To live poorly as those Levites were expected to live, without the opportunity of earthly gain, while often the share of national support which was due fell to a very low and wholly inadequate amount, would try the fidelity of the best of them. No large claim need be made in behalf of men specially engaged in the work of the Christian Church; and great wealth seems inappropriate to those who represent Christ. But what is their due should at least be paid cheerfully, and the more so if they give earnest minds to the service of God and man. With all faults that have at various periods of the Churchs history stained the character of the clergy, they have maintained a testimony on behalf of the higher life, and the sacredness of duty to God. A materialistic age will make light of that service, and point to ecclesiastical pride and covetousness as more than counterbalancing any good that is done. But a broad and fair survey of the course of events will show that the witness-bearing of a special class to religious ideas has kept alive that reverence on which morality depends. True, the ideal of a theocracy would dispense with an order set apart to teach the law of God and to enforce His claims on men. But for the times that now are, even in the most Christian country, the witness-bearing of a gospel ministry is absolutely needful. And we may take the statute before us as anticipating a general necessity, that necessity which the apostles of our Lord met when they ordained presbyters in every Church, and gave them commission to feed the flock of God.
2. THE CITIES OF REFUGE
Among the forty-eight cities that provide dwellings for the Levites, six are to be cities of refuge, "that the man-slayer which killeth any person unwittingly may flee thither." Three of these cities are to be on the east and three on the west side of Jordan. According to other enactments they are to be distributed so as to be reached quite easily from all parts of the country. They were sanctuaries for any one fleeing from the "avenger of blood"; but the protection found in them was not by any means absolute. Only if there appeared to be good cause for admitting a fugitive was he afforded refuge even for a time, and his trial followed as soon as possible. The laws of protection and judgment are here laid down not fully, though with some detail.
We notice first that the statutes regarding the manslayer are frankly based on the primitive practice of blood revenge. It was the duty of the nearest male relation of one who had been slain to seek the blood of the man who slew him. The duty was held to be one which he owed to his brother, to the community, and to God; and the principle of retribution in such cases was embodied in the saying, "Whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed." The goel, or redeemer, whose part it was to recover for a family land that had been alienated, or a member of the family who had fallen into slavery, had it also laid on him to seek justice on behalf of the family when one belonging to it had been killed. The evils of this method of punishing crime are very evident. All the heat of personal affection for the man put to death, the keen desire to maintain the honour of family or clan, and the bitter hatred of the tribe to which the homicide belonged, made the pursuit of the criminal swift and the stroke fierce and unrelenting. A goel put on a false track might easily strike to the ground an innocent person; and he would feel himself bound to incur all risks in avenging his kinsman. Often whole tribes of Arabs are involved in the blood feud beginning in a single stroke, and wherever the custom prevails there is the gravest danger of wide and sanguinary strife. The enactments of our passage are intended to counteract in part these abuses and dangers.
We may wonder that the Hebrew law, enlightened on many points, did not wholly abolish the practice of blood revenge. Justice is not the private affair of any man, even the nearest kinsman of one who has been injured. We have learned that the administration of law, especially in cases of murder or supposed murder, is best taken out of the hands of a private avenger, whose aim is to strike as soon and as effectually as possible. It remains of course for those whose friend has died by violence to institute inquiries and do their utmost to bring the criminal to justice. But even when a mans guilt seems clear his trial is before an impartial judge by whom all relevant facts are elicted. In Hebrew law there was no complete provision for such an administration of justice. The ancient custom could not be easily set aside, for one thing; the passionate Oriental nature would cling to it. And for another, there was no organisation for repressing disorder and dealing with crime. A certain risk had to be run, in order that the sanctity of human life might be clearly kept before a people too ready to strike as well as to curse. But if the man-slayer was able to reach a city of refuge he had his trial. The old custom was checked by the right of the fugitive to claim sanctuary and to have his case investigated.
As for the sanctuary cities, there may also have been some imperfect custom which anticipated them. In Egypt there certainly was; and the Canaanites, who had learned not a little from Egypt, may have had sacred places that afforded protection to the fugitive. But the Mosaic law prevented abuse of the means of evading justice. He who had killed another was a criminal before God. The blood of the brother he had slain defiled the land and cried to Heaven. No sanctuary must protect a man who had with homicidal purpose struck another. There was to be neither priestly protection, nor sanctuary, nor ransom for him. The Divine principle of justice took up the cause.
In Num_35:16 ff. there are examples of cases which are adjudged to be murder. To smite one with an instrument of iron, or with a stone grasped in the hand presumably large enough to kill, or with a weapon of wood, a heavy club or bar, is adjudged to be deliberate homicide. Then if hatred can be proved, and one known to have cherished enmity towards another is shown to have thrust him down, or hurled at him, lying in wait, or to have smitten him with the hand, such a one is to be allowed no sanctuary. On the other hand, the cases of inadvertent homicide are defined: "if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or hurled upon him anything without lying in wait, or with any stone, whereby a man may die, seeing him not." These, of course, are simply instances, not exhaustive categories.
It is not here stated, but in Jos_20:4 the statute runs that the manslayer who fled to a sanctuary city was to state his cause before the elders, no doubt at the gate. Their preliminary decision had to be given in his favour before he could be admitted. But the real trial was by the "congregation," Num_35:24, some assembly representing the tribe within whose territory the crime has been committed, or more likely a gathering of headmen of the whole nation. Further, at Num_35:30 it is enacted that the charge of the avenger of blood against any one must be substantiated by two witnesses at least. These provisions form the basis of a sound judicial method. The rights of refuge and of revenge stand opposed to each other, and between the two a large and authoritative court gives judgment. It will be observed, moreover, that the judiciary was not ecclesiastical. Where power was to be exercised in the name of God, the priests were not to wield it, but the people. The form of government is far nearer a democracy than a hierocracy.
A singular point in the law is the term during which the unwitting manslayer who had been acquitted by the court of justice must remain in sanctuary. He is in danger of being put to death by the avenger of blood until the acting high priest dies. Till that event he must keep within the border of his city of refuge. And here the idea seems to be that the official memory of the crime which had ceremonially defiled the land rested with the high priest. He was supposed to keep in mind, on Gods behalf, the bloodshed which even though unintentional was still polluting. His death accordingly obliterated the recollection that kept the man-slayer under peril of the goals revenge. The high priest had no power to acquit or condemn a criminal, nor to enforce against him the punishment of his fault. But he was the guardian of the sacredness of the land in the midst of which Jehovah dwelt.
With regard to the symbolical meaning of the cities of refuge, it is needful to exercise great care at every point. The man-slayer, for instance, fleeing from the avenger of blood, is not a type of the sinner fleeing for his life from the justice of God. If guilty of murder, a man could find no safety even in the city of refuge. It was only if he was not guilty of premeditated crime that he found sanctuary. The refuge cities, however, represented Divine justice as in contrast to the justice or rather the vengeance of manta that Divine justice which Christ came to reveal, giving Himself for us upon the cross. Human righteousness errs sometimes by excess, sometimes by defect. Certain offences it would never condemn, others it would passionately and remorselessly punish. The sanctuary cities show a higher idea of justice. But all men are guilty before God. And there is mercy with Him not only for the unwitting transgressor, but for the man who has to confess deliberate sin, the forfeiture of his life to Divine law.
The singular opinion has been expressed that the death of the high priest was expiatory. This is said to be "unmistakably evident" from the addition of the clause, "who has been anointed with the holy oil" (Num_35:25). The argument is that as the high priests life and work "acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Ghost, his death might also be regarded as a death for the sins of the people by virtue of the Holy Ghost imparted to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sins before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town without further exposure to the vengeance of the avenger of blood." And thus, it is said, "The death of the earthly high priest became a type of that of the Heavenly One, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions." But although many of the Rabbins and fathers held this view as to the expiatory nature of the high priests death, there is absolutely nothing in Scripture or reason to support it. All the expiation, moreover, which the Mosaic law provided for was ceremonial. If the death of the high priest was efficacious only so far as his functions were, then there could be no atonement or appearance of atonement for moral guilt, even that of culpable homicide for instance. The death of the high priest was therefore in no sense a type of the death of Christ, the whole meaning of which lies in relation to moral, not ceremonial, offences.
While it cannot be said that "light is thrown by the provisions regarding cities of refuge on the atonement of Christ"-for that would be the morning star shedding light on the sun-still there are some points of illustration; and one of these may be noted. As the protection of the sanctuary city extended only to the boundaries or precincts belonging to it, so the defence the sinner has in Christ can be enjoyed only so far as life is brought within the range of the influence and commands of Christ. He who would be safe must be a Christian. It is not mere profession of faith -"Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name?"-but hearty obedience to the laws of duty coming from Christ that gives safety. "Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect?" -and the elect are those who yield the fruit of the Spirit, who are lovers of God and their fellowmen, who show their faith by their works. It is a misrepresentation of the whole teaching of Scripture to declare that salvation can be had, apart from life and practice, in some mystical relation with Christ which is hardly even to be stated in words.
3. TRIBAL INHERITANCE
Already we have heard the appeal of the daughters of Zelophehad to be allowed an inheritance as representing their father. Now a question which has arisen regarding them must be solved. The five women have not cared to undertake the work of the upland farm allotted to them, somewhere about the head waters of the Yarmuk. They have, in fact, as heiresses been somewhat in request among the young men of different tribes; and they are almost on the point of giving their hands to husbands of their choice. But the chiefs of the family of Manasseh to which they belong find a danger here. The young women may perhaps choose men of Gad, or men of Judah. Then their land, which is part of the land of Manasseh, will go over to the tribes of the husbands. There will be a few acres of Judah or of Gad in the north of Manassehs land. And if other young women throughout the tribes, who happen to be heiresses, marry according to their own liking, by-and-by the tribe territories will be all confused. Is this to be allowed? If not, how is the evil to be prevented?
The national centre and general unity of Israel could not in the early period be expected to suffice. Without tribal coherence and a sense of corporate life in each family the Israelites would be lost among the people of the land. Especially would this tend to take place on the eastern side of Jordan and in the far north. Now the clan unity went with the land. It was as those dwelling in a certain district the descendants of one progenitor realised their brotherhood. Hence there was good reason for the appeal of the Manassites and the legislation that followed. Women who succeeded to land were to marry within the families of their fathers. Men were apparently not forbidden to marry women of another tribe if they were not heiresses. But the possession of land by women carried with it a responsibility and deprived them of a certain part of freedom. Every daughter who had an inheritance was to be wife to one of her near kin; so should no inheritance remove from one family to another; the tribes should cleave every one to his own inheritance.
The exigencies of the early settlement appear to have required this law; and it was maintained as far as possible, so that he who lived in a certain region might know himself not only a Reubenite or a Benjamite as the case might be, but a son of Hanoch of the Reubenites, or a son of Ard among the Benjamites. But we may doubt whether the unity of the nation was not delayed by the means used to keep the land for each tribe and each tribe on its own land. The arrangement was perhaps inevitable; yet it certainly belonged to a primitive social order. The homogeneity of the people would have been helped and the tribes held more closely together by interchange of land. In every law made at an early stage of a peoples development there is involved something unsuitable to after periods. And perhaps one error made by the Israelites was to cling too long and too closely to tribal descent and make too much of genealogy. The enactment regarding the marriage of heiresses within their own families was an old one, bearing the authority of Moses. There came a time when it should have been revoked and everything done that was possible to weld the tribes together. But the old customs held; and what was the result? The tribes east of Jordan, as well as Dan and Asher, were well-nigh lost to the Confederacy at an early date. Subsequently a division began between the northern and southern peoples. We cannot doubt that partly for want of family alliances between Judah and Ephraim, and subordination of tribal to national sentiment, there came the separation into two kingdoms.
For the tribe idea and the other of making inheritance of land a governing matter, the Israelites would seem to have paid dearly. And there is danger still in the attempt to make a nation cohere on any mere territorial basis. It is the spirit, the fidelity to a common purpose, and the pervasive enthusiasm that give real unity. If these are wanting, or if the general aim is low and material, the security of families in the soil may be exceedingly mischievous. At the same time the old feeling is proved to have a deep root in fact. Territorial solidarity is indispensable to a nation; and the exclusion of a people from large portions of its land is an evil intolerable. Christianity has not done its work where the Church, the teacher of righteousness, is unconcerned for this great matter. How can religion flourish where brotherhood fails? And how can brotherhood survive in a nation when the right of occupying the soil is practically denied? First among the economic questions which claim Christian settlement is that of land tenure, land right. Christianity carries forward the principles of the Mosaic law into higher ranges, where justice is not less, but more-where brotherhood has a nobler purpose, a finer motive.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v1This chapter contains directions for the appointment of
CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
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(1) cities for the Levites to dwell in; and
(2) cities of refuge for the manslayer; and laws concerning wilful murder and unintentional homicide.
Num_35:2. Suburbs. Keil and Del. “Pasturage or fields.”
Num_35:3. For their cattle, &c. “More strictly, ‘for their large cattle, for their sheep and goats, and for all their beasts whatsoever they be.’ ”—Speaker’s Comm.
Num_35:4-5. The directions given in these verses as to the extent of the “suburbs” have much perplexed expositors. They seem to us to mean that the suburbs should extend 1,000 cubits, or nearly one-third of a mile, from the city wall in every direction (Num_35:4), and that at their outward extremity they should present on every side a frontage of not less than 2,000 cubits in length (Num_35:5).
Num_35:6. And to them ye shall add. Margin: “And above them ye shall give.” Or, “and in addition to them,” &c.
Num_35:8. From them that have many ye shall give many. From the large inheritance of Judah and Simeon, the Levites received nine cities; from that of Naphtali three, and four from each of the other tribes. On the east of Jordan they had ten, and in Canaan proper, thirty-eight.
Num_35:11. At unawares. Margin: “Heb., by error.” Or, by accident.
Num_35:12. The avenger. Heb. Goël, redeemer, kinsman, &c. Stand before the congregation, &c. Or, “before the assembly,” which consisted of the elders of the city. Comp. Num_35:24-25.
Num_35:15. Unawares. By accident, or, unintentionally.
Num_35:16. Instrument of iron, i.e., a tool, e.g., hatchet, hammer, &c.
Num_35:17. With throwing a stone. Margin: “Heb., with a stone of the hand,” i.e., a large stone, which filled the hand.
Num_35:18. A hand weapon of wood. Or, “a wooden instrument of the hand,” e.g., a club. “The suspicion would rest upon anyone who had used an instrument that endangered life, and therefore was not generally used in striking, that he had intended to take life away.”—Knobel.
Num_35:22-23. Comp. Deu_19:4-5.
Num_35:25. He shall abide in it. He was safe only within the walls of the city.
Unto the death of the high priest. “The atoning death of the Saviour casts its shadow before on the statute-book of the Law and on the annals of Jewish history. The High Priest, as the head and representative of the whole chosen family of sacerdotal mediators, as exclusively entrusted with some of the chief priestly functions, as alone privileged to make yearly atonement within the Holy of Holies, and to gain, from the mysterious Urim and Thummim, special revelations of the will of God, was, pre-eminently, a type of Christ. And thus the death of each successive high priest pre-signified that death of Christ by which the captives were to be freed, and the remembrance of transgressions made to cease.”—Speaker’s Comm.
Num_35:30. The murderer shall be put to death. The cities of refuge were not instituted to screen the guilty from deserved punishment; but to secure a just sentence.
By the mouth of witnesses, &c. Comp. Deu_17:6; Deu_19:15.
Num_35:31. Satisfaction. Rather, redemption money, or ransom.
THE APPOINTMENT OF CITIES FOR THE RESIDENCE OF THE LEVITES
(Num_35:1-8)
The Divine provision for the maintenance of the priests and Levites has already engaged our attention twice (see pp. 84–86, and 339–342); and, inasmuch as most of the homiletical suggestions of this paragraph were noticed there, it is needless to point them out in this place.
REFUGE
(Num_35:6)
“Among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites, there shall be six cities for refuge.”
Some types of Christ appeared for a brief season, and then vanished. The guiding cloud, the manna, ended on Jordan’s banks. But here is a sign which lived through Canaan’s history. It never failed until the Cross was reared.
The story of the ordinance is brief.
Sinner, this type displays your case. The slayer is your counterpart. There may be carnage of duties—talents—time—souls. No day passes in which this guilt is not incurred. As the man-slayer did not plot his deed, so sinners blindly commit these murders through ignorance and unwatched thought.
Take now the sinner awakened to a sense of this guilt. He is, as the slayer, rushing in terror from the kinsman’s wrath. He knows himself to be pursued.
One kinsman only hunted the slayer. But many adversaries threaten the guilty soul God’s justice takes the lead. It has strong claims. Its wrongs are many. Its wrath is righteous. The law is in pursuit winged with vengeance. It demands pure, unblemished love, from the cradle to the grave, in every child of man. All who transgress become its prey. And who transgresses not? This law must have its dues. It follows sternly. The truth of God, too, points an inexorable sword. It has decreed that every sinner must die. Can it be false? Satan moreover follows with huge strides. He claims the sinning soul as his. His hate is bitter.
These adversaries rush on apace. Who, undismayed, can hear their nearing footsteps? Do any cry, Whither shall we flee? Is there a Refuge? Yes. The sheltering cities represent our Refuge. A Refuge is prepared, full—complete—secure. It is Christ the Lord Flee to Him. All in Him are everlastingly secure. “There is therefore now no condemnation,” &c. (Rom_8:1).
Let faith now calmly gaze on this city, and mark its towers. Christ’s person is the grand pillar of security. While Jesus lives, and lives the mighty God, this safety is complete. His finished work builds up the Refuge. The walls—the bulwarks of this city—are red with blood. There is inscribed above each gate, “Christ died.” Justice draws near. It sees this mark; and asks no more. The law’s stern curse falls harmless here. Christ receives its weight. Satan pursues up to these gates. But here he pauses. All within these walls are purified and beautified. He must confess that they are no more his. Blessed be God for this sure Refuge!
Mark, too, this Refuge is at hand. In Israel the slayer had to flee oft-times along a tedious road. Our city stands beside us. “The righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise,” &c. (Rom_10:6-8). The gates are close. Enter this hour.
Believer, you are within this Refuge. Set not one foot beyond the holy precincts. Abide in Christ. Would you be safe through life—in death—for ever? Then cleave to Christ, as ivy to the tree, as limpet to the rock.
And when you realize your mercies and your safe retreat, can your heart fail to love—your lips to praise—your life to serve? Can you now see such multitudes exposed to wrath, and not allure them to your loved Refuge? Strive by every means to call them in. Above all, agonize in prayer, that God’s all-conquering Spirit may fly speedily throughout earth’s bounds, opening blind eyes to see their danger, exciting anxious hearts to rush to this only Refuge.—H. Law, D.D.
THE DIVINE GUARDIANSHIP OF HUMAN LIFE
(Num_35:9-34)
“Human life,” to use the words of Dean Milman, “in all rude and barbarous tribes, is of cheap account; blood is shed on the least provocation; open or secret assassination is a common occurrence. The Hebrew penal law enforced the highest respect for the life of man. Murder ranked with high treason (i.e., idolatry, blasphemy), striking a father, adultery, and unnatural lust, as a capital crime: the law demanded blood for blood (Exo_21:12; Lev_24:17; Lev_24:21-22). But it transferred the exaction of the penalty from private revenge, and committed it to the judicial authority. To effect this, it had to struggle with an inveterate though barbarous usage, which still prevails among the Arabian tribes. By a point of honour, as rigorous as that of modern duelling, the nearest of kin is bound to revenge the death of his relation: he is his Goël or blood avenger. He makes no enquiry; he allows no pause; whether the deceased has been slain on provocation, by accident, or of deliberate malice, death can only be atoned by the blood of the homicide. To mitigate the evils of an usage too firmly established to be rooted out, Moses appointed certain cities of retuge, conveniently situated. If the homicide could escape to one of these, he was safe till a judicial investigation took place. If the crime was deliberate murder, he was surrendered to the Goël; if justifiable or accidental homicide, he was bound to reside within the sanctuary for a certain period; should he leave it and expose himself to the revenge of his pursuers, he did so at his own peril, and might be put to death.”
The various provisions of this law afford an impressive illustration of the Divine regard for human life.
I. In the institution of the cities of refuge as a provision that the life of an innocent person should not be taken away.
“The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel,” &c. (Num_35:9-15; Num_35:22-25).
The adaptation of these cities for this purpose appears in—
1. Their accessibility from all places. “Ye shall give three cities on this side Jordan, and three cities shall ye give in the land of Canaan, which shall be cities of refuge.” “And they appointed Kedesh in Galilee,” &c. (Jos_20:7-8). A reference to the map of Canaan will show that these cities were so situated that one of them could be reached in a few hours from any part of the country.
2. Their accessibility to all persons. “These six cities shall be a refuge for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them: that every one that killeth any person unawares may flee thither.” God’s regard is not simply for the life of the Israelite, but for the life of man as man.
II. In the laws by which the trial of the manslayer was to be conducted.
The Divine guardianship of human life is manifested in these laws at least in two respects:
1. In the clear discrimination between intentional and unintentional manslaughter. “If he smite him with an instrument.” &c. (Num_35:16-24).
2. In the absolute necessity for the evidence of at least two witnesses before a man could be adjudged guilty of murder. “Whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die” (Num_35:30; comp. Deu_17:6; Deu_19:15). One witness might be mistaken in his view of the case, or might be prejudiced against the homicide; hence the importance of the testimony of at least two witnesses in the trial of such cases.
III. In the punishment of the intentional manslayer.
“The murderer shall surely be put to death” (Num_35:16-18; Num_35:21; Num_35:30). As an evidence of the regard of God for human life, this punishment has additional weight from two facts:—
1. It could not be averted by any ransom. “Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer, which is guilty of death; but he shall be surely put to death.” The crime was too heinous to be expiated by anything less than life itself.
2. It was insisted upon for the most solemn reason. “So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are; for blood it defileth the land,” &c. (Num_35:33-34). The argument seems to be this: that the shedding of human blood defiled the land, that such defilement could be cleansed only by the blood of the murderer; that the Lord Himself dwelt in that land, and therefore it must be kept free from defilement; if murder were committed, the murderer must be put to death. To spare the life of the murderer was to insult Jehovah by defiling the land wherein He dwelt.
IV. In the punishment of the unintentional manslayer.
“The congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the revenger of blood,” &c. (Num_35:25-28). When it was proved on the trial that the manslayer was perfectly free from guilty designs, that he had slain another entirely by accident, even then he had to bear no light punishment. He must leave his estate and his worldly interests, his home and his family, and dwell in the city of refuge. His dwelling there closely resembled imprisonment; for if he left the city, and its divinely appointed suburbs, the Goël, if he should come upon him, was at liberty to put him to death. He must remain there throughout his life, or until the death of the high priest should bring him release.
What striking witness does all this bear to the sacredness of human life in the sight of God! (a)
Conclusion.
i. Respect human life—that of others, and your own also. (b)
ii. Guard against anger; for it leads to murder, and in the estimation of Heaven it is murder. “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer” (1Jn_3:15).
iii. Cultivate brotherly kindness and Christian charity. Where these are, anger cannot come.
ILLUSTRATIONS
(a) In the precepts delivered to the sons of Noah, and, therefore, through them, to all their descendants, that is, to all mankind, that against murder is thus delivered: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made He man” (Gen_9:6). There is in this reason a manifest reference to the dignity put upon human nature, by its being endowed with a rational and immortal spirit. The crime of murder is made to lie, therefore, not merely in the putting to death the animal part of man’s nature, for this is merged in a higher consideration, which seems to be, the indignity done to the noblest of the works of God; and particularly, the value of life to an immortal being, accountable in another state for the actions done in this, and which ought, for this very reason, to be specially guarded, since death introduces him into changeless and eternal relations, which were not to lie at the mercy of human passions. Such moralists as the writer above quoted (Dr. Whately), would restrain the essential characteristics of an act of murder to the “hurt done to a neighbour in depriving him of life,” and the “insecurity” inflicted upon society; but in this ancient and universal law, it is made eminently to consist in contempt of the image of God in man, and its interference with man’s immortal interests and relations as a deathless spirit; and, if so, then suicide bears upon it these deep and awful characteristics of murder. It is much more wisely said by Bishop Kidder, in his remarks upon this passage, that the reason given—“for in the image of God made He man”—is a further aggravation of the sin of murder. It is a great trespass upon God, as it destroys His likeness; and self-murder, upon this account, is forbidden as well as the killing of others.—Richard Watson.
But more than this. Man, the immortal, is man, the sinful, the guilty; and for this immortal, sinful, guilty creature, a Saviour has been provided; and it depends on his having, or not having, an interest in this Saviour, whether his never-ending existence is to be one of happiness or woe. And it is now, and here—in the present life and the present world, that this interest in the Saviour must be effected, this connection with Him formed. And it is here, and now, too, that a certain change of heart and character must be wrought, a change such as alone can fit for the only description of happiness that is at all to be found in the world, and the eternity beyond. How precarious, then, is life! Short, vain, passing as it is, a vapour, a shadow, a handbreadth, a dream! Yet, viewed in this, its relation to eternity, it acquires a worth which it is far beyond all the powers of human arithmetic to compute. And it becomes, in this view of it, the more solemnly important that, though brief even when most protracted, its limit, in each case, is every moment uncertain. For when the time is precarious on which any great event materially affecting our interests depends, and every moment may be that which is to determine for us the evil or the good, the preciousness of every moment is mightily, oppressively felt. With the sarcastic coolness of a scoffing scepticism, Mr. Hume asks: “Where is the crime of diverting a few ounces of blood from their channel?” The question is based on the assumption of there being no hereafter; no deathless spirit lodged in the frame through which that blood circulates; no moral accountableness; no judgment to come. It is the language of a narrow-minded, heartless materialism. It is the language of an ethereal spirit endowed with divine capacities, and prostituting its Heaven-bestowed powers to disprove its own immortality; to rob itself of the highest elements of its dignity; to disfranchise itself of the noblest of its chartered privileges: to debase itself to a level with the “beasts that perish.”—Ralph Wardlaw, D. D.
(b) On suicide, our modern moralists have added little to what is advanced by the ethical writers of Greece and Rome to prove its unlawfulness; for, though suicide was much practised in those ancient states, and sometimes commended, especially by the Stoics, it was occasionally condemned. “We men,” says Plato, “are all by the appointment of God in a certain prison or custody, which we ought not to break out of or run away.” So likewise Cicero: “God, the Supreme Governor of all things, forbids us to depart hence without His order. All pious men ought to have patience to continue in the body, as long as God shall please who sent us hither; and not force themselves out of the world before He calls for them, lest they be found deserters of the station appointed them by God.” …
Whatever weight may be due to the considerations urged by moralists against this crime—and every motive which may deter men from listening to the first temptation to so direful an act, is important—yet the guards of Christianity must be acknowledged to be of a more powerful kind. For the principles of our religion cannot be understood without our perceiving, that, of almost all other crimes, wilful suicide ought most to be dreaded. It is a sin against God’s authority. He is “the God of our life”; in “His hand our breath is”; and we usurp His authority when we presume to dispose of it As resulting from the pressure of mortifications of spirit, or the troubles of life, it becomes a sin, as arraigning His providential wisdom and goodness. It implies either an atheistic denial of God’s government, or a rebellious opposition to His permissive acts or direct appointments; it cannot be committed, therefore, when the mind is sound, but in the absence of all the Christian virtues, of humility, self-denial, patience, and the fear and love of God, and only under the influence of pride, worldliness, forgetfulness of God, and contempt of Him. It hides from the mind the realities of a future judgment, or it defies them; and it is consummated by the character of unpardonableness, because it places the criminal at once beyond the reach of mercy.—Richard Watson.
THE CITIES OF REFUGE, AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE SALVATION OF JESUS CHRIST
(Num_35:9-34)
There are certain respects in which the analogy between the cities of refuge and the salvation offered to man in the Gospel does not hold good; e.g.—
i. The cities of refuge afforded no lasting protection to the guilty. By their means a fair trial was secured for the manslayer; but if he was found guilty of murder, he was given up to the Goël to be put to death. They were an abiding refuge for those only who had accidentally slain a fellow creature. But Christianity is a refuge for the guilty. “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom,” saith St. Paul, “I am chief.” “This man receiveth sinners.” “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.” The guiltiest soul that flies to Jesus Christ is inviolably secure.
ii. The cities of refuge did not exempt even the unintentional manslayer from death, but simply postponed it. They rescued him from the vengeance of the Goël; but they could not screen him from that death which “is appointed unto all men.” But the spiritual death, which is the penalty of sin, Christianity abolishes for the believer by bestowing upon him a life which is immortal and blessed. In the city of refuge the unintentional manslayer obtained bodily security for a time; in Christ the guilty sinner obtains spiritual security and joy for ever.
There are other respects in which the analogy is not quite complete; but in three most conspicuous features it is both clear and striking.
I. A great peril.
Under this head there are three points of resemblance.
1. A broken law. The manslayer had broken the law which guards human life. “Thou shalt not kill.” Every man has transgressed the holy law of God in some respects. “All have sinned,” &c. (Rom_3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,” &c. (1Jn_1:8; 1Jn_1:10).
2. The penalty of death. “At the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made He man.” “The murderer shall surely be put to death.” “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” “Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” (a)
3. The peril of the exaction of the penalty. The Goël of the slain person allowed no time to elapse before setting forth to avenge the death on the manslayer; and if he overtook him before he gained the city of refuge, he put him to death. The manslayer was fleeing for his very life. And the dire penalties of sin follow hard upon the heels of the sinner. Conscience pursues him with its condemnations, and will not be silenced. Divine Justice follows him closely, crying, “Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.” And the wrath of God, which burns with unquenchable fire against sin, speeds swiftly on the track of the guilty sinner. (b)
II. A gracious provision.
By Divine command six cities were appointed cities of refuge; to either of these the manslayer might flee, &c.
1. The provision was of Divine appointment. “Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come over Jordan,” &c. It was this fact, that they were appointed by God’s command, that made these cities a secure refuge for the homicide;—not the strength of their gates or walls, not the authority of their governors, but the authority of Him who had instituted them for this purpose. Jesus Christ is the Refuge appointed by God for the sinner. “The redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation,” &c. “Him hath God exalted with His right hand, a Prince and a Saviour,” &c Hence, they who flee to Him are perfectly secure, (c)
2. The provision was adequate to the need. Six cities were appointed; and were quite sufficient for the entire country. In each there was ample room, &c. The provisions of Christianity for the salvation of the sinner are enough for all the needs of all men in all ages and all lands. “A great multitude which no man could number” have found a secure and blessed refuge in Jesus Christ; “and yet there is room.”
3. The provision was accessible from all places. Three measures were adopted to secure this:—
(1) The cities were suitably situated, “They appointed Kedesh in Galilee,” &c. (Jos_20:7-9). Our Saviour is everywhere present. He is a Refuge always near.
(2) The roads leading to these cities were kept in good condition. Moses “took care,” says Dr. Jahn, “that roads leading to them in straight lines should be laid out in every direction, which were to be distinguished from other streets.” (Comp. Deu_19:3.) And, according to the Talmudists,
(3) where two or more roads met, posts were put up with the word מִקְלָט, REFUGE, clearly marked on them for the direction of the fugitive. All this may be viewed as illustrating the accessibility of Jesus Christ to the sinner. “Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven?” &c. (Rom_10:6-9).
4. The provision was accessible to all persons. “These six cities shall be a refuge for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them;” &c. They were accessible to every person in the land. Jesus Christ “is the Saviour of all men” (1Ti_4:10). “Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish,” &c (Joh_3:15-17). “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out” (Joh_6:37). “Whosoever believeth in Him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference,” &c. (Rom_10:11-13). (d)
5. The provision was exclusive. No other city, except the six appointed ones, had authority to shelter and protect the manslayer. For the sinner there is no refuge but Jesus. “Neither is there salvation in any other,” &c. (Act_4:12).
III. The urgent obligation.
The cities of refuge were of no advantage to the manslayer unless he gained an entrance into one of them before the Goël overtook him. It was his highest interest and imperative duty to make his way to the nearest city of refuge. It is yet more the duty and interest of the sinner to hasten to the Lord Jesus as his refuge. This obligation is—
1. Personal. No one could escape to the city of refuge for the homicide; he must go himself, or be put to death. Salvation is a personal concern and duty. Repentance, faith, self-consecration, are things which no one can do for another. “Work out your own salvation,” &c.
2. Prompt. The manslayer had to escape at once or to perish. To linger was to be lost. Salvation must be sought at once. “Behold, now is the accepted time,” &c. “Ye know not what shall be on the morrow,” &c.
3. Pressing. The manslayer may not loiter on the way, or slacken his pace until he was safe within the city. The words which were addressed to Lot were applicable to him: “Escape for thy life; look not behind thee,” &c. (Gen_19:17). And the sinner must put forth earnest effort. Christ must be sought zealously and with all the heart. (Comp. Jer_29:12-13.) Salvation must be pursued diligently. “So run, that ye may obtain,” &c. (1Co_9:24-27). “Fight the good fight of faith,” &c. “Let us lay aside every weight,” &c. “Give diligence to make your calling,” &c.
4. Persevering. The homicide must press eagerly on until he entered the city. There was no safety for him if he stopped short of the end. “He that endureth to the end shall be saved.” “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.” Hasten, then, O sinner! to the Refuge, &c.
ILLUSTRATIONS
(a) “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” If then you have come short of the glory of God, you must be lost; it cannot be denied, nor disputed. I tell to every man now present, that he is guilty of sinning against the Almighty—that if there be no intervention of mercy so mighty and so majestic as to satisfy the demands of justice, to quench her fire, and sheathe her sword—if there be not mercy, free, boundless, omnipotent, and eternal, every human being will stand before the judgment bar of God to receive the sentence of his condemnation. He must be banished for ever from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power; and he must go down to those abodes of torment where there are agonies unspeakable and inconceivable; where the smoke of torment ascendeth up for ever and for ever. Go, my hearers, to the brink of eternity, contemplate in imagination the scenes of that horrible pit which the word of revelation has presented to your view—contemplate the worm that dieth not—contemplate the fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels—contemplate the blackness of darkness—contemplate the smoke of torment that ascendeth up for ever and ever! What was it that gave to that worm its fang but sin? What was it that gave to that fire its intensity but sin? What was it that gave to that blackness its shadows but sin? What was it that gave to that torment its woe but sin? The voice is from the abyss uttering one wild cry, “It was sin; it was sin; IT WAS SIN!” Man would sin, and therefore man must suffer. There is a rigid equity between the one and the other. “Death has passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”—James Parsons.
(b) No closer doth the shadow follow the body than the revenge of self-accusation follows sin. Walk eastward in the morning, the shadow starts behind thee; soon after it is upon thy left side; at noon it is under thy feet; lie down, it crouches under thee; towards even it leaps before thee. Thon canst not be rid of it while thou hast a body and the sunlight. No more can thy soul quit the conscience of evil. This is to thee instead of a hell of fiends, that shall ever be shaking firebrands at thee; ever torturing thee with affrights of more pains than thy nature can comprehend.—Hall.
(c) In Samoa, the manslayer, or the deliberate murderer, flies to the house of the chief of the village, or to the house of the chief of another village to which he is related by the father’s or the mother’s side. In nine cases out of ten, he is perfectly safe if he only remains there. In such instances, the chief delights in the opportunity of showing his importance. In Samoa, a chief’s house is literally his fortification, except in times of open rebellion and actual war.—G. Turner, LL.D.
(d) Our Lord is the Saviour of all men, for that He hath rendered all man salvabiles, capable of salvation; and salvandos, designed to salvation, for that He hath removed all obstacles peremptorily debarring men from access to salvation, and hath procured competent furtherances to their attainment of it. He hath performed whatever on His part is necessary or fit in order to salvation, antecedently to the acceptance and compliance with those reasonable conditions, which by God’s wisdom are required toward the instating men into a full and immediate right to salvation, or to a complete and actual fruition thereof. He made the way to happiness plain and passable; levelling the insuperable cliffs, and filling up the chasms, and rectifying the obliquities, and smoothing the asperities thereof, as the prophet foretold; so that all men, who would, might conveniently walk therein. He set the doors of paradise wide open, so that who pleased might enter therein; all the bonds and restraints under which men lay, He so far loosed, that any man might be free, who would concur to his own liberty and enlargement. All the protection and encouragement which were needful toward obtaining salvation, He afforded and exhibited to every one that would embrace and make use of them. In respect to which performances He might be truly called a Saviour, although all men do not in effect become saved. For the estimation and denomination of performances are to be grounded upon their own nature and design, not upon events depending upon the contingent and arbitrary behaviour of men. As he that freely offers a rich boon is no less to be accounted a benefactor, and liberal, although his gift be refused, than if it were accepted; as he that opens the prison is to be styled a deliverer, although the captive will not go forth; as he that ministers an effectual remedy, although the patient will not use it, deserves the honour and thanks due to a physician; so is our Lord in regard to what He hath performed for men, and offered to them (being sufficient to prevent their misery and promote their happiness), to be thankfully acknowledged their Saviour, although not all men, yea although not one man, should receive the designed benefit.—Isaac Barrow, D.D.
THE CITIES OF REFUGE, AS LEGISLATIVE ENACTMENTS, AND AS RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS
(Num_35:9-15)
The system of redemption as revealed in the Gospel is often exhibited to our notice as bearing decisive marks of Divine wisdom. It is styled “the wisdom of God”—“the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom … which none of the princes of this world knew.” The Apostle thus intimates to us that the Gospel would bear the closest inspection in all its parts; that it was worthy of our admiration, as well as of our love; that our redemption was not to be effected either by blind force, or by blind affection; that it should be accomplished in such a manner as that no rights were to be compromised, no perfections outraged, no interests overlooked, but, on the contrary, that a perfect harmony and balance should be maintained between the apparently rival attributes of the Divine character, and the apparently rival interests of earth and Heaven. Thus God was to be just, and yet the justifier of him that believeth; Mercy and Truth were to meet together; Christ crucified in humility and weakness was to present a most eminent illustration both of the wisdom and of the power of God; and thus the countless multitudes saved by grace should have reason to exclaim in time and eternity—Herein “He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence!”
But while these remarks are readily admitted respecting the Christian dispensation, they might be extended with equal propriety to the Jewish dispensation also. While the Gospel claims our homage on account of the wisdom it displays, we are prepared to make a similar demand on behalf of the Law. Both are the product of the same Author; both are the offspring of the same covenant of mercy; both conduce to the same happy result; and, though the Gospel confessedly has “the glory that excelleth,” yet the same authority assures us that “that which is done away was glorious” also. There are two points of view expressly in which wisdom shines in the departed economy:—
First: As its leading institutions were particularly adapted to the state of the Jews in the infancy of the Church. Their ceremonial rites and observances were particularly suited to the climate in which they lived, to the circumstances in which they were placed, and to the evils to which they were exposed. Ignorant and uncultivated as they were during their four hundred years’ bondage, they required a religion addressed to the senses, as well as to the intellect; and hence they have a visible glory, “a worldly sanctuary,” animal sacrifices, symbolical institutions. Having recently been brought out of the midst of an idolatrous people, many of their regulations were intended to preserve them from a relapse into idolatry, and to keep constantly before them the worship of one God, and faith in a promised Messiah. And having to wander for forty years in the wilderness without fixed habitations, without regular communities, and without the arts and ornaments of life, some laws were enacted suited to their unsettled condition, and some preparatory to their establishment in the Promised Land. In many instances Moses adapted himself to the customs and usages which had prevailed among them from patriarchal times, in some, his institutions were altogether new; in all, there was a perpetual reference to their moral and religious interests—to encourage virtue, to diminish crime, to induce them to walk humbly with God.
Secondly: As it was expressly calculated to point to the coming of Christ, and introduce the Gospel dispensation. The Law was a shadow—a figure for the time then present—a schoolmaster to bring them to Christ. Unto them was the Gospel preached, as well as unto us. Their history in the wilderness and their worship in the Temple alike prefigured the times of the Messiah. Their sacrifices pointed to Him; the “Rock that followed them” was a type of Him; the scapegoat, the brazen serpent, the cities of refuge, and the manna in the wilderness, prefigured the nature of His offices, the design of His death, or the spiritual blessings of His kingdom.
These observations apply with peculiar force to our present subject—the Cities of Refuge. As civil appointments, they were calculated to prevent much mischief and misery; as religious ordinances, they serve to illustrate Gospel blessings. We shall consider them—
I. As legislative enactments adapted to the habits and customs of an Eastern people in an early age of the world.
Two things require notice—
1. The office of the avenger of blood and the evils consequent upon it. This office probably had a very early origin: it may be a relic of the earliest state of civil society, for where there was no magistrate or public tribunal, murders would have been frequently perpetrated had there been no process of this kind among surviving relatives. Cain evidently was in dread of summary vengeance for his murder of Abel. (Comp. Gen_4:14.) Rebecca probably dreaded a similar retaliation in case Esau had murdered Jacob; for “why,” says she, “should I be deprived also of you both in one day?” It has been common among the wandering Arabs from Ishmael’s time to the present hour. It probably arose out of the original law,—“At the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man,” &c. (Gen_9:5-6).
It is evident that such a practice must give rise to many very serious evils. Besides that it fostered a spirit of relentless hatred and revenge, it was often accompanied with flagrant injustice and wrong. The Goël is governed only by his passions; and it may be that the person he suspects is not the murderer; thus an innocent person suffers, and instead of avenging one murder he commits a second. One such deed never fails to give birth to another; and so ten murders have not unfrequently their origin in one. The families on both sides take part in the quarrel, and thus under the pious pretext of avenging innocent blood, two families may be in a state of constant warfare, and transmit feuds and enmities from father to son, even to the tenth generation. Thus the office of the avenger of blood, though proper in some states of society, was subject to many abuses, and required to be placed under strong restrictions Moses could not have abolished it altogether, at least on a sudden, he therefore adopted regulations which neutralised the evil.
2. The appointment of the cities of refuge, in order to secure the ends, both of mercy and of justice. Six cities of refuge were appointed—three on the one side of Jordan, three on the other—to which the manslayer might immediately repair, and in which the individual might be safe, &c.… Thus provision was made both for justice and mercy—for justice if the fugitive were guilty, for mercy if he were innocent. And in order to give the innocent person every reasonable hope of escaping, the cities were placed at easy distances, to which persons might have access from any part of the land, the roads were straight and plain, &c.…
But even in the mercy that was shown an accidental manslayer, we see how sacred life was in God’s esteem; for the fugitive must be a prisoner and an exile, apart from all his friends, till the death of the High Priest, perhaps for many years. This was intended to punish that imprudence which had cost another man his life, and could not fail to make the people cautious against the recurrence of such accidents; for as no compensation could be taken for the life of a murderer, so no sum could rescue an innocent manslayer from the city (Num_35:31-32).
II. As a religious ordinance designedly employed by the apostle to illustrate the wisdom and goodness of God in the methods of our salvation.
Here we see clearly depicted the character and office of our great Redeemer. This Redeemer is our near Kinsman; for “He is not ashamed to call us brethren.” To this the apostle alludes: “God sent forth His Son made of a woman,” &c. (Gal_4:4-5). This illustrates the sublime passage in the book of Job: “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” &c. He is here compared to the Goël, &c. (Comp. Hos_13:14; Zec_9:12.) The apostle says: “That I may win Christ, and be found in Him,” for which, like the manslayer, he would count all things loss. And he describes Christians as having “fled for refuge.” “There is therefore now no condemnation,” &c.
1. A state of exposure is implied. Every man who reflects upon his past life, upon the holiness of God’s law, upon the inflexibility of His government, and upon the sentence He has pronounced against sin, must be aware that he is in a state of jeopardy. The sentence has been promulgated from age to age with awful solemnity, “Cursed is every one,” &c. If we carry the thought to its extent, it is Jehovah Himself who is the Avenger. His law we have broken, &c.
2. A method of rescue has been provided. Christ has undertaken our desperate cause. We are to flee for refuge. It is the only one. It is open to the Gentile as well as the Jew.
Samuel Thodey.
THE SECURITY OF THOSE WHO FLEE TO THE CITY OF REFUGE
(Num_35:24-28)
That the Mosaic law had a spiritual meaning, is placed beyond all doubt from the clear allusions of Scripture (Zec_9:12; Heb_6:18). Observe—
I. Our natural state is one of imminent danger.
We are all criminals, having, ignorantly and in unbelief, rebelled against the Almighty Sovereign. As criminals, we are justly exposed to the infliction of the threatened penalty of death (Eze_18:4; Rom_6:23; Rev_21:8). Truly, then, we may observe in the situation of the manslayer a great resemblance to that of our own, as pursued by the inexorable Justice of One whose wrath we have so much provoked (Rom_1:18; Joh_3:36).
II. Nothing can deliver us from this danger but a zealous and timely flight.
We may sit at ease, bless ourselves in our heart, and feel secure; but if death overtakes us loitering in our sins, we must perish in them; and it will be vain to trust to anything as our covenant and hope, so long as we remain under that indifference to our spiritual interests, which demonstrates us to be still unchanged (Jas_2:10).
III. There is a place of safety to which we can flee.
Christ is our refuge:—
1. A Refuge Divinely appointed. God so pitied, so deeply and intensely compassionated our state, as to plan and provide a way of deliverance for us by His only begotten Son (Joh_3:16).
2. A Refuge free and open to all. None are shut out from it, but those who, by their impenitence and obstinacy, shut out themselves. No stage, no state of guilt, can make any difference; but sinners of every rank and description, without limitation or reserve, have a place prepared in which they may find security (1Co_6:11).
3. A Refuge everywhere near to resort to. Christ is set before us in the Gospel, and to find Him we need neither climb up into heaven, nor descend into the bottom of the sea (Rom_10:8).
4. A Refuge easily accessible. Every obstacle is effectually removed, God being reconciled, His justice satisfied, and His law magnified; so that nothing need hinder our trusting in Christ, the great God, and our Saviour.
5. A Refuge containing an ample supply for our wants and necessities. For here are to be found wisdom, grace, life, liberty, peace, and joy.
IV. Having once entered this place we must abide there.
It was not enough that the man-slayer fled to the city of refuge. Having gained this place, he must remain in it till the death of the high priest. Nor is it sufficient to have once believed in Christ. We must abide in Him, renouncing for ever all thoughts of going into any forbidden region (Isa_30:15). And woe be unto us, if we dare to be found without (2Pe_2:20-21).
Let us hence seek after a sight of our danger, abandon all means of relief not warranted in the Scripture, and resign ourselves up to Christ.—William Sleigh.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow1909 · Public DomainOn v1The Levitical Cities. The Cities of Refugie
The Levitical Cities. The Cities of Refugie
1-8. The Levitical Cities.
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The tribe of Levi received no part of the land of Canaan as their inheritance (Num_18:20-24; Num_26:62). By way of compensation they received the tithes for their support (Num_18:21). It is here further provided that 48 cities with their suburbs be allotted to them out of the inheritance of the other tribes, for the maintenance of themselves and their herds. The carrying out of this injunction is recorded in Joshua 21, where it is also noted that the priests (the sons of Aaron) received 13 of these cities (Num_35:4). The people, as well as the priests and Levites, benefited by this arrangement, for the latter being dispersed throughout the land were able to instruct the people in the law and worship of God. On the duty of the priests and Levites to teach the people see Lev_10:11; Deu_17:8-9; Deu_33:10; 2Ch_19:8-10. It would appear that the law of the Levitical cities was never strictly carried into practice.
4, 5. There is a difficulty in understanding these measurements. Perhaps the simplest explanation is to say that the area of the city itself is disregarded. The city being conceived as a mathematical point, 1,000 cubits measured on either side give a square 2,000 cubits in the side. The Greek version has 2,000 cubits in Num_35:4. If this is right there is no difficulty at all. The city would be surrounded on all sides by a strip of land 2,000 cubits in width.
6, 9-15. The Cities of Refuge. (See also Deu_19:1-3; Joshua 20.) In primitive times, before the machinery of justice was organised, the duty of avenging a murder devolved upon the nearest relative of the murdered person. Duty required him to pursue the murderer and slay him with his own hand. This law was not repealed by Moses, but certain restrictions were placed upon it in the interests of humanity and justice. Of the Levitical cities, six were marked out as Cities of Refuge to which a man who had killed another accidentally (Num_35:11, Num_35:22-25) might flee and be safe from the 'avenger of blood.' This provision did not apply to wilful murderers, who were not to escape the death penalty (Num_35:16-21). The names of the cities are given in Jos_20:7, Jos_20:8. Three were on the W. side of Jordan and three on the E. The reason why Levitical cities were selected for this purpose was, not merely that these were regarded as possessing a sacred character, but that they were inhabited by men who knew the law, and who could decide in doubtful cases between wilful murder and accidental homicide (Num_35:24; Deu_19:12, Deu_19:17). Deu_19:3 provides that the principal roads leading to these cities of refuge be kept open, so that the innocent fugitive might have every facility in reaching the place of sanctuary (see note there). For the Christian application of this law of asylum see on Num_35:25.
12. Stand before the congregation] As a wilful murderer might flee to one of these cities in the hope of escaping with his life, a trial must be held to ascertain whether the murder was wilful or accidental.
16-21. If the trial shows that the murder was committed wilfully, the murderer is to be handed over for execution at the hands of the avenger of blood.
22-29. If the trial shows that the murder was accidental (see Deu_19:4-5) the murderer's life is spared. But he must stay within the bounds of the city till the death of the high priest, when he is at liberty to go. If he stray outside the bounds before that time he does so at the peril of his own life. 25. Unto the death of the high priest] The amnesty declared to the man-slayer on the death of the high priest, which marks the close of one period and the beginning of a new, is an appropriate symbol of that redemption from the sins of the past wrought by Christ, and that new life of liberty into which they enter who believe in Him: cp. Heb_6:18-20.
30-32. Murder is such a serious crime that it cannot be atoned for by the payment of a money fine; nor can the man who has unintentionally killed another purchase his release from the city of refuge before the death of the high priest. St. Peter reminds Christians that they were not redeemed with silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ (1Pe_1:18-19).
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein1922 · Public DomainOn v111. The Cities of Refuge
11. The Cities of Refuge
CHAPTER 35
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1. The provision of the Levites: Forty-eight cities (Num 35:1-8)
2. The cities of refuge (Num 35:9-34)
The cities of the Levites were scattered through the land. Gen 49:7 is therefore fulfilled. The provision of cities for refuge is full of interest. The careful study of the purpose of these cities is recommended. Note especially that they were provided to give shelter for those who had killed a person unawares. The avenger of blood (Hebrew: _goel, which means to redeem) pursued the person and the city of refuge gave shelter. The death of the high priest resulted in liberty for all who were in the cities of refuge. It was the signal that they could return to their possessions (verse 28).
Israel’s history may be easily read in this chapter in connection with the cities of refuge. The innocent blood shed is the blood of Christ. Blood guiltiness is upon the nation. They did it ignorantly, even as He prayed on Calvary’s cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” They are on account of this blood-guiltiness kept out of their inheritance, and yet they have had their city of refuge and have been preserved till the time comes when they are set free and return to the possession in the land. And that will be when the Priesthood of Christ as now exercised by Him in glory ends, when He comes forth as the King-Priest to exercise the Melchisedek priesthood. The names of the cities are not given in the book of Numbers. They were: Bezer, Ramoth, Golan, Kedesh, Shechem and Hebron (Deu 4:41-43; Jos 20:7). The cities are also types of Christ because they gave shelter. He is our refuge and our hiding place.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann1924 · Public DomainOn v1The Cities of the Levites
The Cities of the Levites
v. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses in the Plains of Moab by Jordan, near Jericho, saying,
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v. 2. Command the children of Israel that they give unto the Levites of the Inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in, for the Levites, as a tribe, received no special territory in the land of Canaan, Num 18:20-23; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them, meadows, pasture-land for their herds and flocks, fields which could not be sold, but remained the permanent and inalienable property of the Levites, Lev 25:34. This does not hold true of the cities themselves, for in these it was only the houses that were given to the Levites, in regard to which the Lord had provided that they could be redeemed at any time after being sold and should always be returned to the original owners or their heirs in the Year of Jubilee, Lev 25:32-33.
v. 3. And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and the suburbs, the meadows, the pasture-land, of them shall be for their cattle and for their goods and tor all their beasts.
v. 4. And the suburbs of the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites shall reach from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about, that is, measuring directly from the city wall in a straight line.
v. 5. And ye shall measure from without the city, from its wall or boundary, on the east side two thousand cubits, and on the south side two thousand cubits, and on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst, and the place occupied by it should not enter into the calculations; this shall be to them the suburbs of the cities.
v. 6. And among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites there shall be six cities for refuge, which ye shall appoint for the manslayer, to the man who unintentionally takes his neighbor’s life, that he may flee thither; and to them ye shall add forty and two cities, making a total of forty-eight.
v. 7. So all the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities; them shall ye give with their suburbs.
v. 8. And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel, selected from the territory apportioned to the tribes; from them that have many ye shall give many; but from them that have few ye shall give few; every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites according to his inheritance which he inheriteth. As the plan worked out afterward, Joshua 21, there were ten cities of the Levites in the country east of the Jordan and thirty-eight in Canaan proper. By living in the midst of all the tribes, the Levites were to be an example to the entire nation, continually reminding them of their divine call and of the covenant of Jehovah, so that the fear of the Lord might be maintained in Israel.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv1, 3, 5a large area of flat land
plains
a large area of flat land
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give some of their own shares of land to the Levites
Yahweh did not give the Levites their own land, so they had to live in cities that belonged to other tribes.
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv1, 435:1-34 The tribe of Levi received no territory, so…
35:1-34 The tribe of Levi received no territory, so ch 35 describes their allotment of 48 towns dispersed among the territories of Israel’s other tribes (see Josh 21; see also Lev 25:32-34; 1 Chr 13:2; 2 Chr 11:14). Just as the Levites had lived in the center of the Israelite camp during the wilderness period (cp. Num 2:17), in the Promised Land they were to live among the other tribes and have a leavening influence among them (see Deut 33:9-10; 2 Chr 17:7-9; 19:8-11; 35:3). The cities and their surrounding pastureland were not a “homeland” (cp. Num 18:23; 26:62) but only a tiny fraction of the Canaanite territory dispersed among the other tribes.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv2, 5 Because they had no inheritance assigned them in the…
Because they had no inheritance assigned them in the land of Canaan.
God would have them scattered through all the land, because the people might be preserved by them in the obedience of God and his Law.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On v2 Num 35:2 Command the children of Israel, that they…
Num 35:2 Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites of the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in; and ye shall give [also] unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them.
Ver. 2. Suburbs.] These were for pasture, pleasure, and other country commodities, not for tillage; for the Levites were to have no such employment. {Num 18:20; Num 18:24}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv3–4 For their cattle; for pasturage for their cattle; where…
For their cattle; for pasturage for their cattle; where they might not build houses, nor plant gardens, orchards, or vineyards, no, nor sow corn, for which they were abundantly provided out of the first-fruits and tithes. And these suburbs did not belong to the Levites in common, but were distributed to them in convenient proportions, as may appear from Jos 21:18; 1Ch 6:60.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–5 And the Lord spake to Moses,.... After he had…
And the Lord spake to Moses,.... After he had described the borders of the land, and given instructions about the division of it among the several tribes, and named the persons that should be concerned in parting and putting it into the possession of the Israelites, he makes a provision for the Levites; for though they had no inheritance in the land as a tribe, yet it was proper they should have cities and houses to dwell in; for it would not be suitable that they should be always about the tabernacle, as they were in the wilderness; and it is concerning this the Lord is said to speak to Moses:
in the plains of Moab by Jordan, near Jericho: where the Israelites now were, and had been for some time:
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saying; as follows.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4 Forty eight cities assigned to the Levites, of which…
Forty eight cities assigned to the Levites, of which six were cities of refuge, ver. 1-15. In what cases it was not allowed to flee to these, ver. 16-21. In what cases it was allowed, ver. 22- 24. Laws concerning them, ver. 25-34.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 5 The Israelites are commanded to give the Levites, out…
CHAPTER XXXV
The Israelites are commanded to give the Levites, out of their
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inheritances, cities and their suburbs for themselves and for
their cattle, goods, c., 1-3.
The suburbs to be 3,000 cubits round about from the wall of the
city, 4, 5.
The cities to be forty-two, to which six cities of refuge should
be added, in all forty-eight cities, 6, 7.
Each tribe shall give of these cities in proportion to its
possessions, 8.
These cities to be appointed for the person who might slay his
neighbour unawares, 9-12.
Of these six cities there shall be three on each side Jordan,
13, 14.
The cities to be places of refuge for all who kill a person
unawares, whether they be Israelites, strangers, or sojourners,
15.
Cases of murder to which the benefit of the cities of refuge
shall not extend, 16-21.
Cases of manslaughter to which the benefits of the cities of
refuge shall extend, 22, 23.
How the congregation shall act between the manslayer and the
avenger of blood, 24, 25.
The manslayer shall abide in the city of refuge till the death
of the high priest he shall then return to the land of his
possession, 26-28.
Two witnesses must attest a murder before a murderer can be put
to death, 29, 30.
Every murderer to be put to death, 31.
The manslayer is not to be permitted to come to the land of his
inheritance till the death of the high priest, 32.
The land must not be polluted with blood, for the Lord dwells
in it, 33, 34.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXXV
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2–4 Num 35:2. That they give unto the Levites —…
Num 35:2. That they give unto the Levites — cities — The reason of this appointment was, that the Levites, being a body of people distinct from the rest of the nation, had no share in the division of the country. It is to be observed that the priests, the sons of Aaron, being also of the tribe of Levi, are here comprehended under the common name of Levites, as well as those inferior ministers of religion generally signified by that term.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv2, 5 Suburbs - Rather, “pasture-grounds,” required for their large cattle,…
Suburbs - Rather, “pasture-grounds,” required for their large cattle, for their sheep and goats, and for all their beasts whatever they might be Num 35:3.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv3–5 Cities, in all forty-eight, with a thousand paces round…
Cities, in all forty-eight, with a thousand paces round them. This land belonged to the community: but some built upon it, Josue xxi. 18., and 1 Paralipomenon vi. 60. The burial place for the Levites lay behind it. (Drusius) --- In these cities alone, the Levites had houses and gardens of their own; other might live with them, and indeed the cities acknowledged other lords, as Hebron belonged to Caleb, Josue xiv. 14. The Levites were dispersed throughout the land, that they might instruct the people both by word and by example, Deuteronomy xxxiii. 10. They had a clear revenue without labour of husbandry, equivalent to any two of the other tribes. (Abulensis.) --- Six of their cities were assigned for places of refuge, as they were the proper judges of the cases, in which murder may be excused, and to remind them that hey ought to be very merciful. Hence arose the privileges, granted to some churches, of protecting those who fled to them for an asylum. That none might be hindered from enjoying this benefit, three of these cities were situated on each side of the Jordan, and at equal distances. (Salien)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 Regulations for the Levitical Cities and the Cities of…
THIRTEENTH SECTION
Regulations for the Levitical Cities and the Cities of Refuge
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Numbers 35
1And the Lord spake unto Moses in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho, saying, 2Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites, of the inheritance of their possession, cities to dwell in; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them. 3And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and the suburbs of them shall be for their cattle, and for their goods, and for all their beasts. 4And the suburbs of the cities, which ye shall give unto the Levites, shall reach from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about. 5And ye shall measure from without the city on the east side two thousand cubits, and on the south side two thousand cubits, and on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst: this shall be to them the suburbs of the cities. 6And among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites there shall be six cities for refuge, which ye shall appoint for the manslayer, that he may flee thither: and 1to them ye shall 7add forty and two cities. So all the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities: them shall ye give with their suburbs. 8And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel: from them that have many ye shall give many; but from them that have few ye shall give few: every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites according to his inheritance which 2he inheriteth.
9And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 10Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come over Jordan into the land of Canaan, 11Then ye shall appoint you cities to be cities of refuge for you; that the slayer may flee thither, which killeth any person at 3unawares. 12And they shall be unto you cities for refuge from the avenger; that the manslayer die not, until he stand before the 13congregation in judgment. And of these cities which ye shall give, six cities shall ye have for refuge. 14Ye shall give three cities on this side Jordan, and three cities shall ye give in the land of Canaan, which shall be cities of refuge. 15These six cities shall be a refuge, both for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them; that every one that killeth any person unawares may flee thither. 16And if he smite him with an instrument of iron, so that he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death. 17And if he smite him with throwing a 4stone wherewith he may die, and he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall 18surely be put to death. Or if he smite him with a hand weapon of wood, wherewith he may die, and he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death. 19The revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer: when he meeteth him, he shall slay him. 20But if he thrust him of hatred, or hurl at him by laying of wait, that he die; 21Or in enmity smite him with his hand, that he die: he that smote him shall surely be put to death; for he is a murderer: the revenger of blood shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him. 22But if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or have cast upon him any thing without laying of wait, 23Or with any stone, wherewith a man may die, seeing him not, and cast it upon him, that he die, and was not his enemy, neither sought his harm; 24Then the congregation shall judge between the slayer and the revenger of blood according to these judgments: 25And the congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the revenger of blood, and the congregation shall restore him to the city of his refuge, whither he was fled: and he shall abide in it unto the death of the high priest, which was anointed with the holy oil. 26But if the slayer shall at any time come without the border of the city of his refuge, whither he was fled; 27And the revenger of blood find him without the borders of the city of his refuge, and the revenger of blood kill the slayer: he shall not be guilty of 5blood: 28Because he should have remained in the city of his refuge until the death of the high priest: but after the death of the high priest 29the slayer shall return into the land of his possession. So these things shall be for a statute of judgment unto you throughout your generations in all your dwellings. 30Whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die. 31Moreover, ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer, which Isaiah 6 guilty of death: but he shall be surely put to death. 32And ye shall take no satisfaction for him that is fled to the city of his refuge, that he should come again to dwell in the land, until the death of the priest. 33So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are: for blood it defileth the land: and the 7land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it. 34Defile not therefore the land which ye shall inhabit, wherein I dwell: for I the Lord dwell among the children of Israel.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
ž[Num_35:3. לִרְכֻשָׁם not the ordinary term for sheep and goats or small cattle. Here it designates that which they had acquired—their movable or driven possessions—and so flocks as driven together.—A. G.]
[Num_35:4. מְגְרָשׁ from גָרַשׁ to drive—place to which cattle were driven.—A. G.]
[Num_35:5. Omit shall be.]
[Num_35:6. The preposition is not in the original. Render with Lange: And the cities which ye shall give to the Levites are the six—supply the verb; or better, as to the cities which ye shall give, etc. Six cities shall be for, etc.—A. G.]
[Num_35:11. De Wette: Convenient cities—those easy, ready of access, and so fit.]
[Num_35:11. בּשְׁגָגָה. By his error or wandering; by inadvertence.—A. G.]
[Num_35:12. מגאל from גָאַל to redeem, buy back. Connected with דָּם redeemer of blood, avenger, and so the redeemer of blood was the next of kin, a kinsman.—A. G.]
[Num_35:12. הָּעֵרָח not the word ordinarily used for the congregation, but the local court of the city to which he fled. See Num_35:24-25.—A. G.]
[Num_35:19. In his lighting upon him, wherever he meets him; the word includes even an undesigned meeting.—A. G.]
[Num_35:23. Who willed him no evil.—Luther.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Comp. Joshua 21. After the directions for the purifying of the holy land from all heathen defilement, and its division among the people of Jehovah in a just and equitable manner, a positive consecration is now imparted to it, by the distribution of the Levitical cities throughout the entire land. This gleam of Levitical sanctity over the land, which takes the place of the dark or frivolous image-worship, becomes broader and brighter through the asylums for fugitives, who were pursued for the unintentional shedding of blood; places of refuge which were located among the Levitical cities, and were thus passed under the protection of the Levites, but by the law under which they were appointed, were not only bulwarks of justice and its enforcement, but also of grace and its dispensation, and thus glorified the holy land.
This mingling of the Levitical cities with the places of refuge for those pursued by the revenger of blood, was in the first place peculiarly significant. It expresses the inward connection of righteousness and grace, and also the sharp distinction between the unintentional shedding of blood by the parricide, and the intentional and criminal shedding of blood by the murderer, between expiation by the loss of liberty and expiation by death, and thus the development from the natural thirst for vengeance, to the sacred law of justice and right. The reconciliation between justice and grace gives to this institution the morning rays of the New Testament principles and relations. Its natural basis is the relation between the blood revenger and the right of asylum among the ancients, its ecclesiastical form the refuge to the sanctuary and altars of the Church in the Middle Ages, its Christian development the idea of pardon consistent with right, a legal pardon, its caricature the radical excuse of guilt and the liberalistic dilution of the rights of the slain, or the law of murder.
1. The Levitical cities, Num_35:1-5. The Levites receive no inheritance, no lot in Canaan; their lot and inheritance is Jehovah. But the tribes shall give them cities out of their inheritance, and in addition pasturage for their cattle; the cities only in a conditional sense, i. e., for dwellings in connection with those who were not Levites, but with their own houses and with special rights. The pastures, lay around the cities, for their cattle and their possession (their flocks and herds), and for all their animals generally.8 For an inalienable possession, Lev_25:34. The clear conception and location of the pastures which were to be given to the Levites in the environs of their cities is very difficult. We are not inclined, however, to accept the designation which Keil, after (Michaelis and Knobel) adopts and favors. In the first place, it is not probable that the cities should all be four-square; and then it is hardly supposable that the cities should all be enclosed by pastures exclusively Levite, and indeed an environ of one by two thousand cubits, so that no pasture land should have been left for the other inhabitants of the cities, unless they looked for it, outside of the Levite pastures. Then further, it would barely have been possible to lay out pastures one thousand cubits broad on every side of every city. The description is entirely clear so far, that the Levite pastures should extend one thousand cubits from the city into the fields around; then two thousand cubits, from the outer border of the one thousand (מחוצ) on every side of the city should be set apart for Levite pastures, thus in all eight thousand cubits. There was still room for the gardens near the city walls, and between the measured Levite pastures there was room also for the pastures of the other dwellers in the city. The eight thousand cubits appear to form a plus or minus, an indefinite quantity, to be determined in concrete cases according to the demands and number of their cattle and flocks. Thus the Levites were scattered in Israel according to the prediction—or curse—of Jacob (Genesis 49). But the dispersion, which in another form hung as a doom over the Simeonites, became now, not only a blessing to the Levites, whom the whole broad country had to support, viz., by the payment of the tithes that could not be carried far, but also for Israel, since the Levites, as teachers of the law, consecrated because of the name of Jehovah, were to be the salt of the land and people. But still they should not, as Keil rightly observes, lose their power, by too great a disintegration and dispersion through the whole land, or become burdensome to individual tribes by too great concentration. [“From without. The demarcation here intended would run parallel to the wall of the city outside of which it was made. The object was apparently to secure that the preceding provision should be fairly and fully carried out. The suburb would thus extend for a thousand cubits, or nearly one-third of a mile from the wall. There might be danger, especially with the irregular forms which the cities might assume, and with the physical obstacles presented by the surrounding ground, that neighboring proprietors would deem the suburb sufficient, if it measured a thousand cubits in some directions, not in others, in which case it might occasionally be restricted to a very small area. To guard against this, it was ordained that the suburb should alike on north, south, east and west, present at a thousand cubits’ distance from the wall, a front not less than two thousand cubits in length.” Bib. Com. This is better than Keil’s view (which implies that every Levitical city lay four-square, within the area enclosed by the four sides of a square), because it seems flexible. The two things which seem essential, are to retain the precision and definiteness of the description of the text, and yet allow for the diversity in shape and location which was sure to exist. It is very generally agreed that the first suburb was a thousand cubits broad all round the city in whatever shape its walls may have been constructed. If we regard the enumeration of the Bides north, south, east and west as used to indicate all directions, and not merely four sides, we may conceive of the outer and broader suburb—two thousand cubits deep—conformed in its shape to the walls of the city, and the configuration of the surrounding ground.—A. G.]
2. The Free cities, Num_35:6-16 sqq. The number of free cities is limited to six, which added to the remaining Levitical cities, makes the entire number forty-eight. That the number of the cities occurs here for the first time proves the importance of the free cities. The provision, too, that the Levitical cities should be distributed among the tribes according to their strength, appears here for the first time. The most important Levitical cities, i. e., the cities of the priests, thirteen in number, were divided among the tribes, who later were nearest the sanctuary, Judah, Simeon and Benjamin. No less care appears in the selection of the free, or refuge cities. The location of those on the farther side of Jordan, and those on this side (in Canaan) made the escape to them possible to all. These asylums were announced already in the first giving of the law (Exo_21:13), these regulations were also fixed before this (Lev_4:2), and the law with respect to them was more widely developed later (Deu_19:1-13.)
These were to be located on three circuits of the land, on both sides of the Jordan; and the roads leading to them should be well kept, so that the avenger of blood should not be able to overtake and slay the innocent fugitive through a long and wearisome and difficult road. [The Jewish tradition held that the cities east and west of the Jordan must correspond with each other; that the three on each side must be equally distant from each other; that the cities must be unwalled—of considerable size, have all the necessaries and conveniences of life, both material as water, markets, etc., and moral as teachers’ schools; in short, be a complete little world. Hirsch says that the שׁגגה or error did not include mistakes occurring through their carelessness, but only cases which could not have been calculated upon, or which could not have been avoided by ordinary human foresight. He adds that their protective character belonged in a secondary sense to the Levitical cities, but was the prominent characteristic of these six cities. Levitical or priestly cities were chosen partly because they would be first resorted to in the administration of justice, and partly also because the land and the people were the Lord’s, and the priests were His representatives; and the crime of shedding blood was pre-eminently offensive to Him, and left its stain upon His land; and therefore those charged with this crime and yet innocent, were to seek refuge in His cities and under His protection. The right and duty of revenge for violations of justice was universally recognized among the ancients. It was exercised at first by every member of the family. It was later restricted in its exercise to some one member, generally the next of kin. It was greatly modified in its application by this Mosaic institution and its attendant features. The Goel—“is that particular relation whose special duty it was to restore the violated family integrity, who had not only to redeem landed property that had been alienated from the family (Lev_25:25 sq.), or a member of the family who had fallen into slavery (Lev_25:47), but also the blood that had been taken away from the family by murder.” Oehler in Keil’s Com.—A. G.]
The right of asylum created also, according to Num_35:15, for the stranger, even those who were merely sojourners in the land. But it was only a free city actually to those who had committed manslaughter, and that without design. The murderer, on the contrary, who fled to it for refuge, ran directly to the bar of judgment and to death. Even the homicide was only protected at first from the rage and violence of the avenger.9 His ultimate freedom from the penalty of death depends upon a variety of conditions. The fugitive must at first stand before the gates of the city of refuge, and state his case to the elders, in order to secure admission into the city, and its protection against the avenger. He had thus to vindicate himself before a judicial investigation.10 Then he could not leave the city of refuge until a fixed terminus was reached. If he wandered from its jurisdiction, the avenger might slay him. As he thus stood, on the one side, under the protection of the free city, the authority of the Levites, and the special protection of Jehovah, to whom the Levite cities as peculiarly holy belonged, so he was, on the other hand, in a certain measure banished from his hearth and home. The terminus moreover for the close of this exile is very remarkable. When the high-priest dies, who is anointed with the sacred oil, he may return to his inheritance in safely. This entirely peculiar method of atonement, rests truly upon the idea that the great event of the death of the high priest covers with respect to God, a mass of sins which have risen from ignorance or mistakes, and causes them to be forgotten by men, and thus forms a terminus or bound which even the avenger of blood must respect. Thus even in a moral sense great national calamities—such as the death of the high priest would be regarded in Israel—have something expiatory in their nature; old enmities and dissensions are lost in the national sorrow. In the interval moreover the hope of the fugitive was kept alive awaiting this terminus, while the passion of the avenger was abated. Keil holds especially from the statement that the high priest was anointed with the holy oil that the death of the earthly high priest, typified that of the heavenly, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God (Heb_9:14). It is definitely declared that the priests had to bear the sins of the people; the high priest especially making an atonement stood with his censer between the dead and the living, and his intercession, as his priestly steadfastness when in peril of death, had a somewhat atoning character, as probably also his death. Still we must emphasize the fact that this dynamic or moral efficacy of his death is not mentioned among the definite types of the Old Testament, and could not be so mentioned, since the death of the high priest was not always edifying. [Keil: “In these regulations all the rigor of divine justice is manifested in the most beautiful concord with His mercy. Through the destruction of life, even when not wilful, human blood had been shed and demanded expiation. Yet this expiation did not consist in the death of the offender himself, because he had not sinned wilfully. Hence an asylum was provided for him in the free city to which he might flee, and where he might remain, not as an exile, but under the protection of God, until his sin was expiated by the death of the high priest. The fact that the death of the high priest was regarded as expiatory is evident from the clause, “who has been anointed with the holy oil,” which would appear unmeaning and superfluous on any other view. The anointing with the holy oil was a symbol of the communication of the Holy Ghost, by which the high priest was empowered to act as mediator and representative of the nation before God, so that he alone could carry out the yearly and general expiation for the whole nation on the great day of atonement. But as his life and work acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Ghost, his death might also be regarded as a death for the Sins of the people, by virtue of the Holy Ghost imputed to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sins before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town without further exposure to the avenger of blood. But inasmuch as, according to this view, the death of the high priest had the same result in a certain sense, in relation to his line of office, as his function on the day of atonement had had every year, the death of the earthly high priest became thereby a type of that of the heavenly One, who through the eternal (holy) Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions, and receive the promised eternal inheritance. Just as the blood of Christ wrought out eternal redemption only, because through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God, so the death of the high priest of the Old Testament secured the complete deliverance of the manslayer from his sin, only because he had been anointed with the holy oil, the symbol of the Holy Ghost.” The death of Christ our High Priest avails to release those who have fled for refuge to Him from all the penalty which their sins deserve. And as the high priest was a type of Christ, his death, as the anointed one, and anointed with the Spirit of life and holiness, had a typical efficacy, and released those who had fled for refuge from the avenger to the priestly cities, and representatively at least, to the city of the high priest. That it is not expressly mentioned as a type by no means excludes it from that relation, nor does the mode or features of the high priest’s death affect its typical any more than its real efficacy.—A. G.]
As the acquittal of the unintentional homicide was not unconditioned, so also the restraints of the avenger are not unlimited. The Goel was legally the nearest relative, or in his default the relative next removed (see the book of Ruth), and ultimately the whole family. In actual life however it was that relative of the slain person who felt most deeply the injury which had been inflicted upon him, and would rather die with the slain, than not to claim back his blood, i. e., leave it unavenged. The impulse of blood revenge was therefore, and still is, the original natural impulse of retributive justice, the source of all criminal jurisprudence. But since the avenger is blinded with passion—and unrestrained pursuit of revenge as a passion always engenders fresh revenges, as is seen, to this day among certain tribes and peoples, e.g., in Arabia—so the law steps in between the avenger and his victim, restrains him in the exercise of his right (and duty) by the judgment of the community, in order that the more natural form of revenge may pass more and more into the unimpassioned decision of the public court and justice. Thus the right of refuge and of revenge stand over against each other, and each exerting a modifying and shaping influence upon the other. In a legal point of view the avenger may still kill the homicide with impunity; and is indeed the executioner of the sentence of the court, if the congregation, or the court of the congregation (i. e., the local court of the city of refuge, or perhaps the highest tribunal of the whole community), should adjudge the homicide a murderer. [The order seems to have been this. The manslayer presented himself to the elders of the city of refuge and stated his case; upon that they received him, and if the charge of crime was pressed, he was to be handed over to the community to which he belonged, and then fully tried. If they found him innocent of intentional murder, he was remitted to the protection of the city of refuge; if otherwise, he was delivered to the avenger.—A. G.]
3. The distinction between homicide and murder.
Num_35:16-28. The signs of murder as to the mode. The use of a deadly weapon of iron, or, if heavy enough to cause death, a stone, or of a heavy piece of wood (Cain’s club). [The use of such weapons dangerous to life would imply some evil intent—were presumably proof of a malicious purpose.—A. G.] The motives are hatred and enmity. The means employed an artful plan. Unintentional homicide, on the other hand, might occur from “sudden thrust, a hunting around of a weapon, without enmity; or the casting of a stone without a purpose to injure, or in ignorance of any one in danger, and in cases in which it could then be known that no enmity, no ill-will existed. [See the cases illustrated Deu_19:4-5.—A. G.] In the former case the avenger takes his course, but in the latter the congregation shall judge, i. e., actually determine, and so rescue the manslayer from his pursuer. As to the manslayer even the sentence the avenger may kill him whenever and wherever he meets him, lights upon him, comes under legal limitations, because otherwise the revenger might designate every homicide as a murderer.11
4. The judgment upon the murderer and his motive.
Num_35:29-34. The manslayer can only be convicted of murder by the evidence of several (Deut.: two or three) witnesses. The testimony of a single witness is not sufficient. But if convicted, then he was not to be released upon any expiation, or ransom, or sacrifice, as was done among the heathen nations, by the old Germans, and even in the church of the middle ages. Even the mere manslayer cannot be released from his sentence, that he must remain in the city of refuge until the death of the high priest. For whoever is guilty of blood has defiled and desecrated the land; he has stained it with blood, and there is no atonement for these but the blood of the murderer. If he remains unpunished, then the judicatory itself appointed to administer retributive justice defiles the land, the holy land, in which Jehovah dwells with His people—Jehovah as the sacred personality among His people, whom He has trained to a life of sanctified personality. Thus here too the law forms a sacred pedagogic—a method of training by which men are led upwards from the merely natural to the spiritual life. As Moses thus provides for or regulates the oath, the offering, marriage, divorce, the vow, the revenge of jealousy, so now also the blood revenge, in order to lead it to the ideal goal, where the whole society of the people, the entire community, is made responsible for the execution of the penalty or curse resting upon the shedding of human blood. Comp. this Comm. Gen_9:5-6. [No satisfaction.
Num_35:31-32. “The permission to make compensation for murder undoubtedly mitigates in practice the system of private retaliation, but it does so by sacrificing the principle which is the basis of that retaliation itself. Resting ultimately upon that law of God, “that whosoever sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed,” it bids men rest content with a convenient evasion of that law, and connects the authority given to men to act as God’s ministers in taking life for life, with a warrant for enabling the kinsmen of a murdered man to make gain out of his murder. For I the Lord dwell—an emphatic protest against all enactment or relaxation of laws by men for their own private convenience.” Bib. Com. These words too contain the very principle and sum of the whole law above, viz.: this sacredness of human blood or life—since man is made in the image of God.—A. G.]
For the literature see Winer’s Real-Worterbuch, art. “Freistatt.” Dann: Ueber den Ursprung des Asylrechts, etc., Leipsic, 1840. Cowles on the Pentateuch, pp. 280–284. J. D. Michaelis, Laws of Moses. Smith’s Bib. Dict. arts. “Cities of Refuge” and “Revenger of Blood.”
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
The Levites were specially cared for. They are to be, on the one hand, without large possessions, and, on the other, without care, but, above all, intimately connected with the people; an ideal for an ecclesiastical and spiritual class for all time. The hierarchy of the middle ages did not observe this. It took the tithes, but took with them also the landed property. It reversed the Old Testament relations. It did not dwell with the people, but left them to dwell by themselves. And while men who were pursued for an unintentional crime found safety among the Levites in the cities of refuge, under the hierarchy men who were more innocent than unintentional homicides ran directly to their death, into the very tortures of the inquisition. But the right of sanctuary which the churches offered them was a faint reflection of the Old Testament cities of refuge.
The refuge opened in the bosom of the Levitical cities for those who were pursued by the revenger of blood; how great and true a preparation to the New Testament was this union of holiness and mercy.
But the sharp distinctions which are made with respect to these fugitives, between actual murderers and real homicides, are a divine testimony against the fatuities of modern liberalism, and especially against the abominable lie of materialism, which strips all crimes of their guilt.
[“The atoning death of the Saviour casts its shadow before on the statute book of the law, and on the annals of Jewish history. The High Priest as the head and representative of the whole chosen family of sacerdotal mediators, as exclusively entrusted with some of the chief priestly functions, as alone privileged to make yearly atonement within the Holy of Holies, was pre-eminently a type of Christ. And then the death of each successive high-priest presignified that death of Christ by which the captives were to be freed, and the remembrance of transgressions made to cease.” Bib. Com.—A. G.]
HOMILETICAL HINTS
The beautiful and suggestive union of the Levitical cities and the cities of Refuge, the instructive element in the regulation of the Levitical cities. The sense of justice is consecrated and sanctified in the establishment of the cities of refuge. The wisdom which shines in the union of the two institutions. The distinction between the murderer and the homicide, a fundamental distinction in all criminal jurisprudence. The justice in the limitations of the right of Asylum. Blood revenge as the root of the courts of law, and these courts as abolishing the blood revenge, just as jealousy is the root of marriage, and marriage is the destruction of jealousy. The difficult and ever new and repeated effort for the reconciliation of judgment and mercy, or even of equity and grace. The reconciliation between the rights of the dead and the rights of the living. The rights of the dead or slain one. The rights of the living. The atoning element in the occurrence of great catastrophes upon the land or on the people. Illustrated in the death of the High Priest. [The sacredness of human life in its relations to society and in its relations to God. How God guards and restrains the working of mere blind revenge, and yet cherishes and gives exercise to the sense of justice. Crimes unpunished bring guilt upon the authorities and courts. Henry: “Here is a great deal of good law and of good gospel. It is here enacted, 1. That wilful murder should be punished with death, and in that case no sanctuary should be allowed, no ransom taken nor any commutation of the punishment accepted; the murderer shall surely be put to death. The redemption of the life is so precious that it cannot be obtained by the multitude of riches. 2. That if the slaying was not voluntary, nor done designedly, there was safety in the city of refuge. The protection was under law. It was a remedial law, and all its provisions must be strictly observed. There is here a great deal of good gospel couched under the type and figures of the cities of refuge. (See Heb_6:18.) As, 1. There were several cities, so that the manslayer might easily reach them, so although there is but one Christ, yet He is a refuge at hand. 2. The manslayer was safe in any of these cities, so all who have fled to Christ are safe, Rom_8:1. 3. Even strangers and sojourners might have the benefit of these cities, so in Christ Jesus there is no difference between Greek and Jew. 4. If the manslayer left the city to return to his own home, he lay exposed to the avenger of blood, so those that are in Christ must abide in Christ; it is at their peril if they forsake Him or wander from Him. Drawing back is to perdition.” Wordsworth: “Not only does blood pollute the land, but they also who connive at murder when they ought to punish it, are said here to pollute it. Is it then competent to man to abolish capital punishment for murder?”—A. G.]
Footnotes:
[1]Marg. above them ye shall give.
[2]Heb. they inherit.
[3]Heb. by error.
[4]Heb. a stone of the hand.
[5]Heb. no blood shall be to him.
[6]Heb. faulty to die.
[7]Heb. there can be no expiation for the blood.
[8][וּלְכֹל הַיָּתָם animals generally. So Keil, Bib. Com., Wordsworth; but Hirsch suggests that the phrase is used here, not to supplement the enumeration of the pasture animals, but rather to denote every purifying arrangement necessary for health. No grave could be made in the Levite city or region, unless in the cases of those who had fled to them for refuge.—A. G.]
[9][Jewish Rabbis held that in cases of this crime—where there was no kinsman upon whom the duty fell to revenge the blood shed—the court would appoint one—A. G.]
[10][So strictly was this interpreted by the Jewish doctors, that even when committed in the presence of the court, the crime could not be punished until a judicial examination. In such a case, however, the court which was to sit and adjudicate the case must be a different one from that before which the offence was committed. The functions of a judge and a witness were in their view not lodged in the same person.—A. G.]
[11][Hirsch: At the death of the high priest, the homicide returned to his home and possessions, but not to his social position and official honor, even where these were hereditary. All other transgressors, when they were atoned for, were restored to the honors and offices they enjoyed before, and were qualified to hold new positions but the unintentional murderers were excluded.—A. G.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1, 4 THE LEVITE CITIES, Num_35:1-5.
THE LEVITE CITIES, Num_35:1-5.
1. The plains of Moab — Num_22:1, note.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–2 1–8. The Levitical cities
1–8. The Levitical cities
The Levites are to receive 48 cities with their surrounding land (E.VV. ‘suburbs’), six of which are to be ‘cities of refuge.’ The cities are to be contributed by each tribe in numbers proportionate to its size. Each plot of land is to be a square of 2,000 cubits (c. 1,000 yards). The carrying out of this law is related in fuller detail in Joshua 21, where the allotment is as follows: the Kohathite Levites were given 10 towns in Ephraim, Dan and western Manasseh, the Gershonites 13 in Issachar, Asher, Naphtali and eastern Manasseh, the Merarites 12 in Reuben, Gad and Zebulun, while the priests had 10 in Judah, Simeon and Benjamin.
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Two considerations, however, shew that this is a purely ideal arrangement, which could never have been actually brought about: 1st, In a hilly country like Palestine, cut with deep ravines, it would be impossible to find 48 square plots of land of such a size. 2nd, It is at variance with statements in earlier passages, (a) In Deuteronomy the Levites are classed with widows, orphans and strangers, as poor people who are commended to the charity of Israel; cf. Deu_12:12; Deu_12:18 f., Num_14:27; Num_14:29, Num_16:11; Num_16:14, Num_26:11 ff. In a few cases, indeed, priests settled in communities, and appear to have owned property, e.g. at Anathoth (1Ki_2:26, Jer_32:6 ff.), Nob (1Sa_21:1; 1Sa_22:19) and Bethel (Amo_7:10); but the two latter towns are not included in the list in Joshua 21. Deu_18:8 b may imply that some Levitical priests owned private property, but the passage is uncertain. (b) In Numbers 18, which must belong to an earlier stage of P than the present passage, the offerings to be made to the priests are expressly stated to be due to them because they have no landed property. Ezekiel (ch. 48) puts forward another ideal scheme for providing priests and Levites with land.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 5 (2) Cities to dwell in.—The object of the dispersion…
XXXV.
(2) Cities to dwell in.—The object of the dispersion of the Levites throughout the other tribes seems to have been primarily with a view to the instruction of their brethren in the law of the Lord (Deu_33:10). It is probable that the Levites also discharged all those other functions which are now discharged by the learned professions.
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And ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs . . . —The word migrash, “suburb,” denotes, probably, pasture ground into which flocks are driven.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. H. Mackintosh 1880 · Public Domain On v1 Numbers 35
Numbers 35
The opening lines of this most interesting chapter set before us the gracious provision which Jehovah made for His servants the Levites. Each of the tribes of Israel was privileged - that we say not bound - to furnish the Levites with a certain number of cities with their suburbs, according to their ability. "All the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities: them shall ye give with their suburbs. And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel: from them that have many ye shall give many; But from them that have few ye shall give few: every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites, according to his inheritance which he inheriteth." Verses 7, 8.
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The Lord’s servants were wholly cast upon Him for their portion. They had no inheritance or possession saving himself. Blessed inheritance! Precious portion! None like it, in the judgement of faith. Blessed are all those who can truly say to the Lord, "Thou art the portion of my cup, and the lot of my inheritance." God took care of His dependent servants, and permitted the whole congregation of Israel to taste the hallowed privilege - for such it most assuredly was - of being co-workers with Him in providing for those who had willingly devoted themselves to His work, abandoning all besides.
Thus, then, we learn that, out of the twelve tribes of Israel, forty and eight cities, with their suburbs, were to be given over to the Levites; and out of these again, the Levites had the privilege of furnishing six cities to be a refuge for the poor manslayer. Most lovely provision! Lovely in its origin! Lovely in its object!
The cities of refuge were situated, three on the eastern and three on the western side of Jordan. whether Reuben and Gad were right or wrong in settling east of that significant boundary, God in His mercy would not leave the slayer without a refuge from the avenger of blood. On the contrary, like Himself, He ordained that those cities which were designed as a merciful provision for the slayer should be so situated that wherever there was need of a shelter that shelter might be near at hand. There was always a city within reach of any who might be exposed to the sword of the avenger. This was worthy of our God. If any slayer happened to fall into the hands of the avenger of blood, it was not for want of a refuge near at hand, but because he had failed to avail himself of it. All necessary provision was made; the cities were named, and well defined, and publicly known. Everything was made as plain, as simple, and as easy as possible. Such was God’s gracious way.
No doubt, the slayer was responsible to put forth all his energy to reach the sacred precincts; and, no doubt, he would. It is not at all likely that any one would be so blind or so infatuated as to fold his arms, in cool indifference, and say, "If I am fated to escape, I shall escape, my efforts are not needed. If I am not fated to escape, I cannot escape, my efforts are of no use." We cannot fancy a manslayer using such silly language, or being guilty of such blind fatality as this. He knew too well that if the avenger could but lay his hand upon him, all such notions would be of small account. There was but the one thing to be done, and that was to escape for his life - to flee from impending judgement to find his safe abode within the gates of the city of refuge. Once there, he could breathe freely. No evil could overtake him there. The moment He crossed the threshold of the gate, he was as safe as God’s provision could make him. if a hair of his head could be touched, within the bounds of the city, it could but be a dishonour and a reproach upon the ordinance of God. True, he had to keep close. He dared not venture outside the gate. Within, he was perfectly safe. Without, he was thoroughly exposed. He could not even visit his friends. He was an exile from his Father’s house. He was a prisoner of hope. Absent from the home of his heart’s affections, he waited for the death of the high priest, which was to set him perfectly free and restore him, once more, to his inheritance and to his people.
Now, we believe that this beautiful ordinance had special reference to Israel. They have killed the Prince of life; but the question is, As which are they viewed by God, as the murderer or as the slayer? If the former, there is no refuge, no hope. No murderer could be sheltered within the city of refuge. Here is the law of the case, as stated in Joshua 20, "The Lord also spake unto Joshua, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, saying, Appoint out for you cities of refuge, whereof I spake unto you by the hand of Moses: that the slayer that killeth any person unawares and unwittingly may flee thither: and they shall be your refuge from the avenger of blood. And when he that doth flee unto one of those cities shall stand at the entering of the gate of the city, and shall declare his cause in the ears of the elders of that city, they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place, that he may dwell among them. And if the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver the slayer up into his hand; because he smote his neighbour unwittingly, and hated him not beforetime, And he shall dwell in that city, until he stand before the congregation for judgement, and until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days: then shall the slayer return, and come unto his own city, and unto his own house, unto the city from whence he fled." Vv 1-6.
But with respect to the murderer; the law was rigid and unbending "The murderer shall surely be put to death. The revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him." Numbers 35.
Israel, then, through the marvellous grace of God, will be treated as a slayer and not as a murderer. "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." These potent words ascended to the ear and to the heart of the God of Israel. They were heard and answered; nor are we to suppose that the answer was exhausted in its application on the day of Pentecost. No; it still holds good, and its efficacy will be illustrated in the future history of the house of Israel. That people are now under God’s keeping. They are exiles from the land and the home of their fathers. But the time is coming when they shall be restored to their own land, not by the death of the high priest - blessed be His deathless name! He can never die - but He will leave His present position, and come forth, in a new character, as the Royal Priest, to sit upon His throne. Then shall the exile return to his long-lost home, and his forfeited inheritance. But not till then, else it would be ignoring the fact that they killed the Prince of life, which were impossible. The manslayer mast remain out of his possession until the appointed time; but he is not to be treated as a murderer, because he did it unwittingly. "I obtained mercy" - says the Apostle Paul, speaking as a pattern to Israel because I did it ignorantly in unbelief." "And now, brethren," says Peter, "I wot that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers."
These passages, together with the precious intercession of the slain One, do, in the most distinct manner, place Israel on the ground of the manslayer, and not on the ground of the murderer. God has provided a refuge and a shelter for His much-loved people, and in due time they shall return to their long-lost dwellings, in that land which Jehovah gave as a gift to Abraham his friend for ever.
Such we believe to be the true interpretation of the ordinance of the city of refuge. Were we to view it as bearing upon the case of a sinner taking refuge in Christ, it could only be in a very exceptional way, inasmuch as we should find ourselves surrounded, on all hands, by points of contrast rather than by points of similarity. For in the first place, the manslayer, in the city of refuge, was not exempt from judgement, as we learn from Joshua 20: 6. But for the believer in Jesus there is and can be no judgement, for the simplest of all reasons, that Christ has borne the judgement instead.
Again, there was a possibility of the slayer’s falling into the hands of the avenger, if he ventured outside the gates of the city. The believer in Jesus can never perish; he is as safe as the Saviour himself.
Finally, as regards the slayer, it was a question of temporal safety and life in this world. As regards the believer in Jesus, it is a question of eternal salvation and life everlasting in the world to come. In fact, in almost every particular, it is striking contrast rather than similarity.
One grand point there is common to both, and that is, the point of exposure to imminent danger and the urgent need of fleeing for refuge. If it would have been wild folly on the part of the slayer to linger or hesitate for a moment, until he found himself safely lodged in the city of refuge, it is surely still wilder folly, yea, the very height of madness, on the part of the sinner, to linger or hesitate in coming to Christ. The avenger might perhaps fail to lay hold on the slayer even though he were not in the city; But judgement must overtake the sinner out of Christ. There is no possibility of escape, if there is the thickness of a gold leaf between the soul and Christ. Solemn thought! May it have its due weight in the heart of the reader who is yet in his sins! May he find no rest - not one moment’s rest, until he has fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before him in the gospel. Judgement impends, certain, solemn judgement. It is not only that the avenger may come, but judgement must come upon all who are out of Christ.
Oh! unconverted, thoughtless, careless reader - should this volume fall into the hands of such - hear the warning voice! Flee for thy life! Tarry not, we entreat thee! Delay is madness. Every moment is precious. You know not the hour in the which you may be cut down, and consigned to that place in the which a single ray of hope, not even the faintest glimmer, can ever visit you - the place of eternal night, eternal woe, eternal torment - the place of a deathless worm and an unquenchable flame. Beloved friend, do let us entreat thee, in these few closing lines of our volume, to come now, just as thou art, to Jesus, who stands with open arms and loving heart, ready to receive thee, to shelter, to save, and to bless, according to all the love of His heart, and the perfect efficacy of His name and His sacrifice. May God the Holy Spirit, by His own resistless energy, lead thee, just now, to come. "Come unto me," says the loving Lord and Saviour, "all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." Precious words! May they fall, with divine power, upon many a weary heart!
Here we close our meditations upon this marvellous section of the volume of God;* and, in doing so, we are impressed with a profound sense of the depth and richness of the mine to which we have sought to conduct the reader, and also of the excessive feebleness and poverty of the suggestions which we have been enabled to offer. However, our confidence is in the living God, that He will, by His Holy Spirit, lead the heart and mind of the Christian reader into the enjoyment of His own precious truth, and thus fit him, more and more, for His service in these last evil days, that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be magnified, and His truth maintained in living power. May God, in His abounding mercy, grant this, for Jesus Christ’s sake!
{*Chapter 36 has been referred to in our meditation on chapter 17}
C. H. M.
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The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 5 THE LEVITICAL CITIES, AND CITIES OF REFUGE, AND LAWS…
THE LEVITICAL CITIES, AND CITIES OF REFUGE, AND LAWS AS TO HOMICIDE (verses Num_33:50 Num_36:13.
Vers. 1-34. The dwelling of the faithful: the Redeemer: the sanctity of life.
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There are in this chapter three things closely connected historically, and therefore closely consecutive in the narrative, but distinct in their spiritual application. We have, therefore, separately to consider
I THE PROVISION WHICH GOD MAKES FOR HIS OWN, AND THEIR DISPERSION;
II THE REFUGE SET BEFORE HIM THAT IS GUILTY OF BLOOD;
III THE SANCTITY OF LIFE.
I In the regulations made for the habitation of the Levites and their cattle we have some sort of precedent for religious endowments; but this precedent loses all value in argument when we consider that the old dispensation was essentially temporal, which ours is not; moreover, the Levites do not correspond to the clergy, but rather to the inner circle of the faithful, who are more emphatically the "salt of the earth." Consider, therefore, as to the habitation of the Levites
1. That it was the will of God to disperse them as widely as possible throughout Israel a thing which might have been looked upon as a punishment to them, (Gen_49:7) but was really for the common good. Even so it is his will that his own, who are more especially his own, should be scattered far and wide among the mass of imperfect or nominal Christians; not gathered together in one corner of Christendom, but everywhere found as the few among the many. And note that this is the very law of "salt," which must be scattered and diffused to exercise its antiseptic functions.
2. That the Levites, although dispersed, yet lived in communities, and this no doubt that they might set forth the life of holiness according to the law. Even so there is, beside the law of dispersion, a counter-law of aggregation for "the spiritual," which makes mightily for holiness. For Christianity is a life, and life is complex, and therefore can only be lived by many who agree. There should be centers of high religious influence everywhere, but those centers should be strong.
3. That the allotments of the Levites, though Sufficient, were far from being extensive, on any understanding of the text. Even so, for those who would be an example to Christ"s flock, sufficiency is the rule, and nothing more. (1Ti_6:8) God does not design poverty for his own, (Luk_12:31) unless voluntarily embraced, (ibid. Luk_12:33) but assuredly not wealth. (Luk_6:24)
4. That the object aimed at in the allotment of their cities was to give each tribe, and even each tribesman, a personal and local interest in the Levites. Even so it is the will of God that those who specially follow after him should be identified as strongly as possible with those around them, in order that these may love and reverence them. Every Christian land has its "saints," by whom it is the more edified in that it feels them to be specially its own.
Consider also, mystically
1. That the Levitical cities numbered forty-eight, i.e., 12 4 the first being the symbol of the universal (apostolic see Rev_21:14) Church, the second of the whole earth, (Mat_8:11 Rev_21:13) the whole signifying diffusion throughout the world. Even so the religious life is universal in all parts of the Church of God, even in those which seem to us most remote.
2. That the enclosures round the Levitical cities measured the same every way lay foursquare as far as possible. Even so it is the ideal of the religious life that it be not one-sided, or unequal, but attain its full-development in all directions; if not it must be starved to some extent.
II The law of refuge from the goel is one of the most striking, and yet difficult, of the foreshadowings of the gospel. It is complicated, in the spiritual interpretation, by the fact that Christ is the Victim with whose blood our hands are stained, and our only Refuge, while he is also typified as Redeemer by the goel, and as Messiah by the anointed priest. Consider, however
1. That the law presupposed and provided for a state of blood-guiltiness, which brought after it the sentence of death. (Gen_9:6) Even so the gospel presupposes that all have sinned, and have become guilty of the death of Christ, who died for our sins, and have incurred the sentence of eternal death. David said, "Deliver me from blood-guiltiness", (Psa_51:14) but he had already incurred it; (2Sa_12:9) and so have we. (cf. Heb_6:6 Heb_10:29)
2. That it provided for such blood-guiltiness as was unwittingly incurred. Even so Christ"s excuse for us is that we "know not what we do" (Luke 24), and our hope is that we have not willfully and deliberately preferred sin as such. (Act_3:17 1Ti_1:13)
3. That it presupposed that the avenger was on foot to take the life of the manslayer. Even so the gospel testifies by its very offers of mercy that the Divine justice is surely gone forth with the edict of death against every soul that hath sinned, and that it is a mere matter of time when that justice shall overtake the sinner. (Gen_3:3 Eze_18:4 Rom_3:9, Rom_3:19, &c.);
4. That it pleased God to open a door of safety to the fugitive without staying the avenger. For the mission of the goel was very needful for that age, and yet it was the will of God to spare the unwitting homicide. Even so it has pleased God in a wonderful manner to provide a refuge for the sinner without compromising the Divine justice. The wrath of God against sin and the necessary punishment of sin are declared by the very means which bring salvation to the sinner. (Rom_3:26, &c.);
5. That this refuge was so distributed in six cities, three on each side Jordan, that it was everywhere accessible. Even so the sinner"s refuge in Jesus Christ is everywhere and by all accessible, if they will without delay flee into it. (Heb_6:18, &c.); And note that whereas almost all other religious privilege and promise was concentrated at Jerusalem, this refuge was distributed to all quarters of Jewish settlement, intimating that salvation in Christ is attainable wherever men call upon his name. (Rom_9:33, &c.);
6. That in order to be safe the manslayer must flee to the city of refuge, which was a Levitical city (not a solitary post or a mere sanctuary), and there must take up his abode among the Levites. Even so the sinner who desires to escape from the sentence of Divine justice must flee for refuge unto Christ to take hold on his merits; but in doing so he does ipso facto find a home in the society of the truly faithful, and in that society he will abide. The life of one that is escaped from wrath is not a solitary-walk with God, but a dwelling in a populous city. (Act_2:42Co Act_3:15 Heb_12:22, Heb_12:23; cf. Psa_31:21, &c.);
7. That the manslayer must never stir outside his refuge at risk of his life; if he did, the goel was at liberty to slay him. Even so the sinner must never quit his refuge in Christ for one hour, lest he perish; neither may he (which is part of the same thing) withdraw from the society of the faithful, for that is his (outward) protection. At whatever risk and less of things temporal, he must abide under the shelter of the atonement.
Consider again, with respect to the death of the high priest, and the staying of blood-feuds
1. That the high priest typified Christ, not in that he died by virtue of individual mortality, but in that he lived by virtue of official immortality; (see on Num_20:28 Heb_7:24, Heb_7:25) wherefore it is contrary to the whole analogy of Scripture to attribute any power of atonement to the death of the high priest.
2. That the high priest was not only the mediator and intercessor for Israel, but was also the chief minister of the law of God, and therefore the avenger of all iniquity against Israel, especially of all blood-guiltiness; in a word, he represented Divine justice as well as Divine compassion.
3. That the death of the high priest, which set the escaped manslayer free from all constraints and restrictions, must be taken to represent the passing away (as far as we are concerned) of the law of God as directed against sin. But this will only be when sin itself shall have wholly ceased, i.e. , at the resurrection of the just; then, and only then, will all restraints, all constraints, all necessities for sacrifice and renunciation, all penalties for forsaking the society of the faithful, be for ever abolished as no longer needful.
Consider also, in connection with this
1. That the word goel is translated avenger, kinsman, and redeemer; the same personage sustaining in fact all these characters, and that by a natural law due to the circumstances of the age.
2. That our Lord is unquestionably our God, in that he is our Kinsman, who has made himself our nearest blood relation, and in that he is our Redeemer, who hath redeemed for us our forfeited possession in the kingdom of heaven.
3. That he is also our Goel in that he is in readiness to avenge as Judge all wrongs done unto the temporal or spiritual lives of his own. This is indeed little considered, but is certainly true, since he alone wields all power in heaven and in earth. (see Mat_28:18 Heb_4:12, Heb_4:13, where the "Word of God" is evidently the personal Word; Luk_18:7 2Th_1:6 Rev_6:10 Rev_19:2, &c.);
4. That the work and office of Christ as Avenger and Defender of his own will cease and determine with the final end of all wickedness, and then he will be Goel no longer in this sense. (see 1Co_15:24-28 compared with Rev_7:17, &c.); And this change, whereby the Avenger will be wholly swallowed up in the Kinsman and Redeemer, seems to be symbolized by the death of the high priest (see above).
III The laws of manslaughter here declared have rather a moral than a spiritual value. The one thing which they uphold as a principle is the sanctity of human life, and the duty of inflicting capital punishment for murder, as laid down in Genesis 9. It is difficult to see that this duty is less under the gospel, because the bringing in of the gospel has not changed the fundamental relations of man to his Maker as based upon creation; rather it would seem to have added to the sanctity of human life by adding to the ties which knit that life to the life of God. (cf. Act_9:4, 5 1Co_6:15 2Pe_1:4) Whatever may be held, however, as touching the duties of civil governors, we may consider
1. That the sin against God involved in murder is enormous, and this guilt is incurred by every one that hateth his brother. (1Jn_3:15)
2. That the guilt of murder lay before God in the intention to kill, wherefore murders also proceed out of the heart. (Mar_7:21)
3. That it was laid upon the congregation to show by prompt and righteous procedure that they had no sympathy with the murderer.
4. That in the absence of such vindication of justice the land was polluted with blood in the eyes of God, who dwelt therein.
5. That there is a crime which is murder, but is worse than any killing of the body, i.e., the destroying of the soul by leading it into sin.
6. That it is laid upon all the faithful to show their horror and detestation of this crime by their treatment of seducers and tempters. (1Co_5:11 Eph_5:11 2Ti_2:21 2Jn_1:11)
7. That indulgence and sympathy extended to destroyers of souls that have not repented brings down the wrath of God upon a Church, and makes it hateful in his eyes. (see Isa_1:21, &c.);
8. That this sinful indulgence of seducers is excused by human considerations, in forgetfulness that God is in the midst of his people, and that every sin so lightly excused or ignored stares him in the face. (2Co_6:16 Rev_2:1)
9. That if the blood of Abel cried to him from the ground, and if the land of Canaan could not be cleansed from the blood of its slain, how much more will he be moved by that destruction of immortal souls which is wrought by the wicked lives and solicitations of bad Christians!
HOMILIES BY W. BINNIE Vers. 1-8. The Levites to be distributed in certain cities throughout the whole land.
Unlike the other tribes, the Levites were to have no inheritance in the land. The names of Judah, Ephraim, Manasseh, Reuben figure on the map of Palestine, each giving name to a province or county of its own; but the map knows no tribe of Levi. The Lord was the inheritance of this tribe. For their subsistence the Levites were to depend partly on the tithe, partly on certain dues and perquisites, supplemented by the free-will offerings of the faithful. But although they were landless, it was never the Lord"s will that they should be houseless. A vagabond ministry could not have failed to be a scandalous ministry. Accordingly, the law here provides dwellings for the sacred tribe in forty-eight Levitical cities.
I In this law TWO POINTS CLAIM NOTICE.
1. That the forty-eight cities, although denominated "Levitical cities," were not denoted exclusively to members of this tribe. For example, Hebron, which was perhaps the most noted of the forty-eight, being the city of refuge for what was afterwards the whole kingdom of Judah, formed part of the inheritance of Caleb the Kenezite. (Jos_14:14) Doubtless many families of Judah would also be found among the residents; for the city belonged to Judah. What the Levites obtained was not, in any instance, exclusive possession of the city, but certain houses within the walls, and certain pasture grounds ("glebe lands") adjoining. The houses and glebes thus set apart became the inalienable inheritance of the respective Levitical families. They were as strictly entailed as the lands which constituted the patrimony of the other families in Israel. If at any time they were sold for debt, they reverted to the family at the Jubilee.
2. The Levitical cities were scattered up and down the whole country. The arrangement was a remarkable one. At first sight, indeed, it looks awkward and unnatural. For were not the Levites set apart to do the service of the sanctuary? Would it not have been more convenient to have had them located where they would have been within easy reach of the sanctuary? In the ideal arrangement sketched in Ezekiel"s vision, the Levitical families are seen located in the vicinity of Jerusalem. The circumstance that the law ordained an arrangement so different was meant, I cannot doubt, to suggest to the Levites that they had other duties to discharge in Israel besides doing the service of the sanctuary. It was the will of God that they should, in their several districts, be the stated teachers of the people in the Divine law. (Deu_33:10 Mal_2:4-8) This office and calling of the Levites being so honourable, it has often been thought strange that their dispersion throughout Israel should have been predicted by Jacob as a curse upon the tribe for their father"s sin. (Gen_49:7) In itself it was honourable; nevertheless the words of the patriarch were fulfilled in the end. When the ten tribes revolted from the house of David, they fell away also from the sanctuary; and the Levites dwelling within those tribes had to choose between forfeiting their cities or being cut off from the sanctuary. In either case they found how bitter it was to be divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel.
II WHAT MAY WE LEARN FROM THIS LAW?
1. It has been usual to see in the distribution of the Levites over the whole land a type, and prelude of the arrangement which, in Christendom, assigns to every parish and every congregation its own pastor. The apostles "ordained elders in every city." Ministers of the gospel are not to be massed together in the great cities, but to be scattered everywhere, so that no family in God"s Israel may be beyond reach of one "at whose mouth they may seek the law." Of the institutions which have co-operated to make society what it is in the Christian nations, it would not be easy to name one which has been more influential for good than this.
2. The arrangement may be regarded as representing the principle according to which the lot of Christ"s people in this world is ordered. The faithful do not live apart from other men in towns and provinces of their own. Separation from the world, in this literal sense, has been often the dream of Christian reformers, and not seldom have societies been organized for the purpose of realizing it. But the well-meant schemes have in every case failed. They were bound to fail, for they ran counter to our Lord"s great prayer and rule: "I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil". (Joh_17:15) Nor is the reason of the rule doubtful. Christ"s people are the salt of the earth; and salt, to do its work, must be mingled with that which it is to preserve. The godly must be content to have ungodly persons, more or fewer, for neighbours so long as they abide in this world. An unmixed "congregation of the righteous" belongs to the felicities of the world to come. But if Christ"s people are like the Levites in regard to dispersion, they are like them also in respect to the provision made for their brotherly communion. As the Levites dwelt in their cities with other Levites, so Christians are to be gathered into Churches for mutual comfort and for common work. "We believe in the communion of saints. B.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG Vers. 1-8. God provides places for the Levites to dwell in.
God had laid upon the tribe of Levi many and onerous services, such as gave full occupation for their time (chapters 1, 3, 4, 8, 28, 29); he had also made abundant provision for their support in the matter of food; (Nu 18) it remained that he should give a clear indication of where they were to find a place of abode in Canaan. If their particular place of settlement was important to the other tribes, it was surely of peculiar importance to the tribe which in a representative aspect stood nearer to God than any of the rest. Levi, with all its solemn responsibilities, would assuredly not have been tolerated in such an assertion of self-will as came from Reuben and Gad. As we examine the mode of settlement indicated in this passage, we perceive how God points out the golden mean between too much concentration and too much diffusion.
I THE LEVITES WERE SO SETTLED AS TO AVOID THE GREAT EVILS CONSEQUENT ON UNDUE CONCENTRATION. They might have had the tabernacle fixed up in a certain tribal allotment of their own, and then what would have happened? Those living at a distance from the territory of Levi would have been debarred from many privileges belonging to those in immediate proximity. God is no respecter of persons. He did all that was possible to put every tribe in Israel in a position of religious equality. The proportion of land and the proportion of Levitical service was to be according to the needs of each tribe.
1. Thus, by a judicious diffusion, the unity of the nation was promoted. Different circumstances require different means for the same end. While the Israelites were encamped in the wilderness, the tribe of Levi was all together, in the midst of the camp, and immediately around the tabernacle. But when the Israelites became distributed in Canaan, the Levites were distributed also, thus acting still as a principle of unity, although in a different way. And this distribution had been made all the more necessary since two tribes and a half had chosen to dwell on the east of Jordan. That the Israelites themselves were not supremely conscious of the need of unity had been shown only too clearly by the conduct of Reuben and Gad. Much more was wanted than to lie side by side within the same borders. A mere geographical unity was a mockery, a delusion, and a snare.
2. This judicious diffusion also helped in promoting the knowledge of all that needed to be known in Israel. The Levites were privileged to become and the privilege was a very high one the guides, instructors, counselors, and monitors of the people. That which God had made known to Moses needed to be brought down very patiently and carefully to individual, private, daily life. The Levites had ample opportunities to explain the commandments of God and the significance of the types, the rites and ceremonies, and the great historic commemorations. And as the history of Israel grew, there grew with it opportunities to stimulate and warn by pointing out the mingled glory and shame of the nation"s career, and the lessons to be learnt front considering the men who had been conspicuous in that career. (2Ch_35:3) But these opportunities of instruction only came because God had sufficiently distributed the instructors throughout the land. If a house is to be fully lighted up there must be a light in every room. Those who are already instructed must be where they can firmly lay hold of the ignorant, for the ignorant in the things of God need not only to be instructed, but first of all thoroughly wakened out of sleep.
3. This diffusion also indicated the service which all Israel was to render to the world. What Levi was to Israel, that Israel was to become to all mankind. Levi was diffused through the whole nation, and only kept its individuality as a tribe in proportion as it kept its fidelity to God. Other tribes were distinguished by their territory; Levi by being specially engaged in the holy service of the tabernacle and the temple. Thus what a benefit has been produced more real perhaps than exactly appreciated by the dispersion of Israel among all nations to bear their own peculiar, solemn, and pathetic testimony to Israel"s God, and to the historic verity of the Old Testament! Thus also does God make his own gracious and comprehensive arrangements to diffuse believers in his Son throughout the world, according to the spiritual needs of the world. In one sense they are rigorously separated from the world, even as Israel was by the hard and fast lines of the national borders; in another sense they are meant to be so diffused that wherever there is a dark place, there the light of the truth as it is in Jesus may brightly shine. The gospel is debtor to all nations and all ranks, to both sexes and to all ages. We find the true Israelite in every society where a man has any right to be at all among the highest and the lowest; in Parliaments, in courts of justice, in commerce, in literature, in science, and in art.
II CARE WAS ALSO TAKEN IN THE SETTLEMENT OF THE LEVITES THAT THE NECESSARY DIFFUSION SHOULD NOT BE PUSHED TOO FAR. They were to be distributed through all Israel, but not according to the free choice of the individual Levite. Forty-eight cities, with sufficient accompanying land, were set apart for them. Thus, by fixing a limit of diffusion, God conferred a benefit both on them and on the whole people. Those who are engaged in a special work of such incalculable importance as the work of the Levites was, need to be where they can frequently counsel, comfort, and encourage one another. It was not good for the Levites to be alone. To be isolated was in itself a sore temptation.
And though the work of God is only truly done where there is individual consecration, energy, and initiative, yet he is not a wise Christian who sets lightly by the advantage he gains from frequent recourse to those like-minded with himself. A certain measure of coherence among the Levites was needed for a healthy and profitable state of the official life. You shall have a fire blazing brightly in the grate, and if you leave it so it will go on for a long time giving out its flame, heat, and light. But take the pieces of coal and range them separately on the hearth, and very quickly the glowing fragments will become a dull red and soon die out altogether. The limits which God fixes are wise and loving limits; he ever keeps us from all the dangers of extremes. The Levites were neither to be too much separated from the people nor too much mingled with them. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v1 Give unto the Levites . . . cities to…
Num_35:1-8
Give unto the Levites . . . cities to dwell in.
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The Levites inheritance
1. Cities were allowed them with their suburbs (Num_35:2). They were not to have any ground for tillage; they needed not to sow or reap, or gather into barns, for their heavenly Father fed them with the tithe of the increase of other peoples labours, that they might the more closely attend the study of the law, and might have more leisure to teach the people; for they were not fed thus easily that they might live in idleness, but that they might give themselves wholly to the business of their profession and not be entangled in the affairs of this life.
(1) Cities were allotted them that they might live near together, and converse with one another about the law, to their mutual edification; and that, in doubtful cases, they might consult one another, and in all cases strengthen one anothers hands.
(2) These cities had suburbs annexed to them for their cattle (Num_35:3); a thousand cubits from the wall was allowed them for out-housing to keep their cattle in, and then two thousand and more for fields to graze their cattle in (Num_35:4-5). Thus was care taken that they should not only live, but live plentifully, and have all desirable conveniences about them, that they might not be looked upon with contempt by their neighbours.
2. These cities were to be assigned to them out of the possessions of each tribe (Num_35:8).
(1) That each tribe might thus make a grateful acknowledgment to God out of their real as well as out of their personal estates; for what was given to the Levites was accepted as given to the Lord, and thus their possessions were sanctified to them.
(2) That each tribe might have the benefits of the Levites dwelling among them to teach them the good knowledge of the Lord. Thus that light was diffused through all parts of the country, and none left to sit in darkness (Deu_33:10). They shall teach Jacob Thy judgments. Jacobs curse on Levis anger was, I will scatter them in Israel (Gen_44:7); but that curse was turned into a blessing, and the Levites, by being thus scattered, were put into a capacity of doing so much the more good. It is a great mercy to a country to be replenished in all parts with faithful ministers. (Matthew Henry, D. D.)
The Levites home
The history of this tribe of Levi is fraught with many lessons for Christian workers. They were selected for the priesthood of the children of Israel, and on that account were separated from the rest of their brethren, and God ordained that they should have no inheritance among the children of Israel, and reminded them that God was their inheritance. But it is well for us to remember that it was not always so. At the commencement of their history this tribe of Levi lay underneath a curse (Gen_49:5). But there came in the history of the tribe a crisis. Moses had ascended to the top of the hill, and during his forty days absence the children of Israel made a molten calf, and bowed down to the idol. Moses came down from the hill-top, and at once standing amid the camp he shouted, Who is on the Lords side, let him come over to me; and all the tribe of Levi gathered themselves together unto Moses. It was the turning-point in their lives, they seized their opportunity, and from that time they were the tribe whom God chose for His service. But the call to Levi was not simply a call to privilege, it was a call to work. God calls not to idleness. When once you feel the consecrated hand of God laid upon you, you may be sure that He has work for you, and He has already commanded the help you need. And from that time that special characteristic of the tribe of Levi, which had in former times led them into sin, now is purified by God for His own special service. What was that characteristic? If I were to sum it up in one phrase, it would be this--intense sociability. Their very name, Levi, signifies the joined ones. It was this yearning for companionship which led Levi to join himself to the bloodthirsty Simeon, and to reap the vengeance which Jacob perpetuates upon his death-bed. It is a very important characteristic; it is a characteristic which the Christian ministry needs, which every individual Christian ought to possess. A Christian man should be a man of intense sympathy, and have his tendrils going forth to all around him. But there is another characteristic which is equally necessary to a true and faithful servant of God. And it is to produce this characteristic that Gods dealing with the children of Levi seems to be bent, namely, the power to stand alone. And not until these two characteristics are blended together is the Levite fit for the service of God. These are the true Christian servants--men who are ready to go forth to all, and yet men who are able, bravely, to take their stand alone, because they are joined to God. And now I want you to think of this one ordinance laid down with regard to these men, namely, the provision God had made in this chapter for their homes. We might have imagined it would have been better, as God had appointed this tribe to be workers for Him, for them to live about the temple of Jerusalem, so that they might be at hand to minister within its sacred courts. But no, God lays down the distinct command that this tribe of Levi, which He has chosen for His own peculiar service, should be scattered among the tribes. There were four or five centres in every tribe where these Levites were to dwell. What is the reason of this strange provision? I think it was made partly for the sake of the people, and partly for the sake of the Levites. It was in the first place, because of the people. In the wilderness the children of Israel were not likely to forget God. They had the tabernacle in their centre ; the pillar of cloud or file was always to be seen in the very middle of the camp. But when they became settled down in the promised land, and received their promised inheritance, then indeed they would be scattered abroad, and then would arise the danger lest they should forget the Lord their God. And, therefore, God ordained that their teachers should go and live in the very midst of them, because He wanted to bring religion to their homes. And this, I believe, is Gods law, that His people should go and scatter themselves; not simply settle down in some place, but actually go and let their light shine before men even in the very darkest places of the earth. But if the provision was made for the tribes, I think it was actually made for the Levites. If they had all been gathered together at Jerusalem, these Levites would consider that their work began, continued, and ended in their attendance at the ordinances of the sanctuary; and God wanted to show them, as His ministers, they were not simply to deal with the sanctuary, but with the home life of His people--to carry His religion into their various towns and villages. Further than that, by thus scattering them in these different tribes, God provides here that they may learn that their homes are not to be simply for themselves, but they are to be, as it were, cities of refuge. And this ought to be a picture of our homes. Not only would God scatter us as Christian men and women throughout the nations of the world, but each one of you has your home, and you want it to be a place where there shall be fellowship--a true Hebron. True, the Christian mans home is in the midst of this world with all its defilements; but it is a home of fellowship, it is a royal city, where Jesus Christ reigns as King. (E. A. Stuart, M. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1 Numbers 35; Numbers 36
THE CITIES OF REFUGE
Numbers 35; Numbers 36
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1. THE INHERITANCE OF THE LEVITES
The order relating to the Levitical cities may be said to describe an ideal settlement. We have, at all events, no evidence that the command was ever fully carried out. It was to the effect that in forty-eight cities, scattered throughout the whole of the tribes in proportion to their population, dwellings were to be allotted to the Levites, who were also to have the suburbs of those cities; that is to say, the fields lying immediately about them, "for their cattle, and for their substance, and for all their beasts." It is assumed that closely surrounding each of the cities there shall be pasturage, and that a regular or fairly regular boundary can be made at the distance of one thousand cubits from the city. Singularly, nothing whatever is said as to the duties of the Levites thus distributed throughout the land on both sides Jordan, from Kedesh Naphtali in the north, to Debir in the south, according to Joshua 21. It is not said that they were to perform any ecclesiastical functions or instruct the people in the Divine Law. Yet something of the kind must have been intended, since many of them were at a great and inconvenient distance from Shiloh and other places at which the ark was stationed.
According to this statute, there is, for one thing, to be no seclusion of the Levites from the rest of the people. If clergy and laity, as we say, are distinguished, the distinction is made as small as possible. From the terms of the present order {Num_35:2, ff.} it might appear that the towns given to the Levites were to be occupied by them exclusively. In parallel passages, however, it is clear that the Levites dwelt along with others in the cities; and in this way, as well as by engaging in pastoral work, they were kept closely in touch with the men of the tribes. The land allotted to them was not sufficient for farms; but the tithes and offerings were to a large extent for their support. And the arrangement thus sketched is held with some reason to be an ideal for every order of men called to similar duty. The Levites, indeed, were not at first spiritual. Neither the nature of their work at the sanctuary, nor the conditions of their life, implied any special consecration of heart. But the general tone of a religious ministry advances; and even in Davids time there were Levites who served God in no mere routine, but with earnest mind, with a measure of inspiration. The ordinance here is in behalf of a consecrated order devoted to the service of God.
The suburbs, or pasture lands about the cities, are measured a thousand cubits broad, and are to be two thousand cubits along each of the four boundaries. If the figures given are correct it would seem that, although the wall of the city is spoken of, the measurement must really have begun in the centre of the city; otherwise there could never have been a square of land, cities not taking that form; nor could a boundary of two thousand cubits on each aspect, north, south, east, and west, be made out. The cities must often have been small, a cluster of poor huts built of clay or rude brick, with a wall of similar material. We need imagine no stately dwellings or fine pleasure grounds when we read here of the provision for the Levites. Within the wall they had their bare, mean cottages; outside, there might be a breadth of perhaps four hundred yards of poor enough ground which they could claim. But as the tithes were not always paid, so the dwellings and the pasturage may not always have been allotted. There is not much reason to wonder that in a short time after the settlement in Canaan the Levites, finding no special work at the sanctuary, and obtaining little support from the offerings, gradually became part of the tribes in which they happened to have their abode. Hence we read in Jdg_17:7 of "a young man out of Bethlehem-judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite."
The main purpose of the present statute, so far as it refers to the dwellings of the Levites, would appear to have been economic, not religious. It was that all the tribes might have their share of maintaining the servants of the sanctuary. But it seems likely that a class half priestly would, in lack of other duty, attach itself to the high places, and set up a worship not contemplated by the law. And if this is to be regarded as a misfortune, the choice of the Levitical cities is in some cases difficult to account for. Kedesh in Naphtali had been a famous holy place of the Canaanites; so probably were others, as Gibeon, Shechem, Gath-rimmon. The special symbol of Jehovah was the ark; and where the ark was the principal national rites were always performed. But in a time of pioneer work and constant alarms the central sanctuary could not always be visited, and the Levites appear to have lent themselves to worship of a local kind.
An ecclesiastical order needs great faithfulness if it is not to become irreligious through poverty, or proud and domineering through assumption of power with God. To live poorly as those Levites were expected to live, without the opportunity of earthly gain, while often the share of national support which was due fell to a very low and wholly inadequate amount, would try the fidelity of the best of them. No large claim need be made in behalf of men specially engaged in the work of the Christian Church; and great wealth seems inappropriate to those who represent Christ. But what is their due should at least be paid cheerfully, and the more so if they give earnest minds to the service of God and man. With all faults that have at various periods of the Churchs history stained the character of the clergy, they have maintained a testimony on behalf of the higher life, and the sacredness of duty to God. A materialistic age will make light of that service, and point to ecclesiastical pride and covetousness as more than counterbalancing any good that is done. But a broad and fair survey of the course of events will show that the witness-bearing of a special class to religious ideas has kept alive that reverence on which morality depends. True, the ideal of a theocracy would dispense with an order set apart to teach the law of God and to enforce His claims on men. But for the times that now are, even in the most Christian country, the witness-bearing of a gospel ministry is absolutely needful. And we may take the statute before us as anticipating a general necessity, that necessity which the apostles of our Lord met when they ordained presbyters in every Church, and gave them commission to feed the flock of God.
2. THE CITIES OF REFUGE
Among the forty-eight cities that provide dwellings for the Levites, six are to be cities of refuge, "that the man-slayer which killeth any person unwittingly may flee thither." Three of these cities are to be on the east and three on the west side of Jordan. According to other enactments they are to be distributed so as to be reached quite easily from all parts of the country. They were sanctuaries for any one fleeing from the "avenger of blood"; but the protection found in them was not by any means absolute. Only if there appeared to be good cause for admitting a fugitive was he afforded refuge even for a time, and his trial followed as soon as possible. The laws of protection and judgment are here laid down not fully, though with some detail.
We notice first that the statutes regarding the manslayer are frankly based on the primitive practice of blood revenge. It was the duty of the nearest male relation of one who had been slain to seek the blood of the man who slew him. The duty was held to be one which he owed to his brother, to the community, and to God; and the principle of retribution in such cases was embodied in the saying, "Whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed." The goel, or redeemer, whose part it was to recover for a family land that had been alienated, or a member of the family who had fallen into slavery, had it also laid on him to seek justice on behalf of the family when one belonging to it had been killed. The evils of this method of punishing crime are very evident. All the heat of personal affection for the man put to death, the keen desire to maintain the honour of family or clan, and the bitter hatred of the tribe to which the homicide belonged, made the pursuit of the criminal swift and the stroke fierce and unrelenting. A goel put on a false track might easily strike to the ground an innocent person; and he would feel himself bound to incur all risks in avenging his kinsman. Often whole tribes of Arabs are involved in the blood feud beginning in a single stroke, and wherever the custom prevails there is the gravest danger of wide and sanguinary strife. The enactments of our passage are intended to counteract in part these abuses and dangers.
We may wonder that the Hebrew law, enlightened on many points, did not wholly abolish the practice of blood revenge. Justice is not the private affair of any man, even the nearest kinsman of one who has been injured. We have learned that the administration of law, especially in cases of murder or supposed murder, is best taken out of the hands of a private avenger, whose aim is to strike as soon and as effectually as possible. It remains of course for those whose friend has died by violence to institute inquiries and do their utmost to bring the criminal to justice. But even when a mans guilt seems clear his trial is before an impartial judge by whom all relevant facts are elicted. In Hebrew law there was no complete provision for such an administration of justice. The ancient custom could not be easily set aside, for one thing; the passionate Oriental nature would cling to it. And for another, there was no organisation for repressing disorder and dealing with crime. A certain risk had to be run, in order that the sanctity of human life might be clearly kept before a people too ready to strike as well as to curse. But if the man-slayer was able to reach a city of refuge he had his trial. The old custom was checked by the right of the fugitive to claim sanctuary and to have his case investigated.
As for the sanctuary cities, there may also have been some imperfect custom which anticipated them. In Egypt there certainly was; and the Canaanites, who had learned not a little from Egypt, may have had sacred places that afforded protection to the fugitive. But the Mosaic law prevented abuse of the means of evading justice. He who had killed another was a criminal before God. The blood of the brother he had slain defiled the land and cried to Heaven. No sanctuary must protect a man who had with homicidal purpose struck another. There was to be neither priestly protection, nor sanctuary, nor ransom for him. The Divine principle of justice took up the cause.
In Num_35:16 ff. there are examples of cases which are adjudged to be murder. To smite one with an instrument of iron, or with a stone grasped in the hand presumably large enough to kill, or with a weapon of wood, a heavy club or bar, is adjudged to be deliberate homicide. Then if hatred can be proved, and one known to have cherished enmity towards another is shown to have thrust him down, or hurled at him, lying in wait, or to have smitten him with the hand, such a one is to be allowed no sanctuary. On the other hand, the cases of inadvertent homicide are defined: "if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or hurled upon him anything without lying in wait, or with any stone, whereby a man may die, seeing him not." These, of course, are simply instances, not exhaustive categories.
It is not here stated, but in Jos_20:4 the statute runs that the manslayer who fled to a sanctuary city was to state his cause before the elders, no doubt at the gate. Their preliminary decision had to be given in his favour before he could be admitted. But the real trial was by the "congregation," Num_35:24, some assembly representing the tribe within whose territory the crime has been committed, or more likely a gathering of headmen of the whole nation. Further, at Num_35:30 it is enacted that the charge of the avenger of blood against any one must be substantiated by two witnesses at least. These provisions form the basis of a sound judicial method. The rights of refuge and of revenge stand opposed to each other, and between the two a large and authoritative court gives judgment. It will be observed, moreover, that the judiciary was not ecclesiastical. Where power was to be exercised in the name of God, the priests were not to wield it, but the people. The form of government is far nearer a democracy than a hierocracy.
A singular point in the law is the term during which the unwitting manslayer who had been acquitted by the court of justice must remain in sanctuary. He is in danger of being put to death by the avenger of blood until the acting high priest dies. Till that event he must keep within the border of his city of refuge. And here the idea seems to be that the official memory of the crime which had ceremonially defiled the land rested with the high priest. He was supposed to keep in mind, on Gods behalf, the bloodshed which even though unintentional was still polluting. His death accordingly obliterated the recollection that kept the man-slayer under peril of the goals revenge. The high priest had no power to acquit or condemn a criminal, nor to enforce against him the punishment of his fault. But he was the guardian of the sacredness of the land in the midst of which Jehovah dwelt.
With regard to the symbolical meaning of the cities of refuge, it is needful to exercise great care at every point. The man-slayer, for instance, fleeing from the avenger of blood, is not a type of the sinner fleeing for his life from the justice of God. If guilty of murder, a man could find no safety even in the city of refuge. It was only if he was not guilty of premeditated crime that he found sanctuary. The refuge cities, however, represented Divine justice as in contrast to the justice or rather the vengeance of manta that Divine justice which Christ came to reveal, giving Himself for us upon the cross. Human righteousness errs sometimes by excess, sometimes by defect. Certain offences it would never condemn, others it would passionately and remorselessly punish. The sanctuary cities show a higher idea of justice. But all men are guilty before God. And there is mercy with Him not only for the unwitting transgressor, but for the man who has to confess deliberate sin, the forfeiture of his life to Divine law.
The singular opinion has been expressed that the death of the high priest was expiatory. This is said to be "unmistakably evident" from the addition of the clause, "who has been anointed with the holy oil" (Num_35:25). The argument is that as the high priests life and work "acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Ghost, his death might also be regarded as a death for the sins of the people by virtue of the Holy Ghost imparted to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sins before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town without further exposure to the vengeance of the avenger of blood." And thus, it is said, "The death of the earthly high priest became a type of that of the Heavenly One, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions." But although many of the Rabbins and fathers held this view as to the expiatory nature of the high priests death, there is absolutely nothing in Scripture or reason to support it. All the expiation, moreover, which the Mosaic law provided for was ceremonial. If the death of the high priest was efficacious only so far as his functions were, then there could be no atonement or appearance of atonement for moral guilt, even that of culpable homicide for instance. The death of the high priest was therefore in no sense a type of the death of Christ, the whole meaning of which lies in relation to moral, not ceremonial, offences.
While it cannot be said that "light is thrown by the provisions regarding cities of refuge on the atonement of Christ"-for that would be the morning star shedding light on the sun-still there are some points of illustration; and one of these may be noted. As the protection of the sanctuary city extended only to the boundaries or precincts belonging to it, so the defence the sinner has in Christ can be enjoyed only so far as life is brought within the range of the influence and commands of Christ. He who would be safe must be a Christian. It is not mere profession of faith -"Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name?"-but hearty obedience to the laws of duty coming from Christ that gives safety. "Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect?" -and the elect are those who yield the fruit of the Spirit, who are lovers of God and their fellowmen, who show their faith by their works. It is a misrepresentation of the whole teaching of Scripture to declare that salvation can be had, apart from life and practice, in some mystical relation with Christ which is hardly even to be stated in words.
3. TRIBAL INHERITANCE
Already we have heard the appeal of the daughters of Zelophehad to be allowed an inheritance as representing their father. Now a question which has arisen regarding them must be solved. The five women have not cared to undertake the work of the upland farm allotted to them, somewhere about the head waters of the Yarmuk. They have, in fact, as heiresses been somewhat in request among the young men of different tribes; and they are almost on the point of giving their hands to husbands of their choice. But the chiefs of the family of Manasseh to which they belong find a danger here. The young women may perhaps choose men of Gad, or men of Judah. Then their land, which is part of the land of Manasseh, will go over to the tribes of the husbands. There will be a few acres of Judah or of Gad in the north of Manassehs land. And if other young women throughout the tribes, who happen to be heiresses, marry according to their own liking, by-and-by the tribe territories will be all confused. Is this to be allowed? If not, how is the evil to be prevented?
The national centre and general unity of Israel could not in the early period be expected to suffice. Without tribal coherence and a sense of corporate life in each family the Israelites would be lost among the people of the land. Especially would this tend to take place on the eastern side of Jordan and in the far north. Now the clan unity went with the land. It was as those dwelling in a certain district the descendants of one progenitor realised their brotherhood. Hence there was good reason for the appeal of the Manassites and the legislation that followed. Women who succeeded to land were to marry within the families of their fathers. Men were apparently not forbidden to marry women of another tribe if they were not heiresses. But the possession of land by women carried with it a responsibility and deprived them of a certain part of freedom. Every daughter who had an inheritance was to be wife to one of her near kin; so should no inheritance remove from one family to another; the tribes should cleave every one to his own inheritance.
The exigencies of the early settlement appear to have required this law; and it was maintained as far as possible, so that he who lived in a certain region might know himself not only a Reubenite or a Benjamite as the case might be, but a son of Hanoch of the Reubenites, or a son of Ard among the Benjamites. But we may doubt whether the unity of the nation was not delayed by the means used to keep the land for each tribe and each tribe on its own land. The arrangement was perhaps inevitable; yet it certainly belonged to a primitive social order. The homogeneity of the people would have been helped and the tribes held more closely together by interchange of land. In every law made at an early stage of a peoples development there is involved something unsuitable to after periods. And perhaps one error made by the Israelites was to cling too long and too closely to tribal descent and make too much of genealogy. The enactment regarding the marriage of heiresses within their own families was an old one, bearing the authority of Moses. There came a time when it should have been revoked and everything done that was possible to weld the tribes together. But the old customs held; and what was the result? The tribes east of Jordan, as well as Dan and Asher, were well-nigh lost to the Confederacy at an early date. Subsequently a division began between the northern and southern peoples. We cannot doubt that partly for want of family alliances between Judah and Ephraim, and subordination of tribal to national sentiment, there came the separation into two kingdoms.
For the tribe idea and the other of making inheritance of land a governing matter, the Israelites would seem to have paid dearly. And there is danger still in the attempt to make a nation cohere on any mere territorial basis. It is the spirit, the fidelity to a common purpose, and the pervasive enthusiasm that give real unity. If these are wanting, or if the general aim is low and material, the security of families in the soil may be exceedingly mischievous. At the same time the old feeling is proved to have a deep root in fact. Territorial solidarity is indispensable to a nation; and the exclusion of a people from large portions of its land is an evil intolerable. Christianity has not done its work where the Church, the teacher of righteousness, is unconcerned for this great matter. How can religion flourish where brotherhood fails? And how can brotherhood survive in a nation when the right of occupying the soil is practically denied? First among the economic questions which claim Christian settlement is that of land tenure, land right. Christianity carries forward the principles of the Mosaic law into higher ranges, where justice is not less, but more-where brotherhood has a nobler purpose, a finer motive.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 This chapter contains directions for the appointment of
CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
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(1) cities for the Levites to dwell in; and
(2) cities of refuge for the manslayer; and laws concerning wilful murder and unintentional homicide.
Num_35:2. Suburbs. Keil and Del. “Pasturage or fields.”
Num_35:3. For their cattle, &c. “More strictly, ‘for their large cattle, for their sheep and goats, and for all their beasts whatsoever they be.’ ”—Speaker’s Comm.
Num_35:4-5. The directions given in these verses as to the extent of the “suburbs” have much perplexed expositors. They seem to us to mean that the suburbs should extend 1,000 cubits, or nearly one-third of a mile, from the city wall in every direction (Num_35:4), and that at their outward extremity they should present on every side a frontage of not less than 2,000 cubits in length (Num_35:5).
Num_35:6. And to them ye shall add. Margin: “And above them ye shall give.” Or, “and in addition to them,” &c.
Num_35:8. From them that have many ye shall give many. From the large inheritance of Judah and Simeon, the Levites received nine cities; from that of Naphtali three, and four from each of the other tribes. On the east of Jordan they had ten, and in Canaan proper, thirty-eight.
Num_35:11. At unawares. Margin: “Heb., by error.” Or, by accident.
Num_35:12. The avenger. Heb. Goël, redeemer, kinsman, &c. Stand before the congregation, &c. Or, “before the assembly,” which consisted of the elders of the city. Comp. Num_35:24-25.
Num_35:15. Unawares. By accident, or, unintentionally.
Num_35:16. Instrument of iron, i.e., a tool, e.g., hatchet, hammer, &c.
Num_35:17. With throwing a stone. Margin: “Heb., with a stone of the hand,” i.e., a large stone, which filled the hand.
Num_35:18. A hand weapon of wood. Or, “a wooden instrument of the hand,” e.g., a club. “The suspicion would rest upon anyone who had used an instrument that endangered life, and therefore was not generally used in striking, that he had intended to take life away.”—Knobel.
Num_35:22-23. Comp. Deu_19:4-5.
Num_35:25. He shall abide in it. He was safe only within the walls of the city.
Unto the death of the high priest. “The atoning death of the Saviour casts its shadow before on the statute-book of the Law and on the annals of Jewish history. The High Priest, as the head and representative of the whole chosen family of sacerdotal mediators, as exclusively entrusted with some of the chief priestly functions, as alone privileged to make yearly atonement within the Holy of Holies, and to gain, from the mysterious Urim and Thummim, special revelations of the will of God, was, pre-eminently, a type of Christ. And thus the death of each successive high priest pre-signified that death of Christ by which the captives were to be freed, and the remembrance of transgressions made to cease.”—Speaker’s Comm.
Num_35:30. The murderer shall be put to death. The cities of refuge were not instituted to screen the guilty from deserved punishment; but to secure a just sentence.
By the mouth of witnesses, &c. Comp. Deu_17:6; Deu_19:15.
Num_35:31. Satisfaction. Rather, redemption money, or ransom.
THE APPOINTMENT OF CITIES FOR THE RESIDENCE OF THE LEVITES
(Num_35:1-8)
The Divine provision for the maintenance of the priests and Levites has already engaged our attention twice (see pp. 84–86, and 339–342); and, inasmuch as most of the homiletical suggestions of this paragraph were noticed there, it is needless to point them out in this place.
REFUGE
(Num_35:6)
“Among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites, there shall be six cities for refuge.”
Some types of Christ appeared for a brief season, and then vanished. The guiding cloud, the manna, ended on Jordan’s banks. But here is a sign which lived through Canaan’s history. It never failed until the Cross was reared.
The story of the ordinance is brief.
Sinner, this type displays your case. The slayer is your counterpart. There may be carnage of duties—talents—time—souls. No day passes in which this guilt is not incurred. As the man-slayer did not plot his deed, so sinners blindly commit these murders through ignorance and unwatched thought.
Take now the sinner awakened to a sense of this guilt. He is, as the slayer, rushing in terror from the kinsman’s wrath. He knows himself to be pursued.
One kinsman only hunted the slayer. But many adversaries threaten the guilty soul God’s justice takes the lead. It has strong claims. Its wrongs are many. Its wrath is righteous. The law is in pursuit winged with vengeance. It demands pure, unblemished love, from the cradle to the grave, in every child of man. All who transgress become its prey. And who transgresses not? This law must have its dues. It follows sternly. The truth of God, too, points an inexorable sword. It has decreed that every sinner must die. Can it be false? Satan moreover follows with huge strides. He claims the sinning soul as his. His hate is bitter.
These adversaries rush on apace. Who, undismayed, can hear their nearing footsteps? Do any cry, Whither shall we flee? Is there a Refuge? Yes. The sheltering cities represent our Refuge. A Refuge is prepared, full—complete—secure. It is Christ the Lord Flee to Him. All in Him are everlastingly secure. “There is therefore now no condemnation,” &c. (Rom_8:1).
Let faith now calmly gaze on this city, and mark its towers. Christ’s person is the grand pillar of security. While Jesus lives, and lives the mighty God, this safety is complete. His finished work builds up the Refuge. The walls—the bulwarks of this city—are red with blood. There is inscribed above each gate, “Christ died.” Justice draws near. It sees this mark; and asks no more. The law’s stern curse falls harmless here. Christ receives its weight. Satan pursues up to these gates. But here he pauses. All within these walls are purified and beautified. He must confess that they are no more his. Blessed be God for this sure Refuge!
Mark, too, this Refuge is at hand. In Israel the slayer had to flee oft-times along a tedious road. Our city stands beside us. “The righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise,” &c. (Rom_10:6-8). The gates are close. Enter this hour.
Believer, you are within this Refuge. Set not one foot beyond the holy precincts. Abide in Christ. Would you be safe through life—in death—for ever? Then cleave to Christ, as ivy to the tree, as limpet to the rock.
And when you realize your mercies and your safe retreat, can your heart fail to love—your lips to praise—your life to serve? Can you now see such multitudes exposed to wrath, and not allure them to your loved Refuge? Strive by every means to call them in. Above all, agonize in prayer, that God’s all-conquering Spirit may fly speedily throughout earth’s bounds, opening blind eyes to see their danger, exciting anxious hearts to rush to this only Refuge.—H. Law, D.D.
THE DIVINE GUARDIANSHIP OF HUMAN LIFE
(Num_35:9-34)
“Human life,” to use the words of Dean Milman, “in all rude and barbarous tribes, is of cheap account; blood is shed on the least provocation; open or secret assassination is a common occurrence. The Hebrew penal law enforced the highest respect for the life of man. Murder ranked with high treason (i.e., idolatry, blasphemy), striking a father, adultery, and unnatural lust, as a capital crime: the law demanded blood for blood (Exo_21:12; Lev_24:17; Lev_24:21-22). But it transferred the exaction of the penalty from private revenge, and committed it to the judicial authority. To effect this, it had to struggle with an inveterate though barbarous usage, which still prevails among the Arabian tribes. By a point of honour, as rigorous as that of modern duelling, the nearest of kin is bound to revenge the death of his relation: he is his Goël or blood avenger. He makes no enquiry; he allows no pause; whether the deceased has been slain on provocation, by accident, or of deliberate malice, death can only be atoned by the blood of the homicide. To mitigate the evils of an usage too firmly established to be rooted out, Moses appointed certain cities of retuge, conveniently situated. If the homicide could escape to one of these, he was safe till a judicial investigation took place. If the crime was deliberate murder, he was surrendered to the Goël; if justifiable or accidental homicide, he was bound to reside within the sanctuary for a certain period; should he leave it and expose himself to the revenge of his pursuers, he did so at his own peril, and might be put to death.”
The various provisions of this law afford an impressive illustration of the Divine regard for human life.
I. In the institution of the cities of refuge as a provision that the life of an innocent person should not be taken away.
“The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel,” &c. (Num_35:9-15; Num_35:22-25).
The adaptation of these cities for this purpose appears in—
1. Their accessibility from all places. “Ye shall give three cities on this side Jordan, and three cities shall ye give in the land of Canaan, which shall be cities of refuge.” “And they appointed Kedesh in Galilee,” &c. (Jos_20:7-8). A reference to the map of Canaan will show that these cities were so situated that one of them could be reached in a few hours from any part of the country.
2. Their accessibility to all persons. “These six cities shall be a refuge for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them: that every one that killeth any person unawares may flee thither.” God’s regard is not simply for the life of the Israelite, but for the life of man as man.
II. In the laws by which the trial of the manslayer was to be conducted.
The Divine guardianship of human life is manifested in these laws at least in two respects:
1. In the clear discrimination between intentional and unintentional manslaughter. “If he smite him with an instrument.” &c. (Num_35:16-24).
2. In the absolute necessity for the evidence of at least two witnesses before a man could be adjudged guilty of murder. “Whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die” (Num_35:30; comp. Deu_17:6; Deu_19:15). One witness might be mistaken in his view of the case, or might be prejudiced against the homicide; hence the importance of the testimony of at least two witnesses in the trial of such cases.
III. In the punishment of the intentional manslayer.
“The murderer shall surely be put to death” (Num_35:16-18; Num_35:21; Num_35:30). As an evidence of the regard of God for human life, this punishment has additional weight from two facts:—
1. It could not be averted by any ransom. “Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer, which is guilty of death; but he shall be surely put to death.” The crime was too heinous to be expiated by anything less than life itself.
2. It was insisted upon for the most solemn reason. “So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are; for blood it defileth the land,” &c. (Num_35:33-34). The argument seems to be this: that the shedding of human blood defiled the land, that such defilement could be cleansed only by the blood of the murderer; that the Lord Himself dwelt in that land, and therefore it must be kept free from defilement; if murder were committed, the murderer must be put to death. To spare the life of the murderer was to insult Jehovah by defiling the land wherein He dwelt.
IV. In the punishment of the unintentional manslayer.
“The congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the revenger of blood,” &c. (Num_35:25-28). When it was proved on the trial that the manslayer was perfectly free from guilty designs, that he had slain another entirely by accident, even then he had to bear no light punishment. He must leave his estate and his worldly interests, his home and his family, and dwell in the city of refuge. His dwelling there closely resembled imprisonment; for if he left the city, and its divinely appointed suburbs, the Goël, if he should come upon him, was at liberty to put him to death. He must remain there throughout his life, or until the death of the high priest should bring him release.
What striking witness does all this bear to the sacredness of human life in the sight of God! (a)
Conclusion.
i. Respect human life—that of others, and your own also. (b)
ii. Guard against anger; for it leads to murder, and in the estimation of Heaven it is murder. “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer” (1Jn_3:15).
iii. Cultivate brotherly kindness and Christian charity. Where these are, anger cannot come.
ILLUSTRATIONS
(a) In the precepts delivered to the sons of Noah, and, therefore, through them, to all their descendants, that is, to all mankind, that against murder is thus delivered: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made He man” (Gen_9:6). There is in this reason a manifest reference to the dignity put upon human nature, by its being endowed with a rational and immortal spirit. The crime of murder is made to lie, therefore, not merely in the putting to death the animal part of man’s nature, for this is merged in a higher consideration, which seems to be, the indignity done to the noblest of the works of God; and particularly, the value of life to an immortal being, accountable in another state for the actions done in this, and which ought, for this very reason, to be specially guarded, since death introduces him into changeless and eternal relations, which were not to lie at the mercy of human passions. Such moralists as the writer above quoted (Dr. Whately), would restrain the essential characteristics of an act of murder to the “hurt done to a neighbour in depriving him of life,” and the “insecurity” inflicted upon society; but in this ancient and universal law, it is made eminently to consist in contempt of the image of God in man, and its interference with man’s immortal interests and relations as a deathless spirit; and, if so, then suicide bears upon it these deep and awful characteristics of murder. It is much more wisely said by Bishop Kidder, in his remarks upon this passage, that the reason given—“for in the image of God made He man”—is a further aggravation of the sin of murder. It is a great trespass upon God, as it destroys His likeness; and self-murder, upon this account, is forbidden as well as the killing of others.—Richard Watson.
But more than this. Man, the immortal, is man, the sinful, the guilty; and for this immortal, sinful, guilty creature, a Saviour has been provided; and it depends on his having, or not having, an interest in this Saviour, whether his never-ending existence is to be one of happiness or woe. And it is now, and here—in the present life and the present world, that this interest in the Saviour must be effected, this connection with Him formed. And it is here, and now, too, that a certain change of heart and character must be wrought, a change such as alone can fit for the only description of happiness that is at all to be found in the world, and the eternity beyond. How precarious, then, is life! Short, vain, passing as it is, a vapour, a shadow, a handbreadth, a dream! Yet, viewed in this, its relation to eternity, it acquires a worth which it is far beyond all the powers of human arithmetic to compute. And it becomes, in this view of it, the more solemnly important that, though brief even when most protracted, its limit, in each case, is every moment uncertain. For when the time is precarious on which any great event materially affecting our interests depends, and every moment may be that which is to determine for us the evil or the good, the preciousness of every moment is mightily, oppressively felt. With the sarcastic coolness of a scoffing scepticism, Mr. Hume asks: “Where is the crime of diverting a few ounces of blood from their channel?” The question is based on the assumption of there being no hereafter; no deathless spirit lodged in the frame through which that blood circulates; no moral accountableness; no judgment to come. It is the language of a narrow-minded, heartless materialism. It is the language of an ethereal spirit endowed with divine capacities, and prostituting its Heaven-bestowed powers to disprove its own immortality; to rob itself of the highest elements of its dignity; to disfranchise itself of the noblest of its chartered privileges: to debase itself to a level with the “beasts that perish.”—Ralph Wardlaw, D. D.
(b) On suicide, our modern moralists have added little to what is advanced by the ethical writers of Greece and Rome to prove its unlawfulness; for, though suicide was much practised in those ancient states, and sometimes commended, especially by the Stoics, it was occasionally condemned. “We men,” says Plato, “are all by the appointment of God in a certain prison or custody, which we ought not to break out of or run away.” So likewise Cicero: “God, the Supreme Governor of all things, forbids us to depart hence without His order. All pious men ought to have patience to continue in the body, as long as God shall please who sent us hither; and not force themselves out of the world before He calls for them, lest they be found deserters of the station appointed them by God.” …
Whatever weight may be due to the considerations urged by moralists against this crime—and every motive which may deter men from listening to the first temptation to so direful an act, is important—yet the guards of Christianity must be acknowledged to be of a more powerful kind. For the principles of our religion cannot be understood without our perceiving, that, of almost all other crimes, wilful suicide ought most to be dreaded. It is a sin against God’s authority. He is “the God of our life”; in “His hand our breath is”; and we usurp His authority when we presume to dispose of it As resulting from the pressure of mortifications of spirit, or the troubles of life, it becomes a sin, as arraigning His providential wisdom and goodness. It implies either an atheistic denial of God’s government, or a rebellious opposition to His permissive acts or direct appointments; it cannot be committed, therefore, when the mind is sound, but in the absence of all the Christian virtues, of humility, self-denial, patience, and the fear and love of God, and only under the influence of pride, worldliness, forgetfulness of God, and contempt of Him. It hides from the mind the realities of a future judgment, or it defies them; and it is consummated by the character of unpardonableness, because it places the criminal at once beyond the reach of mercy.—Richard Watson.
THE CITIES OF REFUGE, AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE SALVATION OF JESUS CHRIST
(Num_35:9-34)
There are certain respects in which the analogy between the cities of refuge and the salvation offered to man in the Gospel does not hold good; e.g.—
i. The cities of refuge afforded no lasting protection to the guilty. By their means a fair trial was secured for the manslayer; but if he was found guilty of murder, he was given up to the Goël to be put to death. They were an abiding refuge for those only who had accidentally slain a fellow creature. But Christianity is a refuge for the guilty. “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom,” saith St. Paul, “I am chief.” “This man receiveth sinners.” “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.” The guiltiest soul that flies to Jesus Christ is inviolably secure.
ii. The cities of refuge did not exempt even the unintentional manslayer from death, but simply postponed it. They rescued him from the vengeance of the Goël; but they could not screen him from that death which “is appointed unto all men.” But the spiritual death, which is the penalty of sin, Christianity abolishes for the believer by bestowing upon him a life which is immortal and blessed. In the city of refuge the unintentional manslayer obtained bodily security for a time; in Christ the guilty sinner obtains spiritual security and joy for ever.
There are other respects in which the analogy is not quite complete; but in three most conspicuous features it is both clear and striking.
I. A great peril.
Under this head there are three points of resemblance.
1. A broken law. The manslayer had broken the law which guards human life. “Thou shalt not kill.” Every man has transgressed the holy law of God in some respects. “All have sinned,” &c. (Rom_3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,” &c. (1Jn_1:8; 1Jn_1:10).
2. The penalty of death. “At the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made He man.” “The murderer shall surely be put to death.” “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” “Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” (a)
3. The peril of the exaction of the penalty. The Goël of the slain person allowed no time to elapse before setting forth to avenge the death on the manslayer; and if he overtook him before he gained the city of refuge, he put him to death. The manslayer was fleeing for his very life. And the dire penalties of sin follow hard upon the heels of the sinner. Conscience pursues him with its condemnations, and will not be silenced. Divine Justice follows him closely, crying, “Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.” And the wrath of God, which burns with unquenchable fire against sin, speeds swiftly on the track of the guilty sinner. (b)
II. A gracious provision.
By Divine command six cities were appointed cities of refuge; to either of these the manslayer might flee, &c.
1. The provision was of Divine appointment. “Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come over Jordan,” &c. It was this fact, that they were appointed by God’s command, that made these cities a secure refuge for the homicide;—not the strength of their gates or walls, not the authority of their governors, but the authority of Him who had instituted them for this purpose. Jesus Christ is the Refuge appointed by God for the sinner. “The redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation,” &c. “Him hath God exalted with His right hand, a Prince and a Saviour,” &c Hence, they who flee to Him are perfectly secure, (c)
2. The provision was adequate to the need. Six cities were appointed; and were quite sufficient for the entire country. In each there was ample room, &c. The provisions of Christianity for the salvation of the sinner are enough for all the needs of all men in all ages and all lands. “A great multitude which no man could number” have found a secure and blessed refuge in Jesus Christ; “and yet there is room.”
3. The provision was accessible from all places. Three measures were adopted to secure this:—
(1) The cities were suitably situated, “They appointed Kedesh in Galilee,” &c. (Jos_20:7-9). Our Saviour is everywhere present. He is a Refuge always near.
(2) The roads leading to these cities were kept in good condition. Moses “took care,” says Dr. Jahn, “that roads leading to them in straight lines should be laid out in every direction, which were to be distinguished from other streets.” (Comp. Deu_19:3.) And, according to the Talmudists,
(3) where two or more roads met, posts were put up with the word מִקְלָט, REFUGE, clearly marked on them for the direction of the fugitive. All this may be viewed as illustrating the accessibility of Jesus Christ to the sinner. “Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven?” &c. (Rom_10:6-9).
4. The provision was accessible to all persons. “These six cities shall be a refuge for the children of Israel, and for the stranger, and for the sojourner among them;” &c. They were accessible to every person in the land. Jesus Christ “is the Saviour of all men” (1Ti_4:10). “Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish,” &c (Joh_3:15-17). “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out” (Joh_6:37). “Whosoever believeth in Him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference,” &c. (Rom_10:11-13). (d)
5. The provision was exclusive. No other city, except the six appointed ones, had authority to shelter and protect the manslayer. For the sinner there is no refuge but Jesus. “Neither is there salvation in any other,” &c. (Act_4:12).
III. The urgent obligation.
The cities of refuge were of no advantage to the manslayer unless he gained an entrance into one of them before the Goël overtook him. It was his highest interest and imperative duty to make his way to the nearest city of refuge. It is yet more the duty and interest of the sinner to hasten to the Lord Jesus as his refuge. This obligation is—
1. Personal. No one could escape to the city of refuge for the homicide; he must go himself, or be put to death. Salvation is a personal concern and duty. Repentance, faith, self-consecration, are things which no one can do for another. “Work out your own salvation,” &c.
2. Prompt. The manslayer had to escape at once or to perish. To linger was to be lost. Salvation must be sought at once. “Behold, now is the accepted time,” &c. “Ye know not what shall be on the morrow,” &c.
3. Pressing. The manslayer may not loiter on the way, or slacken his pace until he was safe within the city. The words which were addressed to Lot were applicable to him: “Escape for thy life; look not behind thee,” &c. (Gen_19:17). And the sinner must put forth earnest effort. Christ must be sought zealously and with all the heart. (Comp. Jer_29:12-13.) Salvation must be pursued diligently. “So run, that ye may obtain,” &c. (1Co_9:24-27). “Fight the good fight of faith,” &c. “Let us lay aside every weight,” &c. “Give diligence to make your calling,” &c.
4. Persevering. The homicide must press eagerly on until he entered the city. There was no safety for him if he stopped short of the end. “He that endureth to the end shall be saved.” “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.” Hasten, then, O sinner! to the Refuge, &c.
ILLUSTRATIONS
(a) “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” If then you have come short of the glory of God, you must be lost; it cannot be denied, nor disputed. I tell to every man now present, that he is guilty of sinning against the Almighty—that if there be no intervention of mercy so mighty and so majestic as to satisfy the demands of justice, to quench her fire, and sheathe her sword—if there be not mercy, free, boundless, omnipotent, and eternal, every human being will stand before the judgment bar of God to receive the sentence of his condemnation. He must be banished for ever from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power; and he must go down to those abodes of torment where there are agonies unspeakable and inconceivable; where the smoke of torment ascendeth up for ever and for ever. Go, my hearers, to the brink of eternity, contemplate in imagination the scenes of that horrible pit which the word of revelation has presented to your view—contemplate the worm that dieth not—contemplate the fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels—contemplate the blackness of darkness—contemplate the smoke of torment that ascendeth up for ever and ever! What was it that gave to that worm its fang but sin? What was it that gave to that fire its intensity but sin? What was it that gave to that blackness its shadows but sin? What was it that gave to that torment its woe but sin? The voice is from the abyss uttering one wild cry, “It was sin; it was sin; IT WAS SIN!” Man would sin, and therefore man must suffer. There is a rigid equity between the one and the other. “Death has passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”—James Parsons.
(b) No closer doth the shadow follow the body than the revenge of self-accusation follows sin. Walk eastward in the morning, the shadow starts behind thee; soon after it is upon thy left side; at noon it is under thy feet; lie down, it crouches under thee; towards even it leaps before thee. Thon canst not be rid of it while thou hast a body and the sunlight. No more can thy soul quit the conscience of evil. This is to thee instead of a hell of fiends, that shall ever be shaking firebrands at thee; ever torturing thee with affrights of more pains than thy nature can comprehend.—Hall.
(c) In Samoa, the manslayer, or the deliberate murderer, flies to the house of the chief of the village, or to the house of the chief of another village to which he is related by the father’s or the mother’s side. In nine cases out of ten, he is perfectly safe if he only remains there. In such instances, the chief delights in the opportunity of showing his importance. In Samoa, a chief’s house is literally his fortification, except in times of open rebellion and actual war.—G. Turner, LL.D.
(d) Our Lord is the Saviour of all men, for that He hath rendered all man salvabiles, capable of salvation; and salvandos, designed to salvation, for that He hath removed all obstacles peremptorily debarring men from access to salvation, and hath procured competent furtherances to their attainment of it. He hath performed whatever on His part is necessary or fit in order to salvation, antecedently to the acceptance and compliance with those reasonable conditions, which by God’s wisdom are required toward the instating men into a full and immediate right to salvation, or to a complete and actual fruition thereof. He made the way to happiness plain and passable; levelling the insuperable cliffs, and filling up the chasms, and rectifying the obliquities, and smoothing the asperities thereof, as the prophet foretold; so that all men, who would, might conveniently walk therein. He set the doors of paradise wide open, so that who pleased might enter therein; all the bonds and restraints under which men lay, He so far loosed, that any man might be free, who would concur to his own liberty and enlargement. All the protection and encouragement which were needful toward obtaining salvation, He afforded and exhibited to every one that would embrace and make use of them. In respect to which performances He might be truly called a Saviour, although all men do not in effect become saved. For the estimation and denomination of performances are to be grounded upon their own nature and design, not upon events depending upon the contingent and arbitrary behaviour of men. As he that freely offers a rich boon is no less to be accounted a benefactor, and liberal, although his gift be refused, than if it were accepted; as he that opens the prison is to be styled a deliverer, although the captive will not go forth; as he that ministers an effectual remedy, although the patient will not use it, deserves the honour and thanks due to a physician; so is our Lord in regard to what He hath performed for men, and offered to them (being sufficient to prevent their misery and promote their happiness), to be thankfully acknowledged their Saviour, although not all men, yea although not one man, should receive the designed benefit.—Isaac Barrow, D.D.
THE CITIES OF REFUGE, AS LEGISLATIVE ENACTMENTS, AND AS RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS
(Num_35:9-15)
The system of redemption as revealed in the Gospel is often exhibited to our notice as bearing decisive marks of Divine wisdom. It is styled “the wisdom of God”—“the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom … which none of the princes of this world knew.” The Apostle thus intimates to us that the Gospel would bear the closest inspection in all its parts; that it was worthy of our admiration, as well as of our love; that our redemption was not to be effected either by blind force, or by blind affection; that it should be accomplished in such a manner as that no rights were to be compromised, no perfections outraged, no interests overlooked, but, on the contrary, that a perfect harmony and balance should be maintained between the apparently rival attributes of the Divine character, and the apparently rival interests of earth and Heaven. Thus God was to be just, and yet the justifier of him that believeth; Mercy and Truth were to meet together; Christ crucified in humility and weakness was to present a most eminent illustration both of the wisdom and of the power of God; and thus the countless multitudes saved by grace should have reason to exclaim in time and eternity—Herein “He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence!”
But while these remarks are readily admitted respecting the Christian dispensation, they might be extended with equal propriety to the Jewish dispensation also. While the Gospel claims our homage on account of the wisdom it displays, we are prepared to make a similar demand on behalf of the Law. Both are the product of the same Author; both are the offspring of the same covenant of mercy; both conduce to the same happy result; and, though the Gospel confessedly has “the glory that excelleth,” yet the same authority assures us that “that which is done away was glorious” also. There are two points of view expressly in which wisdom shines in the departed economy:—
First: As its leading institutions were particularly adapted to the state of the Jews in the infancy of the Church. Their ceremonial rites and observances were particularly suited to the climate in which they lived, to the circumstances in which they were placed, and to the evils to which they were exposed. Ignorant and uncultivated as they were during their four hundred years’ bondage, they required a religion addressed to the senses, as well as to the intellect; and hence they have a visible glory, “a worldly sanctuary,” animal sacrifices, symbolical institutions. Having recently been brought out of the midst of an idolatrous people, many of their regulations were intended to preserve them from a relapse into idolatry, and to keep constantly before them the worship of one God, and faith in a promised Messiah. And having to wander for forty years in the wilderness without fixed habitations, without regular communities, and without the arts and ornaments of life, some laws were enacted suited to their unsettled condition, and some preparatory to their establishment in the Promised Land. In many instances Moses adapted himself to the customs and usages which had prevailed among them from patriarchal times, in some, his institutions were altogether new; in all, there was a perpetual reference to their moral and religious interests—to encourage virtue, to diminish crime, to induce them to walk humbly with God.
Secondly: As it was expressly calculated to point to the coming of Christ, and introduce the Gospel dispensation. The Law was a shadow—a figure for the time then present—a schoolmaster to bring them to Christ. Unto them was the Gospel preached, as well as unto us. Their history in the wilderness and their worship in the Temple alike prefigured the times of the Messiah. Their sacrifices pointed to Him; the “Rock that followed them” was a type of Him; the scapegoat, the brazen serpent, the cities of refuge, and the manna in the wilderness, prefigured the nature of His offices, the design of His death, or the spiritual blessings of His kingdom.
These observations apply with peculiar force to our present subject—the Cities of Refuge. As civil appointments, they were calculated to prevent much mischief and misery; as religious ordinances, they serve to illustrate Gospel blessings. We shall consider them—
I. As legislative enactments adapted to the habits and customs of an Eastern people in an early age of the world.
Two things require notice—
1. The office of the avenger of blood and the evils consequent upon it. This office probably had a very early origin: it may be a relic of the earliest state of civil society, for where there was no magistrate or public tribunal, murders would have been frequently perpetrated had there been no process of this kind among surviving relatives. Cain evidently was in dread of summary vengeance for his murder of Abel. (Comp. Gen_4:14.) Rebecca probably dreaded a similar retaliation in case Esau had murdered Jacob; for “why,” says she, “should I be deprived also of you both in one day?” It has been common among the wandering Arabs from Ishmael’s time to the present hour. It probably arose out of the original law,—“At the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man,” &c. (Gen_9:5-6).
It is evident that such a practice must give rise to many very serious evils. Besides that it fostered a spirit of relentless hatred and revenge, it was often accompanied with flagrant injustice and wrong. The Goël is governed only by his passions; and it may be that the person he suspects is not the murderer; thus an innocent person suffers, and instead of avenging one murder he commits a second. One such deed never fails to give birth to another; and so ten murders have not unfrequently their origin in one. The families on both sides take part in the quarrel, and thus under the pious pretext of avenging innocent blood, two families may be in a state of constant warfare, and transmit feuds and enmities from father to son, even to the tenth generation. Thus the office of the avenger of blood, though proper in some states of society, was subject to many abuses, and required to be placed under strong restrictions Moses could not have abolished it altogether, at least on a sudden, he therefore adopted regulations which neutralised the evil.
2. The appointment of the cities of refuge, in order to secure the ends, both of mercy and of justice. Six cities of refuge were appointed—three on the one side of Jordan, three on the other—to which the manslayer might immediately repair, and in which the individual might be safe, &c.… Thus provision was made both for justice and mercy—for justice if the fugitive were guilty, for mercy if he were innocent. And in order to give the innocent person every reasonable hope of escaping, the cities were placed at easy distances, to which persons might have access from any part of the land, the roads were straight and plain, &c.…
But even in the mercy that was shown an accidental manslayer, we see how sacred life was in God’s esteem; for the fugitive must be a prisoner and an exile, apart from all his friends, till the death of the High Priest, perhaps for many years. This was intended to punish that imprudence which had cost another man his life, and could not fail to make the people cautious against the recurrence of such accidents; for as no compensation could be taken for the life of a murderer, so no sum could rescue an innocent manslayer from the city (Num_35:31-32).
II. As a religious ordinance designedly employed by the apostle to illustrate the wisdom and goodness of God in the methods of our salvation.
Here we see clearly depicted the character and office of our great Redeemer. This Redeemer is our near Kinsman; for “He is not ashamed to call us brethren.” To this the apostle alludes: “God sent forth His Son made of a woman,” &c. (Gal_4:4-5). This illustrates the sublime passage in the book of Job: “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” &c. He is here compared to the Goël, &c. (Comp. Hos_13:14; Zec_9:12.) The apostle says: “That I may win Christ, and be found in Him,” for which, like the manslayer, he would count all things loss. And he describes Christians as having “fled for refuge.” “There is therefore now no condemnation,” &c.
1. A state of exposure is implied. Every man who reflects upon his past life, upon the holiness of God’s law, upon the inflexibility of His government, and upon the sentence He has pronounced against sin, must be aware that he is in a state of jeopardy. The sentence has been promulgated from age to age with awful solemnity, “Cursed is every one,” &c. If we carry the thought to its extent, it is Jehovah Himself who is the Avenger. His law we have broken, &c.
2. A method of rescue has been provided. Christ has undertaken our desperate cause. We are to flee for refuge. It is the only one. It is open to the Gentile as well as the Jew.
Samuel Thodey.
THE SECURITY OF THOSE WHO FLEE TO THE CITY OF REFUGE
(Num_35:24-28)
That the Mosaic law had a spiritual meaning, is placed beyond all doubt from the clear allusions of Scripture (Zec_9:12; Heb_6:18). Observe—
I. Our natural state is one of imminent danger.
We are all criminals, having, ignorantly and in unbelief, rebelled against the Almighty Sovereign. As criminals, we are justly exposed to the infliction of the threatened penalty of death (Eze_18:4; Rom_6:23; Rev_21:8). Truly, then, we may observe in the situation of the manslayer a great resemblance to that of our own, as pursued by the inexorable Justice of One whose wrath we have so much provoked (Rom_1:18; Joh_3:36).
II. Nothing can deliver us from this danger but a zealous and timely flight.
We may sit at ease, bless ourselves in our heart, and feel secure; but if death overtakes us loitering in our sins, we must perish in them; and it will be vain to trust to anything as our covenant and hope, so long as we remain under that indifference to our spiritual interests, which demonstrates us to be still unchanged (Jas_2:10).
III. There is a place of safety to which we can flee.
Christ is our refuge:—
1. A Refuge Divinely appointed. God so pitied, so deeply and intensely compassionated our state, as to plan and provide a way of deliverance for us by His only begotten Son (Joh_3:16).
2. A Refuge free and open to all. None are shut out from it, but those who, by their impenitence and obstinacy, shut out themselves. No stage, no state of guilt, can make any difference; but sinners of every rank and description, without limitation or reserve, have a place prepared in which they may find security (1Co_6:11).
3. A Refuge everywhere near to resort to. Christ is set before us in the Gospel, and to find Him we need neither climb up into heaven, nor descend into the bottom of the sea (Rom_10:8).
4. A Refuge easily accessible. Every obstacle is effectually removed, God being reconciled, His justice satisfied, and His law magnified; so that nothing need hinder our trusting in Christ, the great God, and our Saviour.
5. A Refuge containing an ample supply for our wants and necessities. For here are to be found wisdom, grace, life, liberty, peace, and joy.
IV. Having once entered this place we must abide there.
It was not enough that the man-slayer fled to the city of refuge. Having gained this place, he must remain in it till the death of the high priest. Nor is it sufficient to have once believed in Christ. We must abide in Him, renouncing for ever all thoughts of going into any forbidden region (Isa_30:15). And woe be unto us, if we dare to be found without (2Pe_2:20-21).
Let us hence seek after a sight of our danger, abandon all means of relief not warranted in the Scripture, and resign ourselves up to Christ.—William Sleigh.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 The Levitical Cities. The Cities of Refugie
The Levitical Cities. The Cities of Refugie
1-8. The Levitical Cities.
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The tribe of Levi received no part of the land of Canaan as their inheritance (Num_18:20-24; Num_26:62). By way of compensation they received the tithes for their support (Num_18:21). It is here further provided that 48 cities with their suburbs be allotted to them out of the inheritance of the other tribes, for the maintenance of themselves and their herds. The carrying out of this injunction is recorded in Joshua 21, where it is also noted that the priests (the sons of Aaron) received 13 of these cities (Num_35:4). The people, as well as the priests and Levites, benefited by this arrangement, for the latter being dispersed throughout the land were able to instruct the people in the law and worship of God. On the duty of the priests and Levites to teach the people see Lev_10:11; Deu_17:8-9; Deu_33:10; 2Ch_19:8-10. It would appear that the law of the Levitical cities was never strictly carried into practice.
4, 5. There is a difficulty in understanding these measurements. Perhaps the simplest explanation is to say that the area of the city itself is disregarded. The city being conceived as a mathematical point, 1,000 cubits measured on either side give a square 2,000 cubits in the side. The Greek version has 2,000 cubits in Num_35:4. If this is right there is no difficulty at all. The city would be surrounded on all sides by a strip of land 2,000 cubits in width.
6, 9-15. The Cities of Refuge. (See also Deu_19:1-3; Joshua 20.) In primitive times, before the machinery of justice was organised, the duty of avenging a murder devolved upon the nearest relative of the murdered person. Duty required him to pursue the murderer and slay him with his own hand. This law was not repealed by Moses, but certain restrictions were placed upon it in the interests of humanity and justice. Of the Levitical cities, six were marked out as Cities of Refuge to which a man who had killed another accidentally (Num_35:11, Num_35:22-25) might flee and be safe from the 'avenger of blood.' This provision did not apply to wilful murderers, who were not to escape the death penalty (Num_35:16-21). The names of the cities are given in Jos_20:7, Jos_20:8. Three were on the W. side of Jordan and three on the E. The reason why Levitical cities were selected for this purpose was, not merely that these were regarded as possessing a sacred character, but that they were inhabited by men who knew the law, and who could decide in doubtful cases between wilful murder and accidental homicide (Num_35:24; Deu_19:12, Deu_19:17). Deu_19:3 provides that the principal roads leading to these cities of refuge be kept open, so that the innocent fugitive might have every facility in reaching the place of sanctuary (see note there). For the Christian application of this law of asylum see on Num_35:25.
12. Stand before the congregation] As a wilful murderer might flee to one of these cities in the hope of escaping with his life, a trial must be held to ascertain whether the murder was wilful or accidental.
16-21. If the trial shows that the murder was committed wilfully, the murderer is to be handed over for execution at the hands of the avenger of blood.
22-29. If the trial shows that the murder was accidental (see Deu_19:4-5) the murderer's life is spared. But he must stay within the bounds of the city till the death of the high priest, when he is at liberty to go. If he stray outside the bounds before that time he does so at the peril of his own life. 25. Unto the death of the high priest] The amnesty declared to the man-slayer on the death of the high priest, which marks the close of one period and the beginning of a new, is an appropriate symbol of that redemption from the sins of the past wrought by Christ, and that new life of liberty into which they enter who believe in Him: cp. Heb_6:18-20.
30-32. Murder is such a serious crime that it cannot be atoned for by the payment of a money fine; nor can the man who has unintentionally killed another purchase his release from the city of refuge before the death of the high priest. St. Peter reminds Christians that they were not redeemed with silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ (1Pe_1:18-19).
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 11. The Cities of Refuge
11. The Cities of Refuge
CHAPTER 35
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1. The provision of the Levites: Forty-eight cities (Num 35:1-8)
2. The cities of refuge (Num 35:9-34)
The cities of the Levites were scattered through the land. Gen 49:7 is therefore fulfilled. The provision of cities for refuge is full of interest. The careful study of the purpose of these cities is recommended. Note especially that they were provided to give shelter for those who had killed a person unawares. The avenger of blood (Hebrew: _goel, which means to redeem) pursued the person and the city of refuge gave shelter. The death of the high priest resulted in liberty for all who were in the cities of refuge. It was the signal that they could return to their possessions (verse 28).
Israel’s history may be easily read in this chapter in connection with the cities of refuge. The innocent blood shed is the blood of Christ. Blood guiltiness is upon the nation. They did it ignorantly, even as He prayed on Calvary’s cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” They are on account of this blood-guiltiness kept out of their inheritance, and yet they have had their city of refuge and have been preserved till the time comes when they are set free and return to the possession in the land. And that will be when the Priesthood of Christ as now exercised by Him in glory ends, when He comes forth as the King-Priest to exercise the Melchisedek priesthood. The names of the cities are not given in the book of Numbers. They were: Bezer, Ramoth, Golan, Kedesh, Shechem and Hebron (Deu 4:41-43; Jos 20:7). The cities are also types of Christ because they gave shelter. He is our refuge and our hiding place.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 The Cities of the Levites
The Cities of the Levites
v. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses in the Plains of Moab by Jordan, near Jericho, saying,
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v. 2. Command the children of Israel that they give unto the Levites of the Inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in, for the Levites, as a tribe, received no special territory in the land of Canaan, Num 18:20-23; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them, meadows, pasture-land for their herds and flocks, fields which could not be sold, but remained the permanent and inalienable property of the Levites, Lev 25:34. This does not hold true of the cities themselves, for in these it was only the houses that were given to the Levites, in regard to which the Lord had provided that they could be redeemed at any time after being sold and should always be returned to the original owners or their heirs in the Year of Jubilee, Lev 25:32-33.
v. 3. And the cities shall they have to dwell in; and the suburbs, the meadows, the pasture-land, of them shall be for their cattle and for their goods and tor all their beasts.
v. 4. And the suburbs of the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites shall reach from the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round about, that is, measuring directly from the city wall in a straight line.
v. 5. And ye shall measure from without the city, from its wall or boundary, on the east side two thousand cubits, and on the south side two thousand cubits, and on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst, and the place occupied by it should not enter into the calculations; this shall be to them the suburbs of the cities.
v. 6. And among the cities which ye shall give unto the Levites there shall be six cities for refuge, which ye shall appoint for the manslayer, to the man who unintentionally takes his neighbor’s life, that he may flee thither; and to them ye shall add forty and two cities, making a total of forty-eight.
v. 7. So all the cities which ye shall give to the Levites shall be forty and eight cities; them shall ye give with their suburbs.
v. 8. And the cities which ye shall give shall be of the possession of the children of Israel, selected from the territory apportioned to the tribes; from them that have many ye shall give many; but from them that have few ye shall give few; every one shall give of his cities unto the Levites according to his inheritance which he inheriteth. As the plan worked out afterward, Joshua 21, there were ten cities of the Levites in the country east of the Jordan and thirty-eight in Canaan proper. By living in the midst of all the tribes, the Levites were to be an example to the entire nation, continually reminding them of their divine call and of the covenant of Jehovah, so that the fear of the Lord might be maintained in Israel.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5 a large area of flat land
plains
a large area of flat land
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give some of their own shares of land to the Levites
Yahweh did not give the Levites their own land, so they had to live in cities that belonged to other tribes.
pastureland
an area of land where animals feed on grass
translationWords
Yahweh
Moses
Moab
Jordan River
Jericho
command
Israel
Levi
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 4 35:1-34 The tribe of Levi received no territory, so…
35:1-34 The tribe of Levi received no territory, so ch 35 describes their allotment of 48 towns dispersed among the territories of Israel’s other tribes (see Josh 21; see also Lev 25:32-34; 1 Chr 13:2; 2 Chr 11:14). Just as the Levites had lived in the center of the Israelite camp during the wilderness period (cp. Num 2:17), in the Promised Land they were to live among the other tribes and have a leavening influence among them (see Deut 33:9-10; 2 Chr 17:7-9; 19:8-11; 35:3). The cities and their surrounding pastureland were not a “homeland” (cp. Num 18:23; 26:62) but only a tiny fraction of the Canaanite territory dispersed among the other tribes.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.