“In The Desert”

 “And the LORD spake unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tabernacle of the congregation, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they were come out of the land of Egypt, saying,” (Numbers 1:1)

Copyright CaptBlackEagle 2020

The book of Numbers is the fourth book of the Bible. Its Hebrew name, bemidbar, means “in the desert”. It begins 2 years after escaping Egypt and are now in the shadow of Mt. Sinai.

Moses and Aaron has been busy building the tabernacle. They have also been busy building a military force. Understanding the book of Numbers begins with understanding numbers.

Lets begin with those numbers.

It begins with the ages of the troops. Obviously people who would be leaders are in an age range of 40-80+. this is because they are the leaders of their family. Draft age begins at 20 (“From twenty years old and upward, all that are able to go forth to war in Israel:” Numbers 1:3). In today’s manning strength the average age of a U.S. Army enlisted personnel is just under 21. As with any military service disabilities can keep you out of service, or allow you to stay based on the needs of the service.

There is an issue with Numbers, and that is, numbers. If you add up the numbers of military aged men there are in each tribe you can expand on that and suppose there are two million plus people in total. Its called, Guesstimation.

Although it can be argued that a huge army will defeat a small one, that is just not how ground combat works in either modern or ancient times. We’ll talk about all that later.

What is about to happen in Numbers is war and rebellion in the journey to the promised land.