Numbers Chapter 33

From: Notes and Comments 2

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As regards this chapter and Deut. 10, the supposed difficulty is the proof, whatever we judge of the position of Deuteronomy Io, that the writer wrote from a knowledge of facts which hindered his supposing any liability to have his account attacked by difficulties which arose from ignorance- the best proof of real competency and integrity.

First I remark that, after two years, arriving at the mount of the Amorites, they failed in going up and compassed mount Seir many days, thirty-seven years; they went backwards and forwards in this neighborhood. Now we have three journeys backward and forward from Moseroth or Mosera to the Red Sea—Ezion-gaber point, when at length they turned round to go northward by the south of Seir—and from the Red Sea to Mosera.

31. etc., they go from Mosereth by Bene-jaakan, Horhagidgad to Ezion-gaber. Thence they go to mount Hor, and Aaron dies. It was in that country that Arad attacked them; his destruction is related between Aaron's death in mount Hor and their journey back again to the Red Sea. So that we have the journey from Moseroth to Ezion-gaber by Benejaakan and Gudgodah or Hor-hagidgad, from Ezion-gaber back to Hor, and, in chapter 21, back from Hor to Ezion-gaber before they turned round to go northward the other side of Edom to Moab.

Mount Hor is a district in the western edge of Edom, for the Israelites " pitched in mount Hor in the edge of Edom " before they turned Edom to go northward; but we have, in compassing Edom, a journey from Mosera to Ezion-gaber, from Ezion-gaber to Hor (the same side of mount Hor—more or less on the same identical route) and from Hor to Eziongaber. Now the first time they pass from Mosera by Benejaakan and Hor-hagidgad, i.e., a part of Hor designated by Gidgad. They returned on their steps to Hor by Kadesh. In Deuteronomy we find them going in the inverse direction, as might be expected on their return going from Bene-jaakan to Moseroth, which thus proves the general course of their journeys must have been towards Hor, for on the return journey we know they were going there at the time Aaron died, so that Moseroth is an encampment in the district and neighborhood of Hor; from the encampment he went up into the mountain itself to die.

Then in Deuteronomy 10:7, they return, as we have seen they certainly did, by Gudgodah and Jotbatha, which, according to verses 32, 33 of our chapter, is on the road from Mosera to Ezion-gaber, thus:—(see Map overleaf).

The left line through the dots, verses 30-35; the middle line as in verses 36, 37, and Deuteronomy 10. Aaron dies in Mosera in mount Hor where Israel pitched, and would have passed on through Edom but could not; then comes the right hand line. They come back to the Red Sea (chap. 21), pass up the other side of Edom, and cross the Jordan beyond the Dead Sea; now chapter 21 Connects itself with chapter 33, compare chapter 21: to and chapter 33: 43.

So that it is a great confirmation of the accuracy of the account, and only shows that Mosera is in the district of Hor, and that it was from this station Aaron went up to die. We have the three journeys positively stated, yet no one would have thought in reading, the two verses alone gave the two journeys, and that they returned on their steps, i.e., from Bene-jaakan to Moseroth, and then back by Gudgodah to Jotbatha. Yet the full accounts of Numbers prove they did, and the places in Deuteronomy are found exactly in the order of going and returning. We have positively in Numbers Mosera to Ezion-gaber, Ezion-gaber to Hor (chap. 33), Hor to the Red Sea, i.e. Ezion-gaber, and this by the stations which in Deuteronomy are mentioned, one in the order going to Mosera, and the two others on leaving Mosera in the order coming from towards Ezion-gaber, which we know to have been from Hor where Aaron died.

4, 5. Two solutions have occurred to me, each side being 2,000 cubits; but that allows nothing for the size of the city thus: -

The other, which I suppose must be the meaning, is verse 4, the pomaerium,1 and verse 5 the fields round. In verse 5, the pomaerium is reckoned to the city itself, hence not said from the wall; it was merely mikhutz la-ir (outside the city). The only question would be, if the whole would be only 2,000 cubits, but then there is no mention of the second 1,000 by itself.

1. Pomerium or pomaerium, a space void of buildings within and without the wall of the city.