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A56632
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A commentary upon the fourth Book of Moses, called Numbers by ... Symon, Lord Bishop of Ely.
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Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.
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1699
(1699)
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Wing P774; ESTC R2078
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399,193
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690
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Moses Which is among you By a visible Token of his glorious Presence in the Sanctuary where he dwelt among them XXV Exod. v. 8. And have wept before him saying Why came we forth out of Egypt As if he had undone them by their Deliverance from thence Both Onkelos and Jonathan translate this verse in such a manner that one cannot but think they had a Notion in their Days of more Persons than one in the Godhead For these are the words of the latter of them Because you have despised or rejected as Onkelos the WORD of the LORD for glorious is his Majesty which dwelleth among us For I cannot see how the word MEMRA can signifie any thing in this place whatsoever it may do in some others but a Person equal to JEHOVAH And yet the Anonymus Writer against the Trinity confuted by de Voisin hath the strange unaccountable boldness to pass it by with this silly gloss Proprie de Lege accipi potest c. it may be properly understood of the Law which may be contemned or transgressed as if this could be called the glorious Majesty of the LORD which dwelt among them What will not Men say or do to serve a Cause Verse 21 Ver. 21. And Moses said the People among whom I am Over whom I preside as their Governor Are six hundred thousand Footmen Who were able to carry Arms besides Women and Children and Slaves and the mixt Multitude who in all may well be supposed to have made Thirty hundred thousand And thou hast said I will give them Flesh that they may eat an whole month i. e. How can this be Which is a down-right distrust of God's Promise if we regard merely the words and do not consider that they were spoken hastily and something inconsiderately while his Mind was very much disturbed by the Tumult which the People made For which reason a severe notice is not taken of it but he only put in mind of God's Eternal Power v. 23. Which may make it probable that they were only words of Admiration how such a Provision should be made for such a vast number and those uttered on a sudden Verse 22 Ver. 22. Shall the Flocks and the Herds be slain for them to suffice them In the Hebrew the words are If the Flocks and the Herds be slain for them will they be sufficient for them That is there will not be enough for a whole Month. And so the next Passage is to be translated If all the Fish of the Sea be gathered for them will they be sufficient for them Ver. 23. And the LORD said unto Moses is the LORD's Hand waxed short i. e. I need not tell thee that my Power is as great as ever Thou shalt see now whether my Word shall come to pass Verse 23 unto thee or not For thou shalt be convinced of it by the speedy performance of my Promise Ver. 24. And Moses went out I supposed v. 11. Verse 24 that Moses went into the Sanctuary to make his Addresses to God for relief and if that be true then that is the place from whence he now went out But there is this Objection against it That if he had gone to consult God in the Sanctuary as he did on some occasions VII 89. it would not have been said that he went out but that he came out For that is the usual Expression in this matter Therefore we may rather think he now went out of his own Tent where the People stood murmuring v. 10. And told the People the Words of the LORD Both concerning them and concerning himself And gathered the seventy Men of the Elders of the People That is sent out his Summons to them to attend him though two of them it appears afterwards did not come v. 26. And set them round about the Tabernacle That is required them to come thither and there place themselves that the People might understand they received their Authority from God and that from thence he might send his Holy Spirit upon them For God alone who was their King could appoint who should bear Rule among them There also were the great Assemblies held See XXVII 2. Ver. 25. And the LORD came down in a Cloud The SCHECHINAH or Divine Majesty appeared from Heaven in a Cloud or in the Pillar of the Verse 25 Cloud as it is in XII 5. And spake unto him As he had promised v. 17. declaring it is likely the Reason and Intention of his appearing on this occasion And took of the Spirit that was upon him and gave it unto the seventy Elders See there v. 17. And it came to pass that when the Spirit rested upon them i. e. As soon as they received it They prophesied Either by setting forth the Promises of God in such a strain as none else could imitate or giving such admirable Instructions to the People as manifested they were raised above themselves or perhaps by declaring things to come particularly that they should have Quails as we render the word in great abundance very shortly as some of the Jews take it though that could not gain them just credit as the other Gifts till their Predictions were fulfilled And these the Jews call the second degree of Prophecy Concerning which Maimonides speaks in his Preface to his More Nevochim but more fully in his second Part of it Cap. XLV Where he saith the first degree was that which moved and enabled Men to some heroick Undertaking with assurance they were put upon it from God as to deliver Men from Tyranny and Oppression Which was the Spirit of the LORD that came upon GIDEON and SAMSON and the rest of the Judges of Israel who were carried by an extraordinary Power to perform such things as otherwise they thought not themselves fit to undertake And the second degree was when a Man found a Power upon him exciting him to speak either Psalms or Hymns or wholesome Precepts of living or about Political Affairs and Civil Government far beyond his Natural Capacities and all this waking and in the full vigour of his Senses This is also called the Holy Spirit and in this number he places these LXX Elders Who were endued with the Spirit of Moses for the Government of the People with him in such measure that they attained to be Prophets Just as in the New Testament the Prophets are placed next to the Apostles so these Men were next to Moses And ceased not In which Translation we follow the Chaldee Paraphrasts as several others do But the LXX translate it and they added no further which the Hebrew words will well bear taking the meaning to be that they prophesied that day but not after And this is the sense of the Talmudists particularly of Jarchi Who in his Gloss upon this place saith All these Elders prophesied only this first time that the Spirit rested on them as they stood about the Tabernable but they did not prophesie after that The like say several others
committed about the Worship of God and confirms what I have said upon v. 24. For in IV Levit. both v. 13. and v. 27. he speaks in general of Sins committed either by the Congregation or by particular Persons against any of the Commandments of the LORD not before the LORD i. e. as I understand it in his Worship and Service To make an atonement for him c. He repeats it again to show them that he would no more have a particular Person suffer for his Error than the whole Body of the People Verse 29 Ver. 29. You shall have one Law for him that sinneth through ignorance both for him that is among the Children of Israel and for the Stranger that sojourneth among them See v. 15. This must necessarily be meant of a Proselyte of Justice as they called him that was Circumcised and undertook to keep the whole Law for he speaks of such whether Natives or others as erred in not observing all his Commandments v. 22 23. Ver. 30. But the Soul that doth ought presumptuously Not merely knowingly but wilfully and audaciously in contempt of the Divine Majesty and his Authority For so the Hebrew Phrase with an high hand Verse 30 signifies as Maimonides observes in his More Nevoch P. III. cap. 41. where he saith it imports a Sin not only publickly and openly committed but with Pride and Insolence it proceeding not merely from an ill custom a Man hath got of doing amiss but from an express intention to contradict the Law of God and to set himself in defiance of it Which is the reason of what follows the same reproacheth the LORD Whether he be born in the Land or a Stranger Here the word Stranger is simply used without the addition of that sojourneth among them as in the preceding verse and therefore Mr. Selden well concludes that even the Proselytes of the Gate were concerned in this Law as it related to Idolatry and Blasphemy though not in the foregoing and that they were liable to be cut off by the Hand of Heaven but whether to be punished by the Judges or no it doth not appear Lib. II. de Jure Nat. Gent. cap. 11. The same reproacheth the LORD No Man sinned thus saith Maimonides in the place fore-named but he who had a settled Opinion in his Mind contrary to the Law of God in which he dissented from it And the common received Exposition of this place is that it speaks of an Idolater because he opposed the chief and principal Foundation of the Law For no Man worshipped a Star or a Planet but he that believed its Eternity which is the most repugnant of all other things to the Law of God which in the very first words of it declares that all the World had a beginning and was made by him whom the Jews worshipped Thus he But doing any thing with an high hand doth not signifie any one certain kind of Sin as the Jews generally fancy who think he speaks here only of an Idolater or Blasphemer See Selden Lib. I. de Synedr cap. 6. p. 101. but a certain manner of sinning with despight to the Commands of God and Contempt of his Authority in any kind of Sin whatsoever And this Maimonides himself afterward acknowledges in the words following There seems to me to be the same reason in all other Transgressions which are committed contemptuously against any Law of God as if an Israelite seethed a Kid in its Mother's Milk or wore heterogeneous Garments or rounded the Corners of his Head or his Beard in contempt of the Law For the consequence of this is that he believes this Law not to be true which in my judgment saith he is the meaning of these words He reproacheth the LORD And that Soul shall be cut off from among his People No Sacrifice could make an Atonement for such a Man but he was to die either by the Hand of Heaven or of the Judges Sometimes God saith he will cut off Idolaters and such as consulted Familiar Spirits XX Lev. 5 6. Sometimes he only saith certain Offenders shall be cut off as here in this and many other places Of which Phrase I have given an account XVII Gen. 14. where the Reader may see the several Opinions that have been about it and that its meaning must be determined by the matter in hand Accordingly Maimonides hath judiciously resolved that in this place it signifies cutting off by the Hand of the Magistrates as in the Case of Apostasy to Idolatry XIII Deut. 13 c. Not that all their Goods were to be destroyed and nothing left to their Heirs as when they served other Gods but though a whole Tribe had with an high hand transgressed any Precept of the Law that is denied it to be God's Law he thinks they were only to be all killed Just as all the People thought in the Case of the Reubenites Gadites and half Tribe of Manasseh who only building an Altar on the other side of Jordan contrary to God's Law as was imagined all the rest of the Tribes of Israel gathered together to go up to War against them and cut them off XXII Josh 11 12 c. 22 23. where they acknowledge they deserved to perish if they had built an Altar for Worship as their Brethren thought they had done Ver. 31. Because he hath despised the Word of the Verse 31 LORD This shows the Nature of the offence which was setting at nought God's Laws and denying them to be of Divine Authority And hath broken his Commandment Not only by doing contrary to it but in effect disannulling it by rejecting its Authority and affirming he is not bound to observe that Precept That Soul shall be utterly cut off They shall have no Mercy upon him His Iniquity shall be upon him Not upon those who put him to death but upon himself Ver. 32. And while the Children of Israel were in the Verse 32 Wilderness In this part of the Wilderness at Kadesh-Barnea it is very probable See v. 1. They found a Man The Jews who would not be thought ignorant of any thing say this Man was one of those that presumed to go up to the Mountain when Moses forbad them XIV 44. And some of them say expresly his name was Zelophehad about the dividing of whose Estate a question afterward arose XXVII 1 c. So the Chaldee Paraphrase ascribed to Jonathan and others See Selden Lib. II. de Synedr cap. 1. n. 9. That gathered sticks Or was binding up sticks which he had gathered and pluckt up by the Roots out of the Earth as some of the Jews understand the Hebrew word Mr. Selden there observes from V Exod. 7. On the Sabbath-day This the Jewish Doctors would have to be the very next Sabbath after its first Institution in the Wilderness which is to make this History misplaced and the foregoing also without any necessity Verse 33 Ver. 33. And they that found him gathering sticks Admonished him as the