Preparing to enter the land means preparing to take control of and dwell in the land. The closing verses of Num. 33 (v50-56) make this clear. Therefore, part of the preparation is being ready to govern. There is a lot of wisdom in these chapters.
·
34:1-15: This passage indicates the boundaries
of the land that will become Israel. In
other words, this is what God is promising to them. The map at the end of this post shows two
colors, red and green, both of which together fit the description in Num.
34. The red is what was under control by
the death of Joshua; the green is what would remain still to be conquered. What God promised included modern Lebanon and
most of Syria. It fits the promise of
Gen. 15:18-21 which went from the river of Egypt (not the Nile but Wadi el
Arish, the border of Egypt) to the River Euphrates (which runs just
beyond the northern border of Lebanon).
·
34:16-29: This identifies the new leadership for
each tribe who would be in charge of dividing the land for the remaining nine
and a half tribes. Let me list, without
comment, the meaning of some of the names, as we did earlier in Numbers.
o
18: Caleb = dog, forcible.
o
20: Shmuel = his name is El.
o
21: Elidad = my God has loved.
o
22: Bukki = wasting.
o
23: Hanniel = favored of God.
o
24: Kemuel = raised of God.
o
25: Elizaphan = my God has protected.
o
26: Peltial = God delivers.
o
27: Ahihud = brother of Majesty.
o 28:
Pedahel = Ransomed by God.
·
35:1-8: The LORD commanded that 48 cities would be
open to the Levites to dwell in, and with this they were to be given
common-lands around the cities to farm.
The result was that the Levites were spread all over the country. What a great system.
·
35:9-34: Of those 48 cities for the Levites, six were “cities of refuge.” This was a
critical part of Israel’s justice system.
If someone killed another person they could in turn be killed by an
avenging relative. To give time for the
judges to determine guilt or innocence, the killer could flee to one of these
cities and be safe, either until he was found to be guilty or until the death of
the high priest. This passage includes a
hallmark of Israel’s justice system: one witness is not sufficient testimony
against a person for the death penalty (35:30b). But it also includes another hallmark: Whoever
kills a person, the murderer shall be put to death on the testimony of
witnesses (35:30a). “Life for life”
is not an issue of decreasing the manslaughter numbers. It is justice. Anything less defiles the land (v34).
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