4:27 “All the service of the Gershonites, whether 1 carrying loads 2 or for any of their work, will be at the direction of 3 Aaron and his sons. You will assign them all their tasks 4 as their responsibility.
17:6 So Moses spoke to the Israelites, and each of their leaders gave him a staff, one for each leader, 6 according to their tribes 7 – twelve staffs; the staff of Aaron was among their staffs.
24:7 He will pour the water out of his buckets, 8
and their descendants will be like abundant 9 water; 10
their king will be greater than Agag, 11
and their kingdom will be exalted.
1 tn The term “whether” is supplied to introduce the enumerated parts of the explanatory phrase.
2 tn Here again is the use of the noun “burden” in the sense of the loads they were to carry (see the use of carts in Num 7:7).
3 tn The expression is literally “upon/at the mouth of” (עַל־פִּי, ’al-pi); it means that the work of these men would be under the direct orders of Aaron and his sons.
4 tn Or “burden.”
5 tn Heb “you shall assign by names the vessels of the responsibility of their burden.”
6 tn Heb “a rod for one leader, a rod for one leader.”
7 tn Heb “the house of their fathers.”
8 tc For this colon the LXX has “a man shall come out of his seed.” Cf. the Syriac Peshitta and Targum.
9 tn Heb “many.”
10 sn These two lines are difficult, but the general sense is that of irrigation buckets and a well-watered land. The point is that Israel will be prosperous and fruitful.
11 sn Many commentators see this as a reference to Agag of 1 Sam 15:32-33, the Amalekite king slain by Samuel, for that is the one we know. But that is by no means clear, for this text does not identify this Agag. If it is that king, then this poem, or this line in this poem, would have to be later, unless one were to try to argue for a specific prophecy. Whoever this Agag is, he is a symbol of power.