Numbers: The Book of the Wilderness

Numbers at a Glance

The English name Numbers comes from the two censuses that count Israel's fighting men, one at the start of the book and one near the end. The Hebrew name, which means in the wilderness, says more. Between the two countings an entire generation died. This is the fourth book of Moses.

• Author. Moses. The book says that Moses wrote their goings out according to their journeys by the commandment of the LORD (Numbers 33:2), and it records what the LORD spoke to him again and again.
• Date. The events run from the second year after the Exodus, about 1445 BC (Numbers 1:1), to the fortieth year, about 1406 BC (Deuteronomy 1:3). Moses wrote it before his death.
• Written To. The new generation of Israel, standing at the border of the Promised Land. They needed to learn from their fathers' failure.
• Setting. Mount Sinai, then the wilderness of Paran and Zin, and at last the plains of Moab across the Jordan from Jericho (Numbers 36:13).
• Key Verse. How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them? (Numbers 14:11).
• Key Word or Theme. Wandering. A redeemed people lost forty years to unbelief, yet God did not drop His promise.