⁵And the Lord said to Moses, ⁶“Bring the tribe of Levi near, and set them before Aaron the priest, that they may minister to him. ⁷They shall perform duties for him and for the whole congregation before the tent of meeting, as they minister at the tabernacle; ⁸they shall have charge of all the furnishings of the tent of meeting, and attend to the duties for the people of Israel as they minister at the tabernacle. ⁹And you shall give the Levites to Aaron and his sons; they are wholly given to him from among the people of Israel. ¹⁰And you shall appoint Aaron and his sons, and they shall attend to their priesthood; but if any one else comes near, he shall be put to death.”

¹¹And the Lord said to Moses, ¹²“Behold, I have taken the Levites from among the people of Israel instead of every first-born that opens the womb among the people of Israel. The Levites shall be mine, ¹³for all the first-born are mine; on the day that I slew all the first-born in the land of Egypt, I consecrated for my own all the first-born in Israel, both of man and of beast; they shall be mine: I am the Lord.”

¹⁴And the Lord said to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, ¹⁵“Number the sons of Levi, by fathers’ houses and by families; every male from a month old and upward you shall number.” ¹⁶So Moses numbered them according to the word of the Lord, as he was commanded. ¹⁷And these were the sons of Levi by their names: Gershon and Kohath and Merari. ¹⁸And these are the names of the sons of Gershon by their families: Libni and Shime-i. ¹⁹And the sons of Kohath by their families: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel. ²⁰And the sons of Merari by their families: Mahli and Mushi. These are the families of the Levites, by their fathers’ houses.

²¹Of Gershon were the family of the Libnites and the family of the Shime-ites; these were the families of the Gershonites. ²²Their number according to the number of all the males from a month old and upward was seven thousand five hundred. ²³The families of the Gershonites were to encamp behind the tabernacle on the west, ²⁴with Eliasaph, the son of Lael as head of the fathers’ house of the Gershonites. ²⁵And the charge of the sons of Gershon in the tent of meeting was to be the tabernacle, the tent with its covering, the screen for the door of the tent of meeting, ²⁶the hangings of the court, the screen for the door of the court which is around the tabernacle and the altar, and its cords; all the service pertaining to these.

²⁷Of Kohath were the family of the Amramites, and the family of the Izharites, and the family of the Hebronites, and the family of the Uzzielites; these are the families of the Kohathites. ²⁸According to the number of all the males, from a month old and upward, there were eight thousand six hundred, attending to the duties of the sanctuary. ²⁹The families of the sons of Kohath were to encamp on the south side of the tabernacle, ³⁰with Eli-zaphan the son of Uzziel as head of the fathers’ house of the families of the Kohathites. ³¹And their charge was to be the ark, the table, the lampstand, the altars, the vessels of the sanctuary with which the priests minister, and the screen; all the service pertaining to these. ³²And Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest was to be chief over the leaders of the Levites, and to have oversight of those who had charge of the sanctuary.

³³Of Merari were the family of the Mahlites and the family of the Mushites: these are the families of Merari. ³⁴Their number according to the number of all the males from a month old and upward was six thousand two hundred. ³⁵And the head of the fathers’ house of the families of Merari was Zuriel the son of Abihail; they were to encamp on the north side of the tabernacle. ³⁶And the appointed charge of the sons of Merari was to be the frames of the tabernacle, the bars, the pillars, the bases, and all their accessories; all the service pertaining to these; ³⁷also the pillars of the court round about, with their bases and pegs and cords.

Read in Logos