The Wilderness Years

ADONAI spoke to Moshe in the Sinai Desert, in the tent of meeting, on the first day of the second month of the second year after they had left the land of Egypt. He said,

"Take a census of the entire assembly of the people of Isra'el, by clans and families. Record the names of all the men

twenty years old and over who are subject to military service in Isra'el. You and Aharon are to enumerate them company by company.

Take with you from each tribe someone who is head of a clan.

These are the men to take with you: From Re'uven, Elitzur the son of Sh'de'ur;

From Shim'on, Shlumi'el the son of Tzurishaddai;

From Y'hudah, Nachshon the son of 'Amminadav;

From Yissakhar, N'tan'el the son of Tzu'ar;

From Z'vulun, Eli'av the son of Helon.

Of the children of Yosef: From Efrayim, Elishama the son of 'Ammihud; From M'nasheh, Gamli'el the son of P'dahtzur.

From Binyamin, Avidan the son of Gid'oni;

From Dan, Achi'ezer the son of 'Ammishaddai;

From Asher, Pag'i'el the son of 'Okhran;

From Gad, Elyasaf the son of De'u'el;

From Naftali, Achira the son of 'Enan."

These were the ones called from the assembly, the chiefs of their fathers'clans and heads of thousands in Isra'el.

So Moshe and Aharon took these men who had been designated by name;

and, on the first day of the second month, they gathered the whole assembly to state their genealogies by families and clans and recorded the names of all those twenty years old and over, as well as their total numbers.

Moshe counted them in the Sinai Desert, just as ADONAI had ordered him.

The men twenty years old and over who were subject to military service were recorded by name, family and clan, starting with the descendants of Re'uven, Isra'el's firstborn. Here are the totals:

Descendants of Re'uven 46,500

Descendants of Shim'on 59,300

Those that were numbered of them, even of the tribe of Simeon, were fifty and nine thousand and three hundred.

Descendants of Gad 45,650

Those that were numbered of them, even of the tribe of Gad, were forty and five thousand six hundred and fifty.