Numbers 17
1 The LORD spoke to Moses:
2 “Tell Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, to remove the censers from the middle of the fire and scatter the fire far away, because they have become holy.
3 As for the censers of those who sinned at the cost of their lives, have them hammered into sheets to cover the altar. Because they presented them before the LORD, they have become holy, and they will serve as a sign for the Israelites.”
4 Eleazar the priest took the bronze censers that the burned men had presented, and they hammered them into sheets to cover the altar.
5 This is a memorial for the Israelites, so that no outsider who is not descended from Aaron will come near to burn incense before the LORD; otherwise, what happened to Korah and his group will happen to him, as the LORD had told him through Moses.
6 The next day, the whole community of the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron: “You have killed the LORD’s people!”
7 When the community gathered against Moses and Aaron, they turned toward the tent of meeting. The cloud covered it, and the glory of the LORD appeared.
8 Moses and Aaron went to the front of the tent of meeting.
9 The LORD spoke to Moses:
10 “Move away from the middle of this community, and I will consume them in an instant.” They fell facedown.
11 Moses said to Aaron: “Take the censer, put fire from the altar in it, and add incense. Hurry to the community and make atonement for them, because wrath has gone out from the LORD, and the plague has begun.”
12 Aaron took the censer, as Moses had said, and ran into the middle of the assembly. The plague had already begun among the people. He put in the incense and made atonement for the people.
13 He stood between the dead and the living, and the plague stopped.
14 Those who died in the plague numbered 14,700, besides those who died because of Korah.
15 Aaron returned to Moses at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and the plague had stopped.
16 The LORD spoke to Moses:
17 “Speak to the Israelites and take from them one staff for each ancestral house, from all their leaders according to their fathers’ houses: twelve staffs. Write each man’s name on his staff.
18 Write Aaron’s name on Levi’s staff, because there will be one staff for the head of each ancestral house.
19 Place them in the tent of meeting, before the Testimony, where I meet with you.
20 The staff of the man I choose will sprout. In this way I will put an end to the Israelites’ grumbling against you.”
21 Moses spoke to the Israelites, and all their leaders gave him one staff each, one for each leader according to their ancestral houses: twelve staffs. Aaron’s staff was among theirs.
22 Moses placed the staffs before the LORD in the tent of the Testimony.
23 The next day, Moses entered the tent of the Testimony, and Aaron’s staff, from the house of Levi, had sprouted: it put out buds, blossomed, and produced ripe almonds.
24 Moses brought all the staffs out from before the LORD and showed them to all the Israelites. They saw them, and each man took his own staff.
25 The LORD said to Moses: “Put Aaron’s staff back before the Testimony, to be kept as a sign for the rebels. In this way you will put an end to their grumbling against me, and they will not die.”
26 Moses did as the LORD had commanded him; that is what he did.
27 The Israelites said to Moses: “We are dying! We are lost; all of us are lost!
28 Everyone who comes near, who comes near the LORD’s tabernacle, dies. Are we all going to die?”
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