What is the meaning of Numbers 6:24?
Numbers 6:24 is the first line of the blessing God dictated to Moses for Aaron and his sons to speak over Israel, and it names Jehovah at its head before it names any gift. Two things are asked — that God would bless, and that He would keep — and the commentators ask who really gives this, through whom it reaches the people, and when it will be fully true.
Blessing Comes Down, Never Up
The word "bless" carries a plain sense once the Old and New Testament words are set side by side. The same act runs in two directions, and only one of them is God's.
Michael HardtThe original meaning of the Hebrew word for blessing ('barak') is 'kneel', and it is used in two different senses: 'to bless' (when God acts) and 'to praise' (relating to man when he 'blesses' God). In the New Testament the relationship between these two acts becomes clearer, since the Greek word ('eulogeo') is a compound of 'good' ('eu') and 'speak' ('logeo'). When we praise God, we are expressing good things about us. When He expresses good things about us, He is blessing us.
Israel had just come out of a country where water was pumped up by human effort, and Moses later contrasts that land with one watered by rain from above.
Michael HardtEgypt's water came only from below. The spiritual meaning is obvious: the world does not know God's blessing, but only the treadmill — a wretched substitute.
Spoken by Priests, Not by God Directly
God could have said these words over the people Himself. Instead the instruction travels from God to Moses to Aaron, and that detour is deliberate.
Michael HardtIt is remarkable that God does not simply pronounce this blessing over His people. Nor does He leave it to His servant Moses. Instead, Moses has to pass these instructions on to Aaron and his sons. This shows that God wishes to use the priesthood to give this blessing to His people.
Commentators trace the same pattern forward to the moment Jesus left the earth with His hands raised over His disciples.
Michael HardtAaron also raised his hands to bless (Lev. 9:22), but his hands had not been pierced. Those of the Lord Jesus had indeed been pierced, and that is how the disciples saw Him ascend.
"And Keep You"
The second half of the verse is not a repetition of the first. It adds safety to supply.
The Christian's FriendHere we have the first character of their blessing. It is the blessing of Jehovah of hosts, and its opening feature is security from evil, freedom from what everyone else was exposed to.
For Israel that keeping meant real enemies held off. Applied to Christians, the danger is different but the promise holds.
Michael HardtIn its application to ourselves as Christians we think of our preservation from evil (John 17:15). It confronts us on all sides and it pours down upon us, using the latest means and avenues. The sin that still lives in us is inclined to give way to such temptations. To these come real attacks from outside: through persecution or scorn, or even through false teaching. But God can and will preserve us.
First Line of Three
Verse 24 is general; the two lines after it narrow and deepen. The order matters.
J. N. DarbyThe blessing places them under the keeping, the grace, and in the peace of Jehovah; and in fact Jehovah first blessed them in a general way; then, in making His face to shine upon them, He caused them to enjoy His grace; lastly, in lifting up His countenance upon them, He gave them the assurance of peace.
Offered, Refused, Still Coming
The tragedy is that the nation did not stay in what was handed to them.
C. H. MackintoshWhat a provision! Oh, that Israel had entered into it, and lived in the power of it! But they did not. They quickly turned aside, as we shall see. They exchanged the light of God's countenance for the darkness of Mount Sinai. They abandoned the ground of grace and placed themselves under law.
Yet the words were never withdrawn. Writers link the blessing's timing to the end of the Nazirite's period of separation described earlier in the chapter — the vow of someone set apart to God.
William KellyThis will really and literally be the fact when the Nazirite's term has come to its end in every sense; and it will end in joy and gladness without limit in the millennial reign.
What Believers May Draw From It Now
Commentators differ on emphasis — some read the passage mainly as Israel's future, others press its present use — but the same two words are applied to the church.
C. H. MackintoshShe is privileged to know the presence of God with her and among her continually — to live in the light of His countenance — to drink of the river of peace — to be blessed and kept, day by day, by Him who never slumbers nor sleeps.
Summary
- Source. Blessing is God speaking good over people; it falls like rain from above, and the world without Him has only the treadmill of self-effort.
- Channel. God routed the words through Aaron's hands rather than saying them directly — and the risen Christ, hands pierced, blessed His disciples the same way.
- Content. "Bless" supplies; "keep" guards. The first gives, the second protects what was given from enemies without and sin within.
- Order. Verse 24 is the general blessing; the shining face adds grace, the lifted countenance adds peace.
- Outcome. Israel traded this for law and lost the enjoyment of it, but the promise stands for their future — and believers may live under "blessed and kept" today.