Numbers 1

Ah, a new book of the Bible! This first chapter was rather repetetive, but I like the topic: a census of the men capable of fighting; effectively a count of the army that Israel could muster. At over 600,000 men, it rivals the size of our standing army today - that must have been quite large for that time period!

It is interesting that here God commanded Moses to make the count, but later in David's reign I think God forbids the same thing. I suppose a lot of that has to do with motivations; here I suspect God was showing the Israelites that they had the manpower to take the land He was leading them to, but in David's time God wanted him to remember that it was God who fought for him and assured vistory, not the numbers of his troops.