For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled, Matthew 5:18.
Many years ago, I came across an old essay written in the 19th century in which the author wrote about peculiar chapters in the King James Bible. He wasn't being critical, he merely wanted to give a list of oddities. He specifically mentioned Numbers Chapter 7. He pointed out that in each of the twelve tribes giving their special offering, the verses were identical with one exception. He said that one of them was missing a comma.
For those of us who read the Book of Numbers periodically, Chapter 7 can be tedious. I have an old rule of thumb; Chapters that are boring to read, are fascinating to study, whereas the easy or fun chapters we read do not yield as much when studied minutely.
I decided to find this missing comma. In reality, there are a few missing commas. Verses 12 and 54 only have one comma each whereas each of the other ten verses introducing the man who would offer for the tribe have two commas in each. What I found far more fascinating was when I found the first missing comma in the verses that meticulously detail each portion of each tribe's offering.
The original printings of the King James Bible used punctuation more as a guide for reading aloud. They used a different set of rules for punctuation which if they had been kept for 400 years would have truly made the King James bible archaic. It was in the mid-1700s that Paris and Blayney each in their respective publishing houses and seven years apart from each other, updated what we call the orthography of our bible. (See here, and here).
To be a doctrinal bible believer is to believe every jot and tittle of our sacred text. For those who cite the confusion of the many editions or competing texts floating around the world today, rest assured, there is an absolutely perfect text of the King James Bible called the Pure Cambridge Edition by our brother in Australia, or the Pure Cambridge text in this blog and in my writing.
With the thought in mind that every punctuation mark in your King James Bible is as equally inspired as the words themselves, why was there a missing comma, and where was the missing comma?
Look at Numbers 7:13; And his offering was one silver charger, the weight thereof was an hundred and thirty shekels, one silver bowl of seventy shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary; both of them were full of fine flour mingled with oil for a meat offering:. there are three commas. Likewise, verses 19 and 25 are identical. It is when we get verse 31 that we finally notice the missing comma mentioned by the 19th century scholar.
His offering was one silver charger of the weight of an hundred and thirty shekels, one silver bowl of seventy shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary; both of them full of fine flour mingled with oil for a meat offering:. There are only two commas. Why?
First of all, notice that in verses 13, 19, and 25, the comma made clear that the silver charger itself weighed an hundred and thirty shekels; one silver charger, the weight thereof was an hundred and thirty shekels. What weighed an hundred and thirty shekels? The silver charger did. The charger is named, there is a comma, and the weight of that charger follows.
What changed in verse 31? We are no longer given the weight of the charger, we are given the weight of the stock of silver of which the charger was made. Why didn't Moses say that the charger weighed an hundred and thirty shekels? Why did he tell us that the lump of silver of which the charger was made was an hundred shekels of silver and not the charger itself?
Somewhere in the making of the charger, either by design or error, the charger did not weigh as much as the original silver of which it came. When we get to verse 37, it reads exactly as did verse 13, 19, and 25. But, when we get to verse 43, we revert to only two commas. The verse describes the lump of silver of which the charger was made as being an hundred and thirty shekels, but it will not ascribe that weight to the charger itself.
I noticed that the two discrepancies were found in the offerings of Rueben and Gad, two tribes that chose not cross the Jordan River to make their homesteads. My first thought was, "Will I find the same for Manasseh of whom half of their families chose to live outside of the land envisioned for them by God?". Yes, I did find that.
In verses 31, 43, and 55, the end product of each of those tribes dedicating an hundred and thirty shekels to the crafting of a silver charger, theirs came up short. We are not told whether that was intentional or by accident. It is just a nugget of truth hidden from any who will not take slight changes as they appear in a text seriously. For 414 years, the Lord has been waving a flag in Numbers Chapter 7 trying to get men to see that there were three tribes that just couldn't be made to give 100%.
We have a perfect bible. I wonder how much else I have missed because when I see a burning bush out of the corner of my eye, I walk on, too engaged in my own world to stop and wonder?