19 When Korah had gathered all his followers in opposition to them at the entrance to the tent of meeting, the glory of the Lord appeared to the entire assembly.
Numbers 16:19
What does the verse mean when it says that ‘the glory of the Lord appeared to the entire assembly’?
The glory of the Lord is the Holy Spirit.
In 1 Peter 4:14 we read:
14 If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you.
1 Peter 4:14
In 1 Enoch 27:2 The Holy Spirit is called God’s Glory:
27.2 Then Raphael, one of the Holy Angels who was with me, answered me, and said to me: “This accursed valley is for those who are cursed for ever. Here will be gathered together all who speak with their mouths against the Lord, words that are not fitting, and say hard things about His Glory.
http://www.bookofenoch.org/enoch26-36.htm
In Ezekiel 8 we see that the Glory of the God of Israel appeared to Ezekiel:
4 And there before me was the glory of the God of Israel, as in the vision I had seen in the plain.
5 Then he said to me, “Son of man, look toward the north…….
Ezekiel 8:4-5 NIV
Verse 4 would be clearer for the reader if the word ‘glory’ was capitalized so that the verse reads: ‘And there before me was the Glory of the God of Israel…’
An early Christian, Justin Martyr, who lived in the second century, wrote:
I shall give you another testimony, my friends,” said I, “from the Scriptures, that God begat before all creatures a Beginning, a certain rational power from Himself, who is called by the Holy Spirit, now the Glory of the Lord, now the Son, again Wisdom, again an Angel, then God, and then Lord and Logos.”
– Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, LXI – (“Wisdom is begotten of the father, as fire from fire.”)
Therefore, the Glory of the God of Israel is the Holy Spirit.
We know that Yahweh sent His Angel along with the Israelites:
20 “See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. 21 Pay attention to him and listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him; he will not forgive your rebellion, since my Name is in him. 22 If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you. 23 My angel will go ahead of you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites, and I will wipe them out.
Exodus 23:20-23
This Angel is called the Holy Spirit in Isaiah 63:8-13:
8 He said, “Surely they are my people,
children who will be true to me”;
and so he became their Savior.
9 In all their distress he too was distressed,
and the angel of his presence saved them.[a]
In his love and mercy he redeemed them;
he lifted them up and carried them
all the days of old.
10 Yet they rebelled
and grieved his Holy Spirit.
So he turned and became their enemy
and he himself fought against them.11 Then his people recalled[b] the days of old,
Isaiah 63:8-13
the days of Moses and his people—
where is he who brought them through the sea,
with the shepherd of his flock?
Where is he who set
his Holy Spirit among them,
12 who sent his glorious arm of power
to be at Moses’ right hand,
who divided the waters before them,
to gain for himself everlasting renown,
13 who led them through the depths?
Therefore, when the glory of God appeared to the entire assembly does this not simply mean that the Angel appeared in front of the tent so that the Israelites could see Him?
In Numbers 16, He initially wanted to destroy all the Israelites, but Moses and Aaron begged Him to destroy only those who were in rebellion:
20 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, 21 “Separate yourselves from this assembly so I can put an end to them at once.”
22 But Moses and Aaron fell facedown and cried out, “O God, the God who gives breath to all living things, will you be angry with the entire assembly when only one man sins?”
23 Then the Lord said to Moses, 24 “Say to the assembly, ‘Move away from the tents of Korah, Dathan and Abiram.’”
25 Moses got up and went to Dathan and Abiram, and the elders of Israel followed him. 26 He warned the assembly, “Move back from the tents of these wicked men! Do not touch anything belonging to them, or you will be swept away because of all their sins.” 27 So they moved away from the tents of Korah, Dathan and Abiram. Dathan and Abiram had come out and were standing with their wives, children and little ones at the entrances to their tents.
28 Then Moses said, “This is how you will know that the Lord has sent me to do all these things and that it was not my idea: 29 If these men die a natural death and suffer the fate of all mankind, then the Lord has not sent me. 30 But if the Lord brings about something totally new, and the earth opens its mouth and swallows them, with everything that belongs to them, and they go down alive into the realm of the dead, then you will know that these men have treated the Lord with contempt.”
31 As soon as he finished saying all this, the ground under them split apart 32 and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and their households, and all those associated with Korah, together with their possessions. 33 They went down alive into the realm of the dead, with everything they owned; the earth closed over them, and they perished and were gone from the community.
Numbers 16:20-33
The incident is remarkably like the incident in which Ananias and Sapphira were also removed from the community of the believers in Jerusalem after they lied to the Holy Spirit.
The removal of all those associated with Korah is not the end of the destruction:
35 And fire came out from the Lord and consumed the 250 men who were offering the incense.
36 The Lord said to Moses, 37 “Tell Eleazar son of Aaron, the priest, to remove the censers from the charred remains and scatter the coals some distance away, for the censers are holy— 38 the censers of the men who sinned at the cost of their lives. Hammer the censers into sheets to overlay the altar, for they were presented before the Lord and have become holy. Let them be a sign to the Israelites.”
39 So Eleazar the priest collected the bronze censers brought by those who had been burned to death, and he had them hammered out to overlay the altar, 40 as the Lord directed him through Moses. This was to remind the Israelites that no one except a descendant of Aaron should come to burn incense before the Lord, or he would become like Korah and his followers.
41 The next day the whole Israelite community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. “You have killed the Lord’s people,” they said.
42 But when the assembly gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron and turned toward the tent of meeting, suddenly the cloud covered it and the glory of the Lord appeared. 43 Then Moses and Aaron went to the front of the tent of meeting, 44 and the Lord said to Moses, 45 “Get away from this assembly so I can put an end to them at once.” And they fell facedown.
46 Then Moses said to Aaron, “Take your censer and put incense in it, along with burning coals from the altar, and hurry to the assembly to make atonement for them. Wrath has come out from the Lord; the plague has started.” 47 So Aaron did as Moses said, and ran into the midst of the assembly. The plague had already started among the people, but Aaron offered the incense and made atonement for them. 48 He stood between the living and the dead, and the plague stopped. 49 But 14,700 people died from the plague, in addition to those who had died because of Korah. 50 Then Aaron returned to Moses at the entrance to the tent of meeting, for the plague had stopped.[c]
Numbers 16:35-50
In Jude 5 Jude describes what happened in Numbers 16 as follows:
5 Though you already know all this, I want to remind you that the Lord[a] at one time delivered his people out of Egypt, but later destroyed those who did not believe.
Jude 5
There is no doubt that Jude had these incidences in mind because he says in Jude 11:
11 Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error; they have been destroyed in Korah’s rebellion.
Jude 11
There is also no doubt that Jude is speaking about Jesus in Jude 5 because the word ‘Lord’ in the original Greek is Ἰησοῦς» which is Jesus in Greek.
It is clear from Jude 5 that Jude is identifying Jesus as the Angel of Yahweh who destroyed the rebellious Israelites in Numbers 16.
What is interesting in Numbers 16 is that in Numbers 16:42 we are told:
42 But when the assembly gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron and turned toward the tent of meeting, suddenly the cloud covered it and the glory of the Lord appeared.
Numbers 16:42
This reminds one of how Jesus was taken up into a cloud (Acts 1:9-12) and Jesus said that He will return on the clouds (Matthew 26:64). The Son of Man in the book of Daniel comes before the Ancient of Days on the clouds (Daniel 7:13).
In Numbers 16:42 this exact same thing seems to be happening. The cloud appears and covers the tent of meeting and then the Angel appears.
Notice that in Isaiah 63:11 the Holy Spirit is called ‘the Shepherd of His flock’:
11 Then his people recalled[a] the days of old,
Isaiah 63:13 NIV
the days of Moses and his people—
where is he who brought them through the sea,
with the shepherd of his flock?
Where is he who set
his Holy Spirit among them,
12 who sent his glorious arm of power
to be at Moses’ right hand,
who divided the waters before them,
to gain for himself everlasting renown,
13 who led them through the depths?
Like a horse in open country,
they did not stumble;
The New Testament teaches that this Good Shepherd, the Holy Spirit, became incarnate as Jesus Christ in the following ways:
When Jesus was transfigured on the mountain the disciples saw His glory in the same way that the Israelites saw Him as the Angel of the Lord outside the tent of meeting in Numbers 16.
The apostle Paul recognized that as a man, Jesus is the Holy Spirit incarnate. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 3:17 that ‘the Lord is the Spirit’ and in 2 Corinthians 3:18 Paul calls Jesus: ‘the Lord the Spirit’. In Philippians, Paul says: ‘For I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance’ (Philippians 1:19 NRSV).
In Galatians, Paul says: ‘And because you Gentiles have become his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, and now you can call God your dear Father’ (Galatians 4:6 NLT). In Romans, Paul says: ‘But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.’ (Romans 8:9, 10 NRSV).
The apostle Paul recognized that Jesus was this Angel and identified Him as such in 1 Corinthians 10:9:
9 We should not test Christ,[a] as some of them did—and were killed by snakes.
1 Corinthians 10:9 NIV
He also identified Jesus as the form of God Who appeared to Moses. Numbers 12:7-8 says:
Not so with My servant Moses. He is faithful in all My house. I speak with him face to Face and even plainly and not in dark sayings and he sees the form of Yahweh….
Numbers 12:7;8 Interlinear
In Philippians 2:5-8, Paul writes:
5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,[a]6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,[b]7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant,[c] being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Philippians 2:5-8 ESV
The apostle Paul knew that the form of God Who appeared to Moses was the Angel of His Presence Who was accompanying the Israelites in the wilderness. He links this Angel to the Holy Spirit through all of the scriptures that he wrote regarding Jesus as the incarnate Holy Spirit.
John describes how Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit into the disciples: ‘Then he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit” ‘(John 20:22 CEV). Jesus was able to do this because His spirit is the Holy Spirit, because He is the incarnate Holy Spirit.
Hebrews 1:7 says:
7 Of the angels he says,
“He makes his angels winds,
Hebrews 1:7 ESV
and his ministers a flame of fire.”
The Angel, the Holy Spirit, is in the body of Jesus as a wind / spirit because He is Jesus’ spirit. Luke, the author of the book of Acts, recognized that the spirit of Jesus, is the Holy Spirit. He says in Acts 16: ‘And after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the spirit of Jesus did not permit them’ (Acts 16:7 NASB).
On the Day of Pentecost Jesus’ spirit returned as a mighty wind and as tongues of fire and filled more of His disciples (notice in Hebrews 1:7 angels can be made by God into winds and flames of fire). Therefore, it is the Angel of Yahweh, the Glory of God, Who inhabits the Church:
18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate[a] the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV
