Text: Numbers 9:1-14
OT Text Referred to: Numbers 5:2
Subject: impurity exclusion creates Passover problem
Source: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Allusion
Connection Method(s): Longitudinal Theme
Significance: Numbers 5:2 commands the removal of anyone unclean through corpse contact (טְמֵא לָנֶפֶשׁ, teme' lanefesh) from the camp. Numbers 9:6-7 reveals that this purity requirement created a pastoral crisis at Passover: men contaminated by contact with a corpse could not participate in the Passover at its appointed time. Their appeal to Moses ("Why should we be kept from presenting the LORD's offering?") prompted the divine ruling in 9:9-14 establishing the delayed second-month Passover. This internal cross-reference demonstrates how the Pentateuch's own laws interact and require supplementary legislation -- the purity expulsion of chapter 5 created the very problem that the delayed-Passover provision of chapter 9 was designed to solve.