Bible Strands
Numbers 16:48
He stood between the living and the dead, and the plague was halted.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Aaron stands in the assembly after Moses’ command, acting as a mediator while the plague begins among the people.
The words — וַיַּעֲמֹד (va.ya.‘amod) means “and he stood,” paired with בֵּין (bein, “between”) to describe his physical position separating the living from the dead.
The thread — The cessation of plague through intercession appears in Psalms 106:30, where Phinehas stands and intervenes to halt the judgment, and in 2 Samuel 24:25, where an altar and sacrifice precede the Lord’s response.
Why it lands — The text records a physical intervention that stops a divine judgment, requiring a reader to recognize that mediation and atonement directly interrupt consequences of rebellion.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And he stood between the dead and the living; and the plague was stayed.
Cross-references
- Numbers 25:8 followed the Israelite into the tent, and drove the spear through both of them—through the Israelite and on through the belly of the woman. So the plague against the Israelites was halted,
- 2 Samuel 24:25 And there he built an altar to the LORD and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. Then the LORD answered the prayers on behalf of the land, and the plague upon Israel was halted.
- Psalms 106:30 But Phinehas stood and intervened, and the plague was restrained.
- Numbers 16:18 So each man took his censer, put fire and incense in it, and stood with Moses and Aaron at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.
- Numbers 16:35 And fire came forth from the LORD and consumed the 250 men who were offering the incense.
- 2 Samuel 24:16 But when the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the LORD relented from the calamity and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand now!” At that time the angel of the LORD was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
- 1 Chronicles 21:26 And there he built an altar to the LORD and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. He called upon the LORD, who answered him with fire from heaven on the altar of burnt offering.
- John 5:14 Afterward, Jesus found the man at the temple and said to him, “See, you have been made well. Stop sinning, or something worse may happen to you.”
- 1 Thessalonians 1:10 and to await His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead—Jesus our deliverer from the coming wrath.
- 1 Timothy 2:5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,