Numbers 16:28-50 ▼

28 And Moses said, Hereby shall ye know that the Lord has sent me to perform all these works, that I have not done them of myself.

29 If these men shall die according to the death of all men, if also their visitation shall be according to the visitation of all men, then the Lord has not sent me.

30 But if the Lord shall shew by a wonder, and the earth shall open her mouth and swallow them up, and their houses, and their tents, and all that belongs to them, and they shall go down alive into Hades, then ye shall know that these men have provoked the Lord.

31 And when he ceased speaking all these words, the ground clave asunder beneath them.

32 And the ground opened, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that were with Core, and their cattle.

33 And they went down and all that they had, alive into Hades; and the ground covered them, and they perished from the midst of the congregation.

34 And all Israel round about them fled from the sound of them, for they said, Lest the earth swallow us up also .

35 And fire went forth from the Lord, and devoured the two hundred and fifty men that offered incense.

36 And the Lord said to Moses,

37 and to Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest, Take up the brazen censers out of the midst of the men that have been burnt, and scatter the strange fire yonder, for they have sanctified the censers

38 of these sinners against their own souls, and do thou make them beaten plates a covering to the altar, because they were brought before the Lord and hallowed; and they became a sign to the children of Israel.

39 And Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest took the brazen censers, which the men who had been burnt brought near, and they put them as a covering on the altar:

40 a memorial to the children of Israel that no stranger might draw nigh, who is not of the seed of Aaron, to offer incense before the Lord; so he shall not be as Core and as they that conspired with him, as the Lord spoke to him by the hand of Moses.

41 And the children of Israel murmured the next day against Moses and Aaron, saying, Ye have killed the people of the Lord.

42 And it came to pass when the congregation combined against Moses and Aaron, that they ran impetuously to the tabernacle of witness; and the cloud covered it, and the glory of the Lord appeared.

43 And Moses and Aaron went in, in front of the tabernacle of witness.

44 And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying,

45 Depart out of the midst of this congregation, and I will consume them at once: and they fell upon their faces.

46 And Moses said to Aaron, Take a censer, and put on it fire from the altar, and put incense on it, and carry it away quickly into the camp, and make atonement for them; for wrath is gone forth from the presence of the Lord, it has begun to destroy the people.

47 And Aaron took as Moses spoke to him, and ran among the congregation, for already the plague had begun among the people; and he put on incense, and made an atonement for the people.

48 And he stood between the dead and the living, and the plague ceased.

49 And they that died in the plague were fourteen thousand and seven hundred, besides those that died on account of Core.

50 And Aaron returned to Moses to the door of the tabernacle of witness, and the plague ceased.