32 BLOOD  MONEY,  NOT  HEAD   TM And the LORD spake  unto Moses, saying, When thou takest the sum of the children of Israel after their numbe~ then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul unto the LORD, when thou numberest  them; that there be no plague among them, when thou numberest them. This they shall give, ev~y one that passeth  among them that are numbered,  hay a shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary: (a shekel is twenty  gerahs:) an half shekel shall be  tb o~ering of the LORD. Eve~ one that Passeth among them that are numbered, from twenty years old and above, shall give an  ofering unto the LORD. The rich  shall  not  give  more,  and  the Poor shall not give less than  halfa shekel, when  th~ give an ojerz�ng unto the LORD, to make an atorwrnentforyour  souls. And thou shalt take the atonement money of the children of Israel, and shalt appoint it for the ser- vice of the tabernacle of the congregation; that it may be a memorial unto the children of Israel before the LORD, to make an atonement for your SOUIS  (Ex.  30:11-16). The people needed a covering, an atonement before God. Why? The text does not say, but other texts tell us. This was a mustering of the fighting men of Israel. Moses counted them as they left Egypt, on the assumption that they would soon enter into a war against Canaan. Israel had left Egypt as an army:  �And it came to pass the selfsame day, that the LORD did bring the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by their armies� (Ex. 12:51). So God told Moses to number this assembly of tribal armies: �Take ye the sum of all the congrega- tion of the children of Israel, after their families, by the house of their fathers, with the number of their names, every male by their polls; From twenty years old and upward, all that are able to go forth to war in Israel: thou and Aaron shall number them by their armies� (Num. 1:2-3). After the plague that God brought on Israel for their fornication with the Midianite women, God ordered another census. �And it came to pass after the plague, that the LORD spake unto Moses and unto  Eleazar  the son of Aaron the priest, saying, 903