Ezra 2:64

The same total i.e. 42,360 is given in Ezra, Nehemiah and 1 Esdras. The items however fail in all three lists to produce this figure.

Ezra

Neh.

1 Esdr.

Men of the people of Israel

24,144

25,406

26,390

Priests

4289

4289

2388

Levites

74

74

74

Singers

128

148

128

Porters

139

138

139

Nethinim and Solomon's servants

392

392

372

Unregistered

652

642

652

Total

29,818

31,089

30,143

other MSS. 30,678

These remarkable discrepancies from the sum total in which there is so much agreement have been variously accounted for. (a) Jewish interpreters have supposed that the sum total comprised members of the ten tribes who have not been enumerated: (b) 1Es 5:41 adds the words -of twelve years old and upward", and the unlikely suggestion has been made that the numbers of the totals include all over 12 years of age, although the numbers of the items included all over 20 years of age. (c) The disagreement is considered to be due to the corruptions in the text arising from copyists" errors in transcription of numbers and signs for numbers.

Of these explanations the last seems the most probable. But it is undoubtedly strange that the three disagreeing sum totals should come within 2000 of one another and yet should fall so far short of the total figure which each text has preserved.