That the priests carried the ark in this crossing of the Jordan, and went before the rest of the people, was said before (quest. 4, 5, and following). But who they [were] who carried it, I nowhere found. But that we may attain this by conjecture in some way, first [it] is to be established [that] the priests altogether then were not much more than twenty-four. This, in the Joshuan booklet (ch. 3 num. 31 & 32), I gathered thus. The minor [lower] priests were not so many in Joshua’s times as [they were] not so long after. For when the first consecration of the Aaronic priests was made — thirty-nine years before, on Mount Sinai — below Aaron himself (who first of all received the Pontifical dignity), there were only four priests, his four sons: Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, Ithamar. And the former of these indeed, on the eighth day from the [day of] consecration, were consumed by a certain unhappy — but, on account of their own fault, just — fire, when they had left no children at all. But the two survivors — since they were younger in birth — who would reckon [them] to have had offspring already then? And yet, unless from the stock of these, no one could aspire to the priesthood — but of these [sons] whom these two also had begotten, [none was a priest] except [one] born twenty-five years [old], or 30 (as our [Interpreter] and the Hebrew [have it]). Whence [it] seems to be concluded [that] only those two, and their sons — but no grandsons — were initiated into the priesthood at the entry into that land. But how great the number of those was, is found by no calculation. Yet even if, from the thirty-eighth year, we were to imagine a son of theirs born to each every year, the priest-sons of both would nevertheless then scarcely have been thirty. But who would believe [that] those years [were] each so fertile that [the fathers] either always begot, or at least always [begot] sons? I therefore suspect [that], besides Eleazar the Pontiff, there was with Joshua [also] Ithamar his brother; [and] the sons of both, at least seven or eight [each], as is signified [in] ch. 6. If more, perhaps twelve, or not much more. From this, if anyone should think Ithamar to be subtracted from the number — because, [out of the six hundred thousand]—
(col. 416 — below the divider)
—[because, out of the] six hundred thousand Israelite men who came out of Egypt, not even Moses and Aaron crossed the Jordan, but only two pious [men], as it were spies — Joshua and Caleb: [it is] to be known [that] that so great slaughter of the others ran upon only those who, from the twentieth year of age, had been entered in the military rolls — unless [they had been] either implicated in the common fault of the [other] murmurers, or bound by some fault of their own, to which this penalty was divinely inflicted (as we have understood of those chief men, Moses and Aaron). But to this our Ithamar — since he was of Levitical stock — what [had he to do] with the military rolls? Since he is nowhere accused by scripture, why should we condemn him to death? Look at Eleazar his brother. [He] had gone out with the rest from Egypt, and yet he himself touched the blessed land. Nay indeed, [it] is the common opinion of the Hebrews — which, from our older [writers] too, Origen approves (homily 27 on Numbers) — [that] the deaths which were brought on in the wilderness did not pertain to the priests and Levites. But of these so few, nearly all think [that] only two carried the ark — so much so that in all the pictures this very [thing] is signified. In only one single writer — whose name, however, has slipped from my memory — I read [that] there were more bearers than two; and he cited Theodoret on 1 Kings [Reg.], quest. 20. But where [is] this work of Theodoret? That author also brings a reason for this same [thing]. But its weakness will appear in the following question; and therefore [there] is nothing [for which] I should wish to depart from the common opinion. And a reason can be added: that neither the weight of the burden, nor a wavering and danger of falling, would demand more [bearers] — nay, the manner of carrying (about which [in] the following question) would not admit [more]. Those two, moreover, I indeed reckon to be none other than the two surviving sons of Aaron, Eleazar and Ithamar — or certainly the [former], and his son Phinehas. For because, for the sake of greater veneration toward God, [and] of greater alacrity and consolation in the people, this carrying was now transferred from the Levites to the priests (as [was] said above), the best and most excellent from the number of those priests seem [to have been] employed. So too below, ch. 6 quest. 4.
(col. 417)