Numbers 26:51 - Ellicott's Commentary On The Whole Bible

Six hundred thousand and a thousand seven hundred and thirty. — The sum total exhibits a decrease of 1,820, as compared with the census taken at Sinai thirty-eight years previously. On this decrease Bishop Wordsworth observes as follows: — “When the Israelites were suffering persecution in Egypt they ‘multiplied exceedingly’ (Exodus 1:7; Exodus 1:20); but after their deliverance from Egypt they rebelled against God, and ‘He consumed their days in vanity, and their years in trouble’ (Psalms 78:33).... Here there is comfort and warning to the Church and every soul in it — comfort in time of affliction, and warning in days of prosperity.”