Then came the children of Israel, even the whole congregation, into the desert of Zin in the first month: and the people abode in Kadesh; and Miriam died there, and was buried there.
Then came the children of Israel ... in the first month - i:e., of the fortieth year (cf. Numbers 20:22-23, with Numbers 33:38), reckoning the months of the year according to the calendar received by the Israelites. In this history only the principal and most important incidents are recorded-those confined chiefly to the first or second and the last years of the journeyings in the wilderness, thence called et-Tih. Between the last verse of the preceding and the first verse of this chapter there is a long and undescribed interval of 38 years. But there is no indication of this wide chronological gap in the record. The course of the narrative is continued in the beginning of this chapter by the prefixed conjunction (wa-); but the form or degree of connection intimated by this copulative is very various, and is frequently, as in this passage, left to be ascertained by the research of the reader, (see the notes at Genesis 1:2; Exodus 1:2; Deuteronomy 20:5-6; 1 Chronicles 10:14; Numbers 11:1, etc.)
Abode in Kadesh - (see the note at Numbers 13:26.) It was their second arrival after an interval of 38 years (Deuteronomy 11:16). The old generation had nearly all died, and the new one encamped in it with the view of entering the promised land; not, however, as formerly, on the south, but by crossing the Edomite region on the east.
Miriam died there - according to Josephus ('Antiquities,' b. 4:, ch. 4:, sec. 6), in the first day of the lunar month Zanthicus-four months before Aaron.