5. The word is also applied to a representative assembly.——
—After the regular organization of the Israelitish commonwealth, although Moses transacted all public business with the chiefs, he is uniformly represented as speaking unto all Israel. This form of speech was not to be misunderstood by the Jews. They had not learned to deny that principle upon which the represented identify with the representative. Deut. xxix. 14, 15, 25. When Moses was about to give his last advice to the Hebrews, he summoned the KEL before him. Deut. xxxi. 30. In this instance, the word unquestionably signifies a representative body. My reasons for considering it so, are,
1. The obvious meaning of the passage. Ver. 29. “Gather unto me all the elders of your tribes—that I may speak these words in their ears.”—ver. 30. “And Moses spake in the ears of all the קהל—the words of this song.” The KEL of Israel are the elders and officers met together.
2. It is impossible it can be otherwise. Moses could not speak in the ears of all Israel, except by representation. No human voice can extend over two millions of men.
3. Upon the principle of representation Moses uniformly acted. He instructed the elders, and the elders commanded the people. Deut. xxvii. 1. “And Moses, with the elders of Israel, commanded the people.” Without multiplying texts, I refer the reader to Exod. xii. 3. “Speak unto all the congregation of Israel”—verse 21. “Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel.” Even in the most solemn acts of religion, the elders represented the whole congregation. Their hands were placed upon the head of the bullock which was offered to make atonement for the whole congregation. Lev. iv. 15. And that the reader may not be without an instance of the use of the word KEL, in the most abstract form which can exist upon the representative principle itself, I refer him to Gen. xxviii. 3. Here it is applied to a single individual. Higher than this, representation cannot be carried. Ver. 1. “Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him”—ver. 3. “That thou mayest be a KEL.” Jacob was a KEL, as the representative@ of a very numerous posterity.
6. The word is used to signify a council—an assembly for deliberation and judgment. Gen. xlix. 6. The patriarch speaks of Simeon and Levi, these two are a KEL. It is, indeed, a representative one. Verse 7. “I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.” This could have been said of the two sons of Jacob, only as including their posterity.
This KEL was however a council. They consulted and determined to destroy the Schechemites. The assembly was a conspiracy. The Septuagint renders the word by Συστασις.
The KEL in which Job cried for redress, could not have been the church of Israel, but a court of Judicature. Job xxx. 28.
Solomon, acquainted with the laws of Israel, must have referred to the power of Judicatures, in detecting crimes, when he spoke of the KEL, in Prov. xxvi. 26. and v. 14.
The KEL, to which Ezekiel refers, xvi. 40. and xxiii. 45-47. cannot be mistaken. The prophet himself expressly says this KEL would sit in judgment, try, and decide, and execute the sentence, upon those who came before them, In these verses, the Septuagint renders the word by Οχλος, and our translation of it is company.