Numbers 16:28-44

²⁸Then Moses said, “By this you will know that Yahweh has sent me to do all these works, for I have not done them of my own accord.

²⁹If these men die a natural death such as normally happens, then Yahweh has not sent me.

³⁰But if Yahweh creates something new, and the earth opens its mouth and swallows them, with everything that they possess, and they go down alive into Sheol, then you must understand that these men have despised Yahweh.”

³¹As soon as Moses finished speaking all these words, the ground opened under those men.

³²The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them, their families, and all the people who belonged to Korah, as well as all their possessions.

³³So they and all that they possessed went down alive into Sheol. The earth closed over them, and they perished from among the community.

³⁴All Israel around them fled from their cries. They exclaimed, “The earth may swallow us up also!”

³⁵Then fire flashed out from Yahweh and devoured the 250 men who had offered incense.

³⁶Again Yahweh spoke to Moses and said,

³⁷“Speak to Eleazar son of Aaron the priest and let him take up the censers out of the flames, for the censers are set apart to me. Then let him scatter the burning coals at a distance.

³⁸Take the censers of those who lost their lives because of their sin. Let them be made into hammered plates as a covering over the altar. Those men did offer them before me, so they are set apart to me. They will be a sign of my presence to the people of Israel.”

³⁹Eleazar the priest took the bronze censers that had been used by the men who were burned up, and they were hammered out into a covering for the altar,

⁴⁰to be a reminder to the people of Israel, so that no outsider who was not descended from Aaron should come up to burn incense before Yahweh, so they might not become like Korah and his group—just as Yahweh had commanded through Moses.

⁴¹But the next morning all the community of the people of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron. They said, “You have killed Yahweh's people.”

⁴²Then it happened, when the community had assembled against Moses and Aaron, that they looked toward the tent of meeting and, behold, the cloud was covering it. Yahweh's glory appeared,

⁴³and Moses and Aaron came to the front of the tent of meeting.

⁴⁴Then Yahweh spoke to Moses. He said,