Numbers 9:3

3. At even Hebrews, between the two evenings. The first evening began when the sun crossed the meridian, and the second at sunset. See Exodus 12:6, note.

According to all the rites R.V., “statutes.” The changed circumstances must have rendered some slight variations necessary. There is no express command, it is true, that the blood, instead of being smeared upon the lintel and posts of the doors or entrances to the tents, should be sprinkled upon the altar of burnt offering, but it is quite probable that this change was made, since there was no destroying angel about to pass through the camp, while there was a newly-consecrated altar upon which the blood of all animals slain for food, as well as in sacrifice, was to be poured out. See Leviticus 17:1-6, notes. The objection raised by Kurtz, that the priests, Aaron, Eleazar, and Ithamar, would be unable to perform this service, is relieved by the suggestion that they were assisted by the Levites in every thing but the act of sprinkling. See chap. Numbers 8:19, note. Assuming that one sheep a year old would furnish a supper for fifteen males and fifteen females, 80,000 lambs would be required. If it was possible in the time of the Emperor Nero to sprinkle upon the altar of the temple the blood of 256,500 paschal lambs in one afternoon by actual count, according to Josephus, it must have been possible in Moses’s time to sprinkle the blood of less than one third of that number upon an altar five cubits square. But this difficulty disappears if we suppose that the law of the passover takes the precedence of subsequent laws for the treatment of the blood. In this case each slayer of a lamb disposes of the blood at his own tent. A pastoral nation could easily furnish one sheep for every thirty of its population.