Over Fifty Mature Male Mentors
It is interesting that many of the new bible translations incorrectly use the word “retire” when translating the scriptures below. They give the idea that at age fifty these men were suppose to stop working and go sit in a rocking chair and wait to die. But nothing could be father from the truth.
Numbers 8:25 (NKJV)-M
25 and at the age of fifty years they must cease performing this work, and shall no more do the work themselves [but instead serve in a supervisory role].
Numbers 8:26 (NIV)-M
26 They may assist their brothers in performing their duties at the Tent of Meeting, [in a supervisory role] but they must not do the work themselves. This, then, is how you are to assign the responsibilities of the Levites.”
At age fifty a man is fully mature and seasoned by many years of real life experience. He is then qualified to give direction to the young men so that they do not have to repeat all of the same mistakes he did in the past.
This is why God told the senior men to stop doing the job themselves at age fifty and begin to take on a supervisory role in mentoring the young men on how to do that job in proper manner (using the right techniques).
If any man is over age fifty he should begin to find ways to mentor young men by imparting the experience he has gained over the previous decades of working in those fields of expertise.
Sniper Illustration
During time of war, the enlisted men are told not to salute their officers because the snipers would identify their leaders and shoot them. When an officer is taken out then there is no direction for the young men and they generally do not know what to do. So enemy snipers resorted to observation and watched for the men who had grey hair and glasses (over age 50) and whom the young solders looked to for direction. Then the enemy snipers would shoot these senior leaders and cause great havoc among the leaderless surviving young men.
Note: If enemy snipers view the (over age fifty) leaders as high value targets then why would we force these over age fifty men to retire? This is a false idea that is promoted by the false translations of NASB, AMP, NIV2011, NIV84, HCSB, and NLT (which all falsely use the word “retire” in their translations)?
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