And he set threescore and ten thousand of them to be bearers of burdens, and fourscore thousand to quarry in the mountains, and three thousand and six hundred overseers to make the people work.
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Bede
AD 735
Now the overseers who were in charge of each operation are the writers of sacred Scripture by whose teaching authority we are instructed in all things as to how best to teach the ignorant and correct the contemptuous, to bear each other’s burdens so that we may fulfill the law of Christ. But the more each one labors in giving his neighbors support in their needs or in correcting their mistakes, the more surely may he expect in the life to come the rewards whether of peace of soul after death or of blessed immortality of body. Consequently, the aforesaid overseers are rightly recorded as numbering 70,000 and 80,000: 70,000 because of the sabbath rest of souls for the seventh day is consecrated to the sabbath, that is, rest; 80,000 because of the hope of resurrection on the eighth day, that is, after the sabbath, has already taken place in the Lord, and, it is hoped, will take place in us also on the eighth day and in the eighth age to come. The overseers, on the other hand, were 3,300, ...
