Rabbi Gordon - Shemot: 7th Portion
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1) From where do we know that the Jewish officers later become the 70 elders of the Sanhedrin?
2) And were there only 70 officers for the entire nation? That wouldn't be enough it seems for a nation of the size of the Israelites at the time.
Thank you very much.
1) The Talmud (Sanhedrin 17a) discusses the fact that Moshe was commanded to choose seventy elders in the desert with whom to share his prophetic vision (Numbers 11:16). These were the impetus for the Sanhedrin being made of seventy elders.
2) There were not only seventy officers. These were just the leaders Similar to how there are only a specific number of congressman and senators in the United States, but there are many more mayors, governors, and the like.
These seventy were the highest authorities, not the only authorities.
There was also a discussion somewhere that the 70 eiders represented 70 that entered Egypt with Yaakov during the famine, with 70 + 2 referring to Joseph's sons even though the counting was hazy. 66 or 69 or 70, and whether the 2 that later prophesied were doing so in the name of Hashem.