God set up the camp as follows:
The Tabernacle was in the midst of the camp (Numbers 2:17)
On the East side the tribes of Judah, Issachar and Zebulon camped
On the West side the tribes of Ephraim, Mannasseh and Benjamin camped
On the North side the tribes of Dan, Asher and Naphtali camped
On the South side the tribes of Rueben, Simeon and Gad camped
Many experts believe that the view from heaven as God looked upon the camp was in the shape of a cross.
“The tribes of Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun–collectively called the Camp of Judah–had to encamp east of the Levites. This poses a technical problem. Notice that if the breadth of their camp was larger than that of the Levites, the excess would be southeast or northeast, not east. Therefore, their camp could only be as wide as the Levites, and they then had to extend eastward to obtain whatever space they required.
The camps of Reuben, Ephraim, and Dan had the same constraint on the south, west, and north, respectively. The length of each leg would be proportional to total in each camp.
If we assemble what we can infer from the Torah account, we can imagine what the camp of Israel looked like from above: the tabernacle and the Levites in the center, surrounded by the four faces of the tribal standards, and each of the four camps of Judah, Ephraim, Reuben, and Dan, stretching out in the four cardinal directions.”
