Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 25-26.

After the failure of Balak’s plan to have Balaam curse the Israelites, the Moabite women began seducing the Israelite men.  It is not clear if the men took part in the worship of Baal of Peor because it involved sexual activity, or if they took part in illicit sexual affairs with Moabite women and then joined them in worship of Baal afterwards.  I lean towards the former, but can see an argument for the latter.  In any case, those Israelite men who were conducting these sexual liaisons in blatant violation of the sexual laws already laid down became so brazen that one of them brought a woman to his tent past the assembly of the people who had met to decide how to address the issue.  The whole incident ended when Phinehas, Aaron’s grandson, killed the man who flaunted his disobedience and disrespect before the entire community, and the woman with whom he committed these acts.  The assembly had decided that those within their midst who had yoked themselves with the Baal of Peor by having sex with women who were part of that cult.  This man decided to challenge that edict.  Phinehas did not hesitate to act.  By doing so, he ended a plague which took the lives of 24,000 Israelites (probably a sexually transmitted disease).  Phinehas acted decisively.  When the Church has reached a decision on an issue, we should act with similar decisiveness (although I do not think the Church should be making decisions to take people’s lives).

I want to make one other point about this story.  This story clearly identifies the Israelite man whom Phinehas killed, and the woman who was killed along with him.  It gives both of their names, and their lineage.  Typically, when a story like this is made up, the people involved, other than the “hero” of the story, are only vaguely identified: “an Israelite man”, or “a Midianite woman”.  The story starts off that way and one might start to think, “Oh, this story was just made up”, even though the specific individuals who m Phinehas killed is not important to the story.  Then, when the story is complete, the writer goes, “Oh, by the way, it was these two specific people.”  The fact that the name and lineage of each of the people killed was given provides evidence that this account was not just a story made up to explain something.  It actually happened and the people who first told the story actually knew the people involved.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 25-26.

Immediately after Balaam blessed the Israelites rather than curse them on behalf of Balak, the Moabite women began inviting Israelite men to join them in the worship of Baal of Peor.  This worship apparently involved sexual acts, and my reading of this passage leads me to believe that the Israelite men joined the worship of Baal in order to indulge in those sexual acts.  As a result of their worship of Baal of Peor, a plague broke out among the Israelites.  The plague led the Israelites to assemble before the tabernacle to call upon God for forgiveness and healing.  While they were so assembled a man from the tribe of Simeon brought a Midianite woman, to whom he was not married, passed the assembly and into his tent for sex.  This behavior indicated that those who were doing this had a brazen disregard for what others in the community thought of their behavior, or even for the consequences of their behavior for others.  When Aaron’s grandson killed this man and the woman he was dallying with, the passage tells us that the plague ended, but not before it killed 24,000 Israelites.   I had suggested that perhaps the plague which killed the ten unfaithful spies was a sexually transmitted disease.  In this passage I am confident that the plague mentioned was a sexually transmitted disease.

Now, this passage starts by telling us that the Moabite women invited the Israelite men to join their worship of Baal, but the woman who was killed at the end of the incident was a Midianite.  And, God told Moses they should treat the Midianites as enemies because of this incident.  I am unsure how we should interpret this.  However, the biblical references to the Midianites suggest that they were either a nomadic people, or a people who settled in among other peoples in the area, or perhaps both to varying degrees.  If that is correct, perhaps when opposition arose to Israelite men partaking in the worship of Baal Peor they stopped being able to go into Moabite towns to do so, but Midianite women came to them to continue the practice.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 25-26.

I start a new job today and am unsure how that will impact my ability to continue this blog in the short term.  I entries completed about a week in advance at the moment (usually I am about two days in advance).  Hopefully that will give me enough time to figure out how to work out my new schedule to keep this going without interruption.

When Balak’s plan to curse the Israelites failed, the Moabites began seducing the Israelite men into worshiping their god, Baal of Peor.  It is worth noting that it appears that Baal did not refer to an individual deity, but instead to the chief god of a geographical location so that the Baal of Peor was a distinct god from Baal of Eshkalom (although evidence suggests that the worship practices for each were similar if not the same).  This fact may explain why Balak in yesterday’s passage took Balaam to multiple sites in his attempt to have Balaam curse the Israelites, Balak may have thought that the different sites would fall under a different god to whom Balaam could appeal to curse the Israelites.  In any case, the Israelites suffered a plague of some kind which resulted from the sexual immorality which they practiced with Midianite (and perhaps Moabite) women.  The plague ended when Phinehas (Aaron’s grandson) killed a family leader from the tribe of Simeon and the Midianite woman whom he was having sex with practically in front of the assembly mourning the immorality of the Israelites.   I am somewhat confused by the fact that the passage begins by saying that it was Moabite women who led the Israelite men into sexual immorality, but then God tells Moses that the Israelites should treat the Midianites as enemies because they had deceived the Israelites into worshiping Baal of Peor.  I have read several explanations for this transition, but not of them are satisfying.  Another one occurred to me today.  Perhaps, while it was the Moabite women who began using sex to convince Israelite men to take part in the worship of Baal of Peaor, the Midianite women may have been instrumental in convincing the Israelites that Baal of Peor and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were interchangeable.   There are several places in the Bible where we see indications that the Midianites shared more cultural similarities with the Israelites than other peoples in the area, and that they possessed more knowledge of the God of Abraham than the other peoples as well (Moses’ father-in-law was a Midianite priest of God).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 25-26.

Every time I read the account of the Israelites being seduced into worship of Baal of Peor I am not quite sure what to make of it. It seems a bit harsh, but that’s not what I have trouble following.  Basically, there seems to be more going on here than what is written.  So, we are told that the Israelites began worshiping the gods of the Midianites, that God told Moses what to do about it, and that Moses gathered the judges he had appointed to tell them what to do about it.  However, when it describes the man who brought a Midianite woman to his tent it seems to imply that a large group of people had gathered to mourn. Further, after Phinehas killed the Israelite and the woman he had taken to his tent, it tells us that the plague was stopped.

So, it suggests to me that the people had gathered in assembly to ask God what to do about the plague.  Further, the phrasing suggests to me that this assembly went on for several days such that the man who brought the Midianite woman to his tent was fully aware that he was acting in defiance of this assembly. It requires a certain brazenness to openly flout the moral sensibilities of the people in front of them the way that he did.  He was more or less daring them to do anything about his actions, a dare which Phinehas took.  I want to note that the man whom Phinehas killed was a leader of the tribe of Simeon, a role which he thought allowed him to be exempt from the rules applied to others.  I want to make note of one other thing which I have never quite understood, the writer thought we should know the name, and family, of the Israelite man and Midianite woman whom Phinehas killed for their sin.