Where is The Count? Here are the Numbers

  *

For My Next Number...

Look at us, three books down and only...checks his notes...sixty-three to go. Holy Moses. Hmm, let's look at it another way. We've polished off 102 pages, which means we've only got...907 more in front of us.

    Sounds a bit daunting, doesn't it? Although I'm trying to look at it this way: it's bound to get better at some point and with over nine hundred pages to go it's got a lot of chances. I mean, God must mellow at some point, right? Finally decide that all of this "My way or you're toast (literally)" attitude isn't really endearing him to those swing voters out there.

    We'll see.

    My first question in approaching the fourth book in what is called the Pentateuch, or Books of Moses, was "Why is it called Numbers?". Luckily, the answer was provided right up front as I read it, and that answer is that there are a lot of numbers involved. I mean a lot.** As in taking a census sorts of numbers. God wants Moses and Aaron to count all of the Israelite men over the age of twenty, as this is a age group considered to be eligible for military service. Yep, strapping young man to advanced geezer, they're all considered to be battlefield fodder. 

    With an interesting exception. The Levite men, the descendents of Levi, son of Jacob, are exempt. God has other plans for them.

    But I'm getting ahead of myself. That can happen when your subject is as exciting as a military draft census. Chapter 1 opens with... 

    The Lord spoke to Moses

    Just in case we might have otherwise jumped to the conclusion that...

Moses had an idea

    Which Moses knows better than to do.

    What God tells Moses is that he wants a 

2)census of the whole congregation of Israelites, in their clans, by ancestral house, according to the number of names, every male individually; 3)from twenty years old and upward, everyone able to go to war.

    God then specifies who he wants assigned to the census committee: one man from each of the twelve tribes (the Levites make it a baker's dozen, but that's for the scholars to discuss) and so Moses calls a meeting, explains the goal, and they get busy making their count. Verses 20 through 43 give us the details for each of the tribes. We'll just mention here that the tribe with the mostest is the Judah clan, with 74,600 eligible males, and the tribe with the leastest is the Manasseh Family with just 32,200 to contribute. Add them all up and we get 603,550. It says so, right in verse 46.

    It doesn't say how long it took to do the census, but I'm thinking it must have taken the better part of an afternoon.

    God then tells Moses he has other plans for the Levite men and those plans are related to the tabernacle, specifically when it needs to be packed up for travel and then when it needs to be set up again. And just so Moses knows it's the one and only Actual God handing out these directions, death is promised to anyone else who might try to volunteer for tabernacle duty.

    Chapter 2 is all about where the Twelve Tribes are supposed to setup camp relative to the tabernacle. East side, west side, all around the tent.

    Chapter 3 opens up with a reminder of what happened to Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron who didn't get the timing right with the incense back in Leviticus, Chapter 10, so that's nice. And then we get a few of the particulars regarding the Duties of the Levites. Well, actually, we don't get much in the way of particulars here, but we do get another reminder from God that he's not going to tolerate any non-Levite elements messing around the Tent of Meeting.

    God then tells Moses that the Levites are going to serve as substitutes for the claim God has on all the Israelite first borns and I've got to admit I still don't understand what is going on with that. What I did get here is that God now wants Moses to conduct another census, but this time just of the Levite males a month old and older. Seems to me that could be a sort of never-ending task, because by the time you've counted them all there are bound to be more kiddos that were twenty-some days old who now qualify. I mean, you knew I was kidding with the whole "better part of an afternoon" gag, right?

    It seems there are three sorts of Levites and they all need their own censuses, if that's the word I want. And each of those groups are to be assigned certain duties related to the transport of the tabernacle, which of course, complex and exacting as its construction was, is designed to be portable. Providing you've got the manpower. Which apparently they have.

1. The Gershons:  
1. 7,500
1. In charge of the tent, hangings, screen, altar and cords.
2. The Kohaths:
1. 8,600
1. In charge of the ark, table, lampstand, altars (wait a sec, are these different altars?) the vessels of the sanctuary, and the screen (Okay now, two screens? If I had more time I'd look back at the building plans in Exodus. But that's not part of the deal here.)
3. The Mahlites:
1. 6,200
2. In charge*** of the hardware and framework.

    Back to the firstborn thing in a section titled "The Redemption of the Firstborn." God has Moses do yet another census, this time of all the firstborns among the Israelites. And then we get this bit of math.

     22,273 Firstborns

    -22,000 Levites

    =    273

    X        5 shekels

    = 1,365 shekels owed to Aaron and Sons

    As far as I can figure out, God is saying that he will leave the firstborns alone (thank goodness!) in exchange for having the Levites as his employees for life with such duties to be passed on generation to generation, amen and if you're a Levite boy don't you go dreaming about being a chorus boy on Broadway or a dentist. And since there aren't quite enough Levites to match the number of firstborns, he will accept cash in lieu of toddlers. And since he has no use for cash because everybody always pays for him wherever he goes, the money should go to his man Aaron (who is still hoping the Golden Calf episode doesn't come up again) and Sons.

    I hope that makes sense. If I can come up with a better way to explain it all I will amend this installment. Because that's what we do with the Bible. See A Word From the Committee.

    Let's wrap up today's installment with Chapter 4, in which God tells Moses to, you guessed it, take another damned census. By now Moses must be wondering where he's going to get any more slates and chalk and abacuses, if that's the word that is the plural of abacus, which probably wasn't in use by the ancient Israelites anyway so what does it matter, not to mention the fact (see note about facts) that fewer and fewer folks are turning up for Census Taker Volunteer Training classes. 

    But take another census he does and this time it restricts itself to Levite men between the ages of thirty and fifty, so it's not nearly as time and resource intensive. The rest of the chapter goes on and on and on and, quite literally, on with just how to prep all of the elements of the tabernacle when it's time to move on and who is going to carry said elements and it's up to Aaron and Sons to make sure everything is wrapped up in blue cloth and fine leather before the worker bees are allowed to come in and carry any of it off because if they don't and the worker bees touch anything they are not worthy to touch they are going to, you guessed it, die.

    Next time we'll learn exactly what to do when a wife has either been unfaithful, or her hubby just thinks his wife has been unfaithful. So far in my advanced reading I haven't come across what to do if a man has been screwing around. It must be here somewhere.    

*The Superstition Mountains

**When I say "lots" I mean that even the Kid's Adventure Bible makes mention of the fact* that there were at least a couple million Israelites wandering around the desert with Moses. So my guess in an earlier installment here has the highest scholarship to back it up.

        *I do hold to the "Facts are facts" as opposed to let's believe whatever we're told school of mental processing. And let's face it, some of the "facts" we've been presented with so far have been just a tad, shall we say, incredible.

***By "in charge", let me just make crystal clear that they are to serve pretty much as pack animals and they are never, ever, under any circumstance, actually touch any part of the tabernacle unless it is securely wrapped up in blue cloth and stretch wrap.

  *

What Shall We Do With 

the Jealous Husband?**

Often as not a chapter will cover a few different, seemingly unrelated subjects. In the case of Numbers, Chapter 5, we get:

1. Unclean Persons
2. Confession and Restitution
3. Concerning an Unfaithful Wife

    I know you're anxious to learn all about the unfaithful wife, but we're going to take things in order. For each one, we're told that the Lord spoke to Moses, so one is just as important as the others. I guess.

    First off, God tells Moses that anyone who has leprosy, or nasty oozing, or has been touching a corpse has to set up their tent outside of the main camp.

    Side note: Don't there seem to be a lot of references to corpse touching? And honestly, I haven't included nearly all of them in my little summaries here, but take it from me, corpse touching gets a lot of ink in Exodus, Leviticus, and now here in Numbers. It makes a person think that folks were dropping dead on an alarmingly regular schedule, not only causing grief for their families and friends, but also creating a situation where those same families and friends had to choose between either lovingly taking care of the mortal remains or risk being ostracized by the community at large. Were there no undertakers amongst the six hundred thousand combat ready alpha males?

    As for the confession and restitution section, essentially God says that whatever loss someone suffers on account of another person, the guilty party owes the victim that same amount plus twenty percent for pain and suffering. And if the victim isn't around anymore and neither are his or her heirs, then whatever is owed goes to Aaron and Sons. This is called Priestly Passive Income.

    And now...

    

    Concerning an Unfaithful Wife

    Here's the deal. If a husband either pretty much knows, or even just thinks that his wife has been engaged in a bit of extracurricular dalliancing, what is called "a spirit of jealousy" here, he is to bring said wife, along with a bit of barley flour to the priest. The priest will sit the wife down and put the barley flour in her hands. He then says some words about how the process is to proceed and what she can expect if things go one way or the other. The priest scrapes some dirt off the floor of the tabernacle, mixes it up in some water and makes her drink the nasty water. The upshot here is that if she had indeed been doing some unauthorized frolicking, the dirty water will make her uterus drop and her womb discharge, and there will be no pitter patter of little feet in her future. If her husband is just paranoid and generally prone to unfounded suspicions then her uterus and womb will be no worse for the experience. In either case,

31) The man shall be free from iniquity

    Of course he will.

    I hadn't heard of the Nazirites before Chapter 6 here, but the footnotes helped out. It seems there is a process non-Levites can go through in order to "separate themselves to the Lord", which I guess means they get special attention and maybe a merit badge or two. Once they have gone through the initiation, they get to call themselves Nazirites. And what, you may ask, are they required to do in order to earn this distinction?

1. Stay away from grapes.
2. No visits to the hairdresser or barbershop.
3. No touching of corpses. See, there it is again.
1. If corpse touching is unavoidable it can all be made right with a properly throttled brace of pigeons or turtledoves and a roasted lamb.
4. All prior requirements being met, the candidate will present a male lamb, a ewe lamb (both a year old and free of blemishes), a basket of nice unleavened bread, cakes of choice flour, a wicker tray lined with a tea towel from Selfridge's on which twelve identical, beautifully baked prune danish have been placed.*** 
5. They then can shave their heads and have a nice glass of Manischewitz.
6. We end Chapter 6 with a nice bit that brought back some nice memories of my time spent in the Methodist and then United Methodist church as a kiddo, youth, and young adult. If I recall correctly, services and youth meetings always ended with what I now know are verses 24-26, Chapter 6, the Book of Numbers. It is a bit of an oasis amidst all the banishment, consumption by fire, and jealous husbands we've been dealing with here.

24 The Lord bless you and keep you,

25 the Lord make his face to shine 

upon you, and be gracious unto you;

26 The Lord lift up his countenance

upon you, and give you

peace.

AMEN

    Isn't that nice? But we're not done with today's installment yet, so stick around. Chapter 7 is a nice long one, but I think we can sum it up pretty easily. After the tabernacle is all built and decorated, Moses has the leaders of the Twelve Tribes bring six covered wagons and twelve oxen to the big tent of meeting. Two of the wagons and four oxen are turned over to the Gershonites to help them transport the tabernacle parts they are responsible for. Four wagons and eight oxen are given to the Merarites for the same thing. But wait a sec! you're saying, what about the Kohathities? They're responsible for a bunch of tabernacle hardware too. True, but the stuff they're assigned to transport all has loop and pole setups and has to be carried by humans of sturdy build. Lucky them.

    After this is established, we get a listing of the gifts each of the tribes brings to celebrate the Grand Opening of the Tabernacle. Everybody must have been looking at the same items in the gift registry because they all bring the same items. It adds up to:

• 12 silver plates
• 12 silver basins
• 12 golden dishes filled with incense
• 12 bulls
• burnt offering
• 12 rams
• burnt offering
• 12 male lambs a year old
• grain offering
• 12 male goats
• sin offering
• 24  bulls
• sacrifice of well being
• 60 rams
• sacrifice of well being
• 60 male goats
• sacrifice of well being
• 60 male lambs a year old
• sacrifice of well being

    The chapter ends with Moses going into the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, whose voice comes from above the mercy seat on the ark, between the two cherubim. What they speak about isn't covered here. I'm hoping the subject of just how Aaron and Sons were supposed to go about cleaning up the place after slaughtering 252 animals.

    Chapter 8 covers two topics.

1. A repeat of God's expectations concerning the lamps.
1. 7 lamps in front of the lampstand
2. Lampstand to be made out of hammered gold.
2. The sort of ceremony needed in order to bring the Levites up to snuff so they can do the tabernacle related duties God wants them to do. There is washing, shaving, bull sacrificing, and some laundry involved. You can read the whole thing if you want, quite honestly I was beginning to nod off so I may have missed something.

* A California Condor, as photographed by the Navajo Bridge in northern Arizona

**Nothing.

*** Just seeing if you're paying attention.

  *

Stop Complaining

and

Blow That Trumpet

But first, make sure you celebrate Passover when and how God says. That is the subject of Chapter 9. And yes, I know God covered that back in Exodus, Chapter 12, but as we all know, a great way to make sure someone retains information is through repetition. So here is what God tells Moses during a conversation they are having during the first month of the second year since they put on their traveling sandals and skedaddled out of Egypt.

    Passover is to be on the 14th day of the 1st month of the year. Sunset to sunset to be specific. Although the translation here says "twilight", the footnote assures us that what God really means is "between the two evenings." As usual, any corpse touching** will disqualify a person from participation.

    Moses takes notes and then passes the info along to the congregation. A few folks grumble about how they might miss out because of a bit of corpse touching they have planned and can't get out of, and how can that be fair? Others want to know what if they happen to be traveling and can't get home in time for the holiday?

    Moses takes their concerns to God, who says, "No problem, if you've touched a corpse (or happen to be on the road***) right before or during Official Passover, you can have Makeup Passover on the 14th day of the 2nd month. How's that? But those are the only exceptions. If you're in town and haven't defiled yourself attendance is mandatory.

    Passover being taken care of, we move on to how the Israelites are going to know when they are supposed to strike camp. That is covered quite nicely in the "Cloud and Fire" section.

    God tells Moses that as long as the cloud he calls Home away from Heaven is covering the tabernacle they are to stay put. He'll make it easy to see in the night time by making the cloud look like fire, which is a nifty trick he just learned and is anxious to put into use. But when the cloud lifts, then is the time to pick up and go to the next KOA campground. They won't need a compass or Rand McNally, all they'll need to do is follow the cloud. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

    But what about the folks whose tents are too far away to be line of sight with the tabernacle you may well ask? I mean, we are talking about a "camp" with a population rivaling that of modern day Houston. How are they supposed to know it's time to pack up and move? 

    That, my friend, is covered in Chapter 10. 

    God tells Moses to make (I'm going to assume that what he actually wants Moses to do is delegate) a couple of silver trumpets of the hammered work variety. Those are to be used by Aaron's two surviving sons, Eleazar and Ithamar, to communicate with the population. One tune will be their cue to gather at the tabernacle for services or potluck or community talent show night, and another tune God calls "alarm" is to signal it's time to move one. The trumpets are also to be played during the burnt offering and well being sacrifices just to add a festive air to the proceedings.

    I know, once again we are dealing with a huge population, necessarily spread over an enormous chunk of land. Wynton Marsalis himself couldn't blow a note that would carry that far. Maybe God also had Moses delegate someone to make a FM radio station and pocket radios were distributed and Moses just didn't think it was worth mentioning here. Maybe.

    In any case, before you know it, on the 20th day of the second month of the second year since they crossed the border illegally, the cloud lifts. Everybody knows their assignments, they pack up their tents and the tabernacle and they head Paran way. I've used a bit of my allotted research time to try to figure out how far away Paran is, but as is often the case none of the scholars really want to commit to anything specific. Mount Sinai is, of course, on the Sinai Peninsula. So, apparently, is Paran. It's a bit south, but it covers a fair amount of area and we really don't know where precisely in Paran they ended up. So let's not worry about it, okay?

    One interesting thing we do learn at the end of this chapter is that every time they were getting ready to move on, Moses would say this,

Arise, O Lord, let your enemies be scattered,

and your foes flee before you.

    And when they arrive at the next stop, he would say,

Return, O Lord of the ten thousand

thousands of Israel.

    Kind of a "Please make sure nothing bad happens to us on the road" followed by a "Hey! We're here! You can settle your cloud now!"

    Remember back in Exodus when the Israelites were complaining about the lack of rations? Sure you do, that's when God sent them Manna From Heaven. Apparently, in spite of all of the references to slaughtered and roasted bulls and rams and goats and ewes and whatnot we've been getting treated to, giving the impression that there was protein on the hoof in great number traveling with them, manna is what the two million plus general population has been existing on since that time. Wake up, gather the manna from under the morning dew, fancy it up the best you can with herbs and a box of Manna From Heaven Helper maybe, but what you ate yesterday is what you're going to eat today and tomorrow, and the people are getting tired of it. So Chapter 11 is called "Complaining in the Desert" and that is what they are complaining about. 

    God, being quite content to live off of pleasing aromas from fricasseed livestock, is not sympathetic. He expresses his impatience with what he perceives as the Israelites' lack of gratitude by scorching the outer parts of the camp. We're not told what the casualty numbers are.

    After a bit of back and forth with Moses, God says "You want meat? I'll give you meat for a month!" And he flies in a bunch of quail from the sea, piling them up  two cubits deep on either side of the camp a day's journey away. A motivated bunch of Israelites rush out, make the world's first barbeque festival, and begin to fill up on avian protein. And then, in verse 33...

But while the meat was still in between their teeth, before it was consumed,, the anger of the Lord was kindled against the people, and the Lord struck the people with a very great plague.

    Another example of "Don't wish too hard for what you want, or then you might get it, and I do mean get it." You can believe there was a lot of corpse touching happening after that, because we're told that the people who "had the craving" were buried where they had been barbequing. The survivors even gave the place a catchy name, Kibroth-harraavah, which is Hebrew for "Eat your damn manna." A Park Service plaque is put up and they move on to Hazeroth. And no, I don't know where that is.

   But I do know that Moses' brother and sister, Aaron and Miriam, are experiencing a bit of sibling jealousy, because Chapter 12 tells us all about it. They can't seem to get over the fact that although they are actual prophets and Aaron is the Head Priest and can touch any part of the tabernacle he wants to without exploding, Moses really does seem to be God's Favorite**** and it's Just Not Fair.

    God tells them to settle down. Yes, he has chosen Moses to be his BFF (for now), but that's just the way it is. Then he strikes Miriam with leprous skin and says she needs to pitch a tent outside of camp for a week to think about what she's done.

    Nothing happens to Aaron. What a surprise.

*That's Copper. He was a good woofer and a great photo subject.

**We just can't get away from the corpse touching, can we?

***Aren't all of them kinda perpetually (or at least for forty years) on the road? Just asking.

****Which just happens to be the title of one of Neil Simon's more obscure plays. It is a comic retelling of the story of Job set in modern times. I was in a student production of "God's Favorite" in college and while we had a great time putting it on and the audience (small) seemed to appreciate it, it wasn't tough to figure out why it remains one of that tremendously popular and accomplished playwrights least performed works. I also happened to be in a college production of Sondheim's "Anyone Can Whistle", which is a bit of a fascinating trainwreck interrupted here and there by terrific tunes.

*****Gee, lots of footnotes today.

  *

Why It Took Forty Years

I know I've wondered out loud here more than once about just why in the world it took the Moses and the Israelites forty years to make their way to the Land Of Milk And Honey, aka Canaan. Well, the next few chapters spell it out for us, kinda, so let's get to it.

    Apparently their camp in the wilderness of Paran is pretty close to the Milk and Honey border, so in Chapter 13 Moses summons a hardy member from each of the Twelve Tribes (no Levites, right?) and tells them he wants a scouting report before the entire group makes the big push into the land God has promised. He wants to know all about the valleys, the hills, the fields, the people, what the towns are like, you know, the lay of the land. He also wants some fruit samples brought back. Just to make the assignment seem exciting and sexy he tells them they are spies and that the fruit should be "stolen."

    In case you want to know their names, here is the Israelites answer to the Dirty Dozen. It's not going to be on a quiz or anything, but if you want to memorize them I guarantee you'll blow away everyone at a party where some guy thinks he can impress the gathering by reciting the names of the Seven Dwarfs** or the Fifteen Counties of Arizona***.

1. Team Reuben: Shammua
2. Team Simeon: Shapnat
3. Team Judah: Caleb
4. Team Issachar: Igal
5. Team Ephraim: Hoshea (Moses changes his name to Joshua. Just because)
6. Team Benjamin: Palti
7. Team Zebulun: Gaddiel
8. Team Joseph: Gaddi
9. Team Dan: Ammiel
10. Team Asher: Sethur
11. Team Naphtali: Nahbi
12. Team Gad: Geuel

    The boys cross the border when nobody's looking and spread out to gather the needed intel. A couple of them come across a vineyard where they snip a bunch of grapes off a vine. It must have been a hella big bunch of grapes, because they have to tie it to a pole and carry it between the two of them on their shoulders. Land of Milk, Honey and Mega Fruit indeed.

    Forty days later they return to camp with their report. The land is indeed one of plenty, but the people who live there are big and scary and all but two of the spies are of the opinion that it is too dangerous to try to boot the existing tenants out. They are all for turning around and heading back to Egypt. The only two who think they should go ahead with the plan are Caleb and Joshua (formerly Hoshea), who lobby unsuccessfully for forging ahead.

    The larger congregation gets wind of the report of big and scary people in Canaan and in Chapter 14 they decide the Go Back To Egypt Plan sounds good to them. This upsets Moses and Aaron so much that they fall on their faces in front of everyone. Really, that's what it says in verse 5. Caleb and Joshua try to help Moses by telling the rest of the Israelites that with God on their side it'll all be okay, that Yes They Can boot all the nasty, scary people out of Canaan, but the people tell them to shut their pie holes or they'll take them out and stone them to death. Really, that's what it says in verse 10.

    God gets wind of what's going on and so he comes down and says he's done with all this disobedience and appalling lack of faith and by golly he's going to kill everyone and just start over. By now I think we can call this God's version of "Do you want me to stop this car? Because if it doesn't settle down back there I'm stopping the car. I mean it." Once again, Moses talks him down, telling him that wiping out the people God led out of Egypt wouldn't be good for his reputation. I mean, be real, what would the Egyptians think? He would be a laughing stock is what would happen. So God relents, kind of, by saying that he won't kill everybody, but he'll be good and gosh darned if the adults of the troupe are ever going to live to see the Land of Milk and Honey. And this is where I'm starting to get some clarity about why it's going to take forty years. God's going to make them wander around the edges of Canaan until the original cast members all croak, and then their descendents can take the land.

    But in the meantime, not being a big fan of delayed gratification, God does still want to smite at least a few of them. He does this in two steps. First, he sends a plague down on the ten spies who messed up his plan. I'm not sure how one arranges such a specifically targeted plague, but since he is All Knowing, maybe he knew they were going to be difficult beforehand and while they were playing at being secret agents he guided them in the path of acquiring some Canaanite STDs during their forty days in amongst the heathens. In my five minutes of research trying to figure out why God has such a poor opinion of those people it does seem that they are reported to have been a society of, shall we say, swingers. 

The amateur spies may have seen too many Bond movies and behaved accordingly.

    The general population Israelites, seeing how things are going and not wanting any more generalized plagues heading their way, put down their "Heck No! We Won't Go!" signs and banners and decide the best way to get back on God's good side is by marching into Canaan like they had agreed to way back when. But since he is still peeved at them, God doesn't go along to be their co-pilot, as it were, and it turns into a bit of an OT Bay of Pigs. 

45) Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who lived in that hill country came down and defeated them, pursuing them as far as Hormah.

    No, I do not know where Hormah is, but it doesn't sound like an all-inclusive resort.

    Just as the whole Will They Invade or Won't They Invade story is getting really interesting, Chapter 15 takes us off on another tangent with what seems to me to be yet another repeat of God's instructions about how he likes his sacrifices. There isn't anything in the thirty-one verses about this that is new as far as I can tell, so we'll just move on to the other two topics in the chapter. If you've become a sacrifices aficionado you're welcome to take the deep dive. 

    First, we are treated to the story of the man who goes out to gather sticks on the sabbath. This is during the Israelites' wandering in the wilderness days. Some of his fellow wanderers get wind of his activities so they grab him by the scruff of the robe and haul him off to stand in front of Moses to explain himself. Moses, of course, consults with God about how to handle the miscreant and God, of course, tells Moses that stick gathering on the sabbath merits death by stoning. The congregation complies with some gusto. Nothing like a good stoning to bring a community together.

    The last bit in this chapter has to do with God telling Moses that he wants everyone to wear fringe and a blue cord all the time. This is because he thinks it will remind the people not to misbehave. Kind of like a string around your wrist is supposed to help you remember something. I guess. My experience with people favoring fringe has been variable.

    Now back to some larger scale infractions, this time involving three gents by the name of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, all of which set off the spellcheck. It's pretty serious stuff, so if the Baby Name Consultant**** you're working with suggests any of those names I think it would be wise to request more choices. I know some folks like to name their kids after characters in the Bible and these three did get their names in the title of Chapter 16, but not for a good reason, as you will see.

Revolt of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram

    So what are they revolting against you may ask? Well, they're members of Team Levite, you know, the ones who work in the tabernacle. They're not Aaron's immediate kin so they're not priests, but still, they've got what I think most of the Israelites probably considered to be some of the more prestigious jobs to be had. But that's not good enough for Korah, Dathan, and Abiram and the two hundred and fifty fellow Levites they convince to come along with them. They're unhappy about the fact that God talks with Moses, and sort of talks with Aaron and Sons, and they think it has given those four an unappealing sort of outsized opinion of themselves. When they tell Moses this he does what the men of the time do when confronted with astonishing news: he falls on his face. Really, it's in verse 4.

4)When Moses heard it, he fell on his face.

    See?

    After he stands back up and wipes the desert dust from his eyebrows Moses tries to explain why things are the way they are and how some people are destined to be management and others worker bees, but the three ringleaders and their two hundred and fifty fellow grumblers don't understand, so they get their incense burners and gather in front of the tabernacle to stage a rally.

    God sees what's going on and he tells Moses and Aaron and Sons to back off, he's got this. He waits until Korah, Dathan, and Abiram have gone back to their tents, tells everyone else to give him some room, waits for the three ringleaders to obligingly step out of their tents with their entire families, and opens up the ground beneath their feet so they can...

go down alive into Sheol*****

    Yep, the ringleaders, their families and all their household goods get the old trap door treatment. And right after that, in verse 35...

35)And fire came out from the Lords and consumed the two hundred fifty men offering the incense

    It's like they hadn't gotten the memo about what happened to Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu and their experiences with ill-timed incense burning.

    As if things weren't bad enough, just about everyone else gets their drawers in a bunch about what has just happened to Korah and Company they start yelling at Moses and Aaron. Like it's their fault. Yet again God feels he needs to step in to calm things down and his go-to method for that is to kill everybody; a plan he sets in motion with another plague. If it wasn't for the fact that Aaron does some quick running into the midst of the congregation with his own special incense formulation that acts as a sort of vaccine against Divinely Inspired Plagues, God's intention to end the whole Israelite Experiment would have come to a successful conclusion. As it is, only 14,700 dead. Plus, of course, the two hundred fifty and the three unfortunate households. But still, considering they've still got two million people who escaped the smiting, I think that is what we call an Old Testament Happy Ending. 

*We had a nice sunrise yesterday. It was ninety-three degrees at 5:45 AM, but the sky was pretty.

**Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Methuselah

• ***Apache, Cochise, Coconino, Gila, Graham, Greenlee, LaPaz, Maricopa, Mohave, Navajo, Pima, Pinal, Santa Cruz, Yavapai, Yuma

****There is at least one such consultant out there charging $295 for a five minute session. I'm thinking blogging about the Bible maybe wasn't my most lucrative late in life career choice.

*****I looked it up, and Sheol is the place of darkness where dead people go awaiting their judgment, or some sort of thing like that. The Hebrew faith doesn't seem to have quite the same sort of concept of Heaven and Hell as a lot of us might understand it, but perhaps Sheol could be described as having some of the features of both Hell and Purgatory. References to it in the OT are usually rather brief and sketchy, but it doesn't sound like a happy place to be sent to all of a sudden, even if you are with your wife and kids. Or maybe especially if you are with your wife and kids.

  *

Of Almonds, Tithes, Water

and

An Unblemished Red Heifer

We are approaching the halfway point of the Book of Numbers, and so far it seems that the whole reason it's called Numbers part is well past us. Not that there haven't been plenty of numbers thrown around, like the three families sent plummeting down to Sheol or the fourteen thousand seven hundred plague victims of God's most recent exercise in mass extermination, but the whole census business that gives the book its name kind of disappears after the first few chapters, which is fine. I mean, imagine thirty-six chapters of nothing but census figures. Page after neverending page of "Sidney, son of Armani of the House of Vanderbilt, Five wives of assorted size, twelve children and seventeen goats, all with blemishes" sorts of entries.  I guess we should be grateful that Numbers sticks with the winning formula of its predecessors, giving us a higgledy piggledy, never staying on one subject sort of structure that has made these first books of the Bible such literary touchstones.

    Another reliable constant we can point to is the grumpy, dissatisfied nature of the average Wandering Israelite. It's always something with them, isn't it? Not enough food. Not enough water. Not enough quality time with God. Bored with manna. What's taking so long up on Mount Sinai? Why can't we have a nice golden calf to worship? And why aren't the people in Canaan wimpy little nerds we can scare off simply by wiggling our ears and saying "boo!"?

    These regular outbursts of mass dissatisfaction over this that and the other never sit well with God, and in Chapter 17 he gives a try at quieting the rumblings without resorting to his preferred method of threatening to kill everyone. If you will recall, recently there have been some rumblings about the elevated status enjoyed by Moses and the priests. The leaders of the Twelve Tribes are feeling left out and think it's time they had some quality one on one time with God. Unfortunately, this isn't God's style and he's not likely to change anytime soon, so in order to make things crystal clear to everyone about what is meant by a Top Down Management Style, he comes up with the Budding Rod Plan, or BuRP for short. I sure you've caught on by now that the word rod is a biblical synonym for staff, or what we would call a trekking pole. Amongst the Israelites anyone who is anyone has a staff/rod.

    The BuRP plan is as follows: Moses is to get the top dudes in each of the Twelve Tribes to bring their favorite staffs to the tabernacle. Moses will then place the staffs, along with Aaron's staff, next to the covenant and let them marinate overnight behind the holy curtains in the divine vibes and aura of the mercy seat and cherubim. Whoever's staff "sprouts" will be God's way of telling everyone who he has designated as the next in the chain of command. Owners of the non-sprouting staffs will then accept the fact that they will never be invited to play golf with the Chairman. What could be clearer or more fair? Nothing, that's what, and so says God...

5)thus will I put a stop to the complaints of the Israelites.

    Right.

    The staffs are placed by the covenant and left overnight. When Moses fetches them out the next day, surprise surprise! Aaron's is the only one to have sprouted evidence of God's favor. 

8)When Moses went into the tent of the covenant on the next day, the staff of Aaron for the house of Levi had sprouted. It put forth buds, produced blossoms, and bore ripe almonds.

    I don't know about you, but to me the blossoms and ripe almonds are a bit of overkill, but maybe God wanted to show he has a creative side and isn't only all about plagues and consuming with fire. Moses shows the Twelve Tribesmen the results, quite possibly handing out some nourishing almonds while doing so in order to try to take at least some of the sting out of their disappointment. God then tells Moses to put Aaron's nutty staff back behind the curtain and if any person or persons has a problem with how things turned out, he (God) will happily arrange for that person(s) to make a quick exit to Sheol. So much for his crafty-creative side.

    Surprisingly, this little demonstration does not have the effect God had in mind. Instead, we are told at the end of this brief chapter,

12)The Israelites said to Moses, "We are perishing, we are lost, all of us are lost! 13) Everyone who approaches the tabernacle of the Lord will die! Are we all to perish?"

    I'm not sure how the leap was made from being told they can't talk directly to God to everyone is going to die, but this just short of hysterical display from the men may be a side effect of a strict manna diet, especially when the priests are enjoying barbeque every day.  As for God's hopes he would "put a stop to the complaints" I guess he overestimated the capacity of the Israelites to always look on the bright side of life.

    Let's move on to Chapter 18, which is titled "The Responsibility of Priests and Levites" and is actually divided into a section spelling out who can be in what part of the tent of meeting and a section about how the priests and their Levite workforce are to be paid. It is not especially stimulating reading, but I'll at least try to give you the gist of the thing.

• The priests, meaning Aaron and Sons (I haven't seen any mention of anyone else being brought into this most exclusive of professions, even as apprentices or unpaid interns) have the okay to roam around the entire the tabernacle, including behind the curtain, by the altar and the outer courtyard where the after service coffee is gathering is held.
• The Average Levite is limited to the outer area and better not poke his nose inside the altar tent. Penalty? Guess.
• Anything brought to the tabernacle as a holy offering belongs to the priests and their families. Since we're talking about two million parishioners and what seems to be a ready supply of livestock, grain, and wine for offerings, Aaron and Sons' larder is guaranteed to be bulging at the seams.
• The Levites are to receive a tithe from the harvests** and general production of the rest of the Israelites. So lots of comestibles coming their way too. 
• Moses does tell them that the priests will be skimming a tithe from their tithe, taking the best of it. What a racket.

   

    Chapter 19 is called "Ceremony of the Red Heifer" and if you think we've gone way too long without talking about touching dead things and being unclean until evening, you will be happy to know we're going to remedy that right now.

    The Lord tells both Moses and Aaron that he wants a nice red heifer brought to the temple. No blemishes, of course, and it has to be young enough that it hasn't been fitted with a yoke yet. Once it is delivered, Aaron's son Eleazar is to take it outside of the camp and "in his presence" it is to be slaughtered. And then Eleazar is to hustle on back to the tabernacle with some of the heifer's blood so he can "sprinkle it seven times towards the front of the tent of meeting." After the sprinkling, he has to get himself back to where the dead heifer is located outside the camp so he can watch it being burned while he tosses some cedarwood, hyssop, and crimson material into the flames. It's all part of a recipe for making, well, we'll see.

    Once the heifer has been turned to a smoldering ash pile, both Eleazar and the fellow who did the actual building of the fire are to clean up. Oh, and the guy who comes to fetch the heifer ashes also has to give himself and his clothes a good wash afterward. If they all do this, by evening they will be good to present themselves in decent society. If they don't they will standing in the unemployment line the next morning.

    And now what is to be done with this combination of heifer, cedarwood, hyssop and crimson cloth ashes? The only thing that makes sense, of course! They are to be combined with water to make a spiritually purifying solution of great efficacy. This is called science.

    We then get a couple of pretty good sized paragraphs about what needs to happen when...

• a person touches the dead body of a human being
• a person is in a tent where someone dies
• an open vessel is in a tent where someone dies
• a person is in an open field and touches someone who has died by the sword
• or who has died naturally
• or finds and touches a human bone
• or a grave

    If any of those situations apply, there is a seven day schedule of washing with heifer water along with additional applications of hyssop and sprinkling that must be followed in order to shake the "unclean" label. These processes have stood the test of time and are still being practiced by nearly every...I'll have to get back to you on that. Google's AI just keeps blinking on and off.

    But speaking of water, Chapter 20 is all about the Waters of Meribah, which I think we've encountered before. Hold on, I'm going to do a search...

    ...I was right! Way back in Exodus, Chapter 17, Moses' merry troupe was throwing a little hissy fit about the lack of drinking water, so God told him to tap a rock with the same staff he parted the Red Sea with, and water came pouring out. And then Moses...

7)...called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the Lord, saying, "Is the Lord among us or not?"

    Now here they are, back at the same place, having the same discussion about hydration challenges, and God tells Moses that the staff trick is still good. Or this is a repeat of the same story because Moses forgot he's already used it a couple of books ago. I don't know. Anyway, he asks God, God tells him to use his rod (staff, trekking pole, whatever), he whacks the rock, water comes out, and you'd think things would be better. But God is miffed that the people didn't keep their grumbles to themselves and smile and say "Things may seem bleak right now and yes, we don't have any water and that's usually a pretty quick way to expire in the desert, but you know what? God is on our side and you just gotta know he's got a nice surprise in store for us, so let's smile and make the best of things!"

    No, they whined until the rock made more water. Enough water for two million people and all their livestock. That's some special rock. And yes, I'm going to keep reminding us all of the vast number of people the Bible itself has told us are involved here, because sometimes things just don't add up.

    Be that as it may, a Real Life Lesson we can all take away from this redundant lesson is that when things are going bad, I mean really skidding downhill and everyone is about to die, it's not a good idea to tug on God's sleeve and ask him for a bit of help, because even if he does provide it he may very well turn around and make you sorry you bothered him. Just like he does in verse 12.

12) But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron. "Because you did not trust in me, to show my holiness before the eyes of the Israelites, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.

    Yep, because Moses and Aaron weren't able to keep the people in line without divine intervention, they're never stepping foot in the Land of Milk and Honey.

    That's harsh.

    Next up we have a bit about a place called Edom. It seems that in order for the Israelites to conveniently get from wherever they happen to be right now, which I guess is by the rock that spews water, to wherever they're going, which I have no idea because they do seem to be traveling in circles, they need to follow the King's Highway through Edom. Thinking that it is difficult to march a couple million men, women, children and their wagons, tabernacle accessories and livestock across a border without attracting the natives' attention, they ask the King of Edom if it's okay with him. He says no. That's pretty much what we're told here. They ask, he says no. Exciting story, eh?

    I guess Google maps came up with a reroute.

    And that reroute has them heading straight for Mount Hor. As they approach, God breaks it to Aaron that his services are no longer required and so would he kindly take his son Eleazar, climb up Mount Hor, and expire? Just Aaron, not Eleazar. The young fellow gets to keep his dad's vestments.

    Aaron climbs the mountain and dies. Everyone is sad for thirty days.

    Moses wonders how long until he gets the pink slip.

    Cliffhanger.

*A peaceful scene at Clear Lake in California

**This is your regular reminder that the concepts of wandering in the desert and raising crops are not compatible. But they do seem to coexist quite cozily here.

  *

Counting Down Numbers

    I said we were going to finish Numbers before I put this little experiment to bed, and by golly that's what we're going to do. Hold onto your hats, because we're gonna fly.

    The last sixteen chapters of this book have a fair amount of action (meaning killing) in them. Lots of land gets conquered, lots of peoples are tossed unceremoniously out of their homes and then killed or taken hostage, so let's get down to the fun.

    In Chapter 21 the Israelites, who I guess we should just call Israel since that's what they're called in the New Revised Standard Version, beat up on the Canaanites with some help from God. But then they start to complain about their rations again so God sends a bunch of deadly snakes to bite them, which doesn't improve their morale at all. Moses asks God not to do this and God says Moses should make a brass snake, put it on a pole, and the people who died or are in the process of dying from the snakebites can look at the brass snake and feel all better.

    There's a lesson here, but I've no idea what it is.

    There is some singing and then Israel conquers the Amorites and King Og of Sashan.

    Chapter 22 introduces us to Balak son of Zippor. He seems to be part of one of the tribes being hunted by Israel. He calls on some seer or local prophet or whatnot name of Balaam to curse Israel. Balaam consults with God, who tells him not to do it. Balaam tells Balak he'd rather not piss off God but Balak invites him to come visit so maybe they can find common ground, and while Balaam is riding his donkey to see Balak an angel with a sword shows up on the path they are on and even though Balaam doesn't see the angel the donkey does and he takes some nifty evasive measures which irritate Balaam. God explains what's going on and Balaam understands and apologizes to his donkey. I rather liked reading this part because in the writings of P.G. Wodehouse his character Bertie Wooster refers to Balaam's ass pretty regularly and now I have a little bit better idea of what that reference is about. This sort of thing is a major motivation for this Bible Reading project of mine.

    Where were we? That's right. Balaam won't curse Israel.

    Chapter 23  has two oracles of Balaam's, provided courtesy of seven special made altars and fourteen slaughtered animals. He still declines to curse Israel.

    Two more Balaamic Oracles in Chapter 24. Still no curse.

    Unless...I may have missed something in Chapter 24, but apparently in Chapter 25 Balaam has persuaded the women of Moab to have sex with the men of Israel, and God's not having it. Eleazar's son Phineas, anxious to prove himself worthy of his inherited priesthood status, charges into a tent where a couple of newlyweds that happen to be of Israel and Midian extraction are staying, and skewers them. This makes God happy and the plague he had started gets cancelled, but not before 24,000 have passed.

    Chapter 26 brings us another census, which is how we started this whole book of Numbers, so it's nice to see it again. And just like before, the only ones worthy of being counted are men over the age of twenty. Military age, in other words.

    

    In case you're wondering, after an interminable number of verses in which we learn way more about how many are each tribe than we really care about, the total is forthcoming: 601,730. Exactly.

    In Chapter 27 the daughters of the late Zelophahad ask Moses to make a special rule so they can inherit their father's land. They have no brothers, and wouldn't it be a shame if they were to miss out on a share of the land about to be taken away from the nasty Canaanites or Midianites or Calcifites or whoever. Moses says he's okay with it.

    Chapter 28 is, at least from what I could tell and remember, nothing but a rehash of how God likes his offerings.

    And since we all know how much God thinks about his offerings, it should come as no surprise that this rehashing of instructions spills over into Chapter 29.

    After the forward thinking way in which Moses handled the whole Daughters of Zelophahad situation, it was disappointing to find out in Chapter 30 that if a daughter or wife (and in this society what other roles could a female aspire to?) makes a vow and her dad or husband hears and doesn't think it's a good idea, he can nullify that vow. No such rule is mentioned concerning mothers or wives hearing their sons or husbands making ill-considered vows. This strikes me as most likely where the whole "Gotta have your husband's permission to have a credit card" nonsense came from.

    Chapter 31 is all about the enlightened approach Moses takes when it comes to dealing with conquered peoples, in this case it's the people of Midian, which just happens to be where his late wife Zipporah is from and where he himself spent some time when he thought he wasn't welcome in Egypt. Taking all that personal history and flushing it down the loo, when his soldiers come back from conquering Midian, killing all the kings (the place was lousy with royalty) and dispatching all the military aged men, Moses gives his generals a stern talking to for daring to bring mothers and young boys back as part of their booty. The only Midianites he wants to live are the young girls. What a dude.

    Just as the super successful conquering Israel army is getting ready to cross the Jordan, the leaders of Teams Reuben and Gad ask Moses if they can have some of the land that has already been conquered. They promise to help wipe out the inhabitants currently living across the Jordan just to help the other tribes. Moses says okay. This all happens in Chapter 32.

    My eyes were kind of glazing over by now, but it seems to me that Chapter 33 was pretty much nothing but "Our Story Up Until Now" or "In Case You Want To Draw a Line Tracing Israel's Path on Your Map of the Holy Land" guide.

    The boundaries of the Land o' Milk and Honey are spelled out in Chapter 34.

    Chapter 35 tells us there will be some cities set aside for the Levites and six cities designated as places where murderers can be safe. If you want the details you know where to look.

    We wrap up the Book of Numbers with a little bit of Reassertion of Patriarchal Power in Chapter 36. The tribal leaders, having heard about the way in which Moses caved to the requests of the Lovely Zelophahal Daughters, point out that it would be just awful if any women who inherit their father's land married outside of the tribe. After all, then the land would go to their husbands and the original tribe would be down a few acres and That's Just Not Right.

   Taking a firm stand, Moses says the women with land can marry anyone they wanted to, as long as it is a man from their tribe.

And I think that's a fitting way for us to end this blog. Women getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop once again. 

If this has inspired you to dive deeper, or even quite shallowly, into the Good Book, that's great. If I have something I just have to share as I continue to forge ahead with my own reading maybe I'll drop a short entry in here just for the heck of it. All with the understanding on my part that chances are nobody will read it.

Shalom!

*A lovely Black and White view of the Superstition Mountains