Numbers 25
The Message
The Orgy at Shittim
25 1-3 While Israel was camped at Shittim (Acacia Grove), the men began to have sex with the Moabite women. It started when the women invited the men to their sex-and-religion worship. They ate together and then worshiped their gods. Israel ended up joining in the worship of the Baal of Peor. God was furious, his anger blazing out against Israel.
4 God said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of Israel and kill them by hanging, leaving them publicly exposed in order to turn God’s anger away from Israel.”
5 Moses issued orders to the judges of Israel: “Each of you must execute the men under your jurisdiction who joined in the worship of Baal Peor.”
6-9 Just then, while everyone was weeping in penitence at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, an Israelite man, flaunting his behavior in front of Moses and the whole assembly, paraded a Midianite woman into his family tent. Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw what he was doing, grabbed his spear, and followed them into the tent. With one thrust he drove the spear through the two of them, the man of Israel and the woman, right through their midsections. That stopped the plague from continuing among the People of Israel. But 24,000 had already died.
10-13 God spoke to Moses: “Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has stopped my anger against the People of Israel. Because he was as zealous for my honor as I myself am, I didn’t kill all the People of Israel in my zeal. So tell him that I am making a Covenant-of-Peace with him. He and his descendants are joined in a covenant of eternal priesthood, because he was zealous for his God and made atonement for the People of Israel.”
14-15 The name of the man of Israel who was killed with the Midianite woman was Zimri son of Salu, the head of the Simeonite family. And the name of the Midianite woman who was killed was Cozbi daughter of Zur, a tribal chief of a Midianite family.
16-18 God spoke to Moses: “From here on make the Midianites your enemies. Fight them tooth and nail. They turned out to be your enemies when they seduced you in the business of Peor and that woman Cozbi, daughter of a Midianite leader, the woman who was killed at the time of the plague in the matter of Peor.”
Numbers 25
21st Century King James Version
25 And Israel abode in Shittim, and the people began to commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab.
2 And they called the people unto the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods.
3 And Israel joined himself unto Baal of Peor, and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel.
4 And the Lord said unto Moses, “Take all the heads of the people and hang them up before the Lord against the sun, that the fierce anger of the Lord may be turned away from Israel.”
5 And Moses said unto the judges of Israel, “Slay ye every one his men who were joined unto Baal of Peor.”
6 And behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought unto his brethren a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.
7 And when Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand;
8 and he went after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel and the woman through her belly. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel.
9 And those who died in the plague were twenty and four thousand.
10 And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying,
11 “Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, hath turned My wrath away from the children of Israel, while he was zealous for My sake among them, that I consumed not the children of Israel in My jealousy.
12 Therefore say: ‘Behold, I give unto him My covenant of peace.
13 And he shall have it, and his seed after him, even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood, because he was zealous for his God, and made an atonement for the children of Israel.’”
14 Now the name of the Israelite who was slain, even who was slain with the Midianite woman, was Zimri, the son of Salu, a prince of a chief house among the Simeonites.
15 And the name of the Midianite woman who was slain was Cozbi, the daughter of Zur. He was head over a people and of a chief housein Midian.
16 And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying,
17 “Vex the Midianites and smite them.
18 For they vex you with their wiles wherewith they have beguiled you in the matter of Peor and in the matter of Cozbi, the daughter of a prince of Midian, their sister, who was slain in the day of the plague for Peor’s sake.”
Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson
Copyright © 1994 by Deuel Enterprises, Inc.