Ceremony of the Red Heifer

19 Now the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron, ² “This is the statute of the law which the Lord has commanded: Tell the people of Israel to bring you a red heifer without defect, in which there is no blemish, and upon which a yoke has never come. ³ And you shall give her to Elea′zar the priest, and she shall be taken outside the camp and slaughtered before him; ⁴ and Elea′zar the priest shall take some of her blood with his finger, and sprinkle some of her blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven times. ⁵ And the heifer shall be burned in his sight; her skin, her flesh, and her blood, with all her dung, shall be burned; ⁶ and the priest shall take cedarwood and hyssop and scarlet stuff, and cast them into the midst of the burning of the heifer. ⁷ Then the priest shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterwards he shall come into the camp; and the priest shall be unclean until evening. ⁸ He who burns the heifer shall wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water, and shall be unclean until evening. ⁹ And a man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place; and they shall be kept for the congregation of the people of Israel for the water for impurity, for the removal of sin. ¹⁰ And he who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until evening. And this shall be to the people of Israel, and to the stranger who sojourns among them, a perpetual statute.

¹¹ “He who touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days; ¹² he shall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so be clean; but if he does not cleanse himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not become clean. ¹³ Whoever touches a dead person, the body of any man who has died, and does not cleanse himself, defiles the tabernacle of the Lord, and that person shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not thrown upon him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is still on him.

¹⁴ “This is the law when a man dies in a tent: every one who comes into the tent, and every one who is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days. ¹⁵ And every open vessel, which has no cover fastened upon it, is unclean. ¹⁶ Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days. ¹⁷ For the unclean they shall take some ashes of the burnt sin offering, and running water shall be added in a vessel; ¹⁸ then a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it in the water, and sprinkle it upon the tent, and upon all the furnishings, and upon the persons who were there, and upon him who touched the bone, or the slain, or the dead, or the grave; ¹⁹ and the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on the third day and on the seventh day; thus on the seventh day he shall cleanse him, and he shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and at evening he shall be clean.

²⁰ “But the man who is unclean and does not cleanse himself, that person shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly, since he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord; because the water for impurity has not been thrown upon him, he is unclean. ²¹ And it shall be a perpetual statute for them. He who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes; and he who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening. ²² And whatever the unclean person touches shall be unclean; and any one who touches it shall be unclean until evening.”

The Waters of Meribah

20 And the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came into the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh; and Miriam died there, and was buried there.

² Now there was no water for the congregation; and they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. ³ And the people contended with Moses, and said, “Would that we had died when our brethren died before the Lord! ⁴ Why have you brought the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, that we should die here, both we and our cattle? ⁵ And why have you made us come up out of Egypt, to bring us to this evil place? It is no place for grain, or figs, or vines, or pomegranates; and there is no water to drink.” ⁶ Then Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the door of the tent of meeting, and fell on their faces. And the glory of the Lord appeared to them, ⁷ and the Lord said to Moses, ⁸ “Take the rod, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water; so you shall bring water out of the rock for them; so you shall give drink to the congregation and their cattle.” ⁹ And Moses took the rod from before the Lord, as he commanded him.

¹⁰ And Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock, and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels; shall we bring forth water for you out of this rock?” ¹¹ And Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock with his rod twice; and water came forth abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their cattle. ¹² And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe in me, to sanctify me in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.” ¹³ These are the waters of Mer′ibah,^[a] where the people of Israel contended with the Lord, and he showed himself holy among them.

Passage through Edom Refused

¹⁴ Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom, “Thus says your brother Israel: You know all the adversity that has befallen us: ¹⁵ how our fathers went down to Egypt, and we dwelt in Egypt a long time; and the Egyptians dealt harshly with us and our fathers; ¹⁶ and when we cried to the Lord, he heard our voice, and sent an angel and brought us forth out of Egypt; and here we are in Kadesh, a city on the edge of your territory. ¹⁷ Now let us pass through your land. We will not pass through field or vineyard, neither will we drink water from a well; we will go along the King’s Highway, we will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left, until we have passed through your territory.” ¹⁸ But Edom said to him, “You shall not pass through, lest I come out with the sword against you.” ¹⁹ And the people of Israel said to him, “We will go up by the highway; and if we drink of your water, I and my cattle, then I will pay for it; let me only pass through on foot, nothing more.” ²⁰ But he said, “You shall not pass through.” And Edom came out against them with many men, and with a strong force. ²¹ Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory; so Israel turned away from him.

The Death of Aaron

²² And they journeyed from Kadesh, and the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came to Mount Hor. ²³ And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron at Mount Hor, on the border of the land of Edom, ²⁴ “Aaron shall be gathered to his people; for he shall not enter the land which I have given to the people of Israel, because you rebelled against my command at the waters of Mer′ibah. ²⁵ Take Aaron and Elea′zar his son, and bring them up to Mount Hor; ²⁶ and strip Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Elea′zar his son; and Aaron shall be gathered to his people, and shall die there.” ²⁷ Moses did as the Lord commanded; and they went up Mount Hor in the sight of all the congregation. ²⁸ And Moses stripped Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Elea′zar his son; and Aaron died there on the top of the mountain. Then Moses and Elea′zar came down from the mountain. ²⁹ And when all the congregation saw that Aaron was dead, all the house of Israel wept for Aaron thirty days.