¹⁴ Moses was angry with the officers of the army—the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds—who were coming back from the military campaign.

¹⁵ Moses said to them, “Have you allowed every woman to live? ¹⁶ Look, following Balaam’s advice, these women were the ones who incited the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, and so the plague came upon the community of the Lord. ¹⁷ Now, kill every male among the children, and kill every woman who has had sexual relations with a man. ¹⁸ But you may keep alive for yourselves all the young females who have not had sexual relations with a man.