Numbers 19-21

Amplified Bible, Classic Edition

19 And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron,

² This is the ritual of the law which the Lord has commanded: Tell the Israelites to bring you a red heifer without spot, in which is no blemish, upon which a yoke has never come.

³ And you shall give her to Eleazar the priest, and he shall bring her outside the camp, and she shall be slaughtered before him.

⁴ Eleazar the priest shall take some of her blood with his finger and sprinkle it toward the front of the Tent of Meeting seven times.

⁵ The heifer shall be burned in his sight, her skin, flesh, blood, and dung.

⁶ And the priest shall take cedar wood, and hyssop, and scarlet [stuff] and cast them into the midst of the burning heifer.

⁷ Then the priest shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water; afterward he shall come into the camp, but he shall be unclean until evening.

⁸ He who burns the heifer shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and shall be unclean until evening.

⁹ And a man who is clean shall collect the ashes of the heifer and put them outside the camp in a clean place, and they shall be kept for the congregation of the Israelites for the water for impurity; it is a sin offering.

¹⁰ And he who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until evening. This shall be to the Israelites and to the stranger who sojourns among them a perpetual statute.

¹¹ He who touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean for seven days.

¹² He shall purify himself with the water for impurity [made with the ashes of the burned heifer] on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean. But if he does not purify himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean.

¹³ Whoever touches the corpse of any who has died and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord, and that person shall be cut off from Israel. Because the water for impurity was not sprinkled upon him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is still upon him.

¹⁴ This is the law when a man dies in a tent: all who come into the tent and all who are in the tent shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁵ And every open vessel, which has no covering fastened upon it, is unclean.

¹⁶ And whoever in the open field touches one who is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a dead man, or a grave, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁷ And for the unclean, they shall take of the ashes of the burning of the sin offering, and the running water shall be put with it in a vessel.

¹⁸ And a clean person shall take hyssop and dip it in the water and sprinkle it upon the tent, and upon all the vessels, and upon the persons who were there, and upon him who touched the bone, or the slain, or the naturally dead, or the grave.

¹⁹ And the clean person shall sprinkle [the water for purification] upon the unclean person on the third day and on the seventh day, and on the seventh day the unclean man shall purify himself, and wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at evening.

²⁰ But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person shall be cut off from among the congregation, because he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. The water for purification has not been sprinkled upon him; he is unclean.

²¹ And it shall be a perpetual statute to them. He who sprinkles the water for impurity [upon another] 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 anyone who touches it shall be unclean until evening.

20 And the Israelites, the whole congregation, came into the Wilderness of Zin in the first month. And the people dwelt in Kadesh. Miriam died and was buried there.

² Now there was no water for the congregation, and they assembled together against Moses and Aaron.

³ And the people contended with Moses, and said, Would that we had died when our brethren died [in the plague] before the Lord!^(A)

⁴ And why have you brought up the congregation of the Lord into this wilderness, that we should die here, we and our livestock?

⁵ And why have you made us come up out of Egypt to bring us into this evil place? It is no place of grain or of figs or of vines or of 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. Then 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 give forth its water, and you shall bring forth to them water out of the rock; so you shall give the congregation and their livestock drink.

⁹ So Moses took the rod from before the Lord, as He commanded him.

¹⁰ And Moses and Aaron assembled the congregation before the rock and Moses said to them, Hear now, you rebels; must we bring you water out of this rock?

¹¹ And Moses lifted up his hand and with his rod he smote the rock ^[a]twice. And the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their livestock.

¹² And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, Because you did not believe in (rely on, cling to) Me to sanctify Me in the eyes of the Israelites, you therefore ^[b]shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.^(B)

¹³ These are the waters of Meribah [strife], where the Israelites contended with the Lord and He showed Himself holy among them.

¹⁴ And Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom, saying, Thus says your kinsman Israel: You know all the adversity and birth pangs that have come upon us [as a nation]:

¹⁵ How our fathers went down to Egypt; we dwelt there a long time, and the Egyptians dealt evilly with us and our fathers.

¹⁶ But when we cried to the Lord, He heard us and sent an angel and brought us forth out of Egypt. Now behold, we are in Kadesh, a city on your country’s edge.

¹⁷ Let us pass, I pray you, through your country. We will not pass through field or vineyard, or drink of the water of the wells. 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 your borders.

¹⁸ But Edom said to him, You shall not go through, lest I come out against you with the sword.

¹⁹ And the Israelites said to him, We will go by the highway, and if I and my livestock drink of your water, I will pay for it. Only let me pass through on foot, nothing else.

²⁰ But Edom said, You shall not go through. And Edom came out against Israel with many people and a strong hand.

²¹ Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory, ^[c]so Israel turned away from him.

²² They journeyed from Kadesh, and the Israelites, even 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 Israelites, because you both rebelled against My instructions at the waters of Meribah.

²⁵ Take Aaron and Eleazar his son and bring them up to Mount Hor.

²⁶ Strip Aaron of his vestments and put them on Eleazar his son, and Aaron shall be gathered to his people, and shall die there.

²⁷ And 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 [priestly] garments and put them on Eleazar his son. And Aaron died there on the mountain top; and Moses and Eleazar came down from the mountain.

²⁹ When all the congregation saw that Aaron was dead, they wept and mourned for him thirty days, all the house of Israel.

21 When the Canaanite king of Arad, who dwelt in the South (the Negeb), heard that Israel was coming by the way of Atharim [the route traveled by the spies sent out by Moses], he fought against Israel and took some of them captive.

² And Israel vowed a vow to the Lord, and said, If You will indeed deliver this people into my hand, then I will utterly destroy their cities.

³ And the Lord hearkened to Israel and gave over the Canaanites. And they utterly destroyed them and their cities; and the name of the place was called Hormah [a banned or devoted thing].

⁴ And they journeyed from Mount Hor by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom, and the people became impatient (depressed, much discouraged), because [of the trials] of the way.

⁵ And the people spoke against God and against Moses, Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water, and we loathe this light (contemptible, unsubstantial) manna.

⁶ Then the Lord sent fiery (burning) serpents among the people; and they bit the people, and many Israelites died.

⁷ And the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord, that He may take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people.

⁸ And the Lord said to Moses, Make a fiery serpent [of bronze] and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.

⁹ And Moses made a serpent of bronze and put it on a pole, and if a serpent had bitten any man, when he looked to the serpent of bronze [^[d]attentively, expectantly, with a steady and absorbing gaze], he lived.

¹⁰ And the Israelites journeyed on and encamped at Oboth.

¹¹ They journeyed from Oboth and encamped at Iye-abarim, in the wilderness opposite Moab, toward the sunrise.

¹² From there they journeyed and encamped in the Valley of Zared.

¹³ From there they journeyed and encamped on the other side of [the river] Arnon, which is in the desert or wilderness that extends from the frontier of the Amorites; for [the river] Arnon is the boundary of Moab, between Moab and the Amorites.

¹⁴ That is why it is said in the Book of the Wars of the Lord: Waheb in Suphah, and the valleys of [the branches of] the Arnon [River],

¹⁵ And the slope of the valleys that stretch toward the site of Ar and find support on the border of Moab.

¹⁶ From there the Israelites went on to Beer [a well], the well of which the Lord had said to Moses, Assemble the people together and I will give them water.^(C)

¹⁷ Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O well! Let all sing to it,^(D)

¹⁸ The fountain that the princes opened, that the nobles of the people hollowed out from their staves. And from the wilderness or desert [Israel journeyed] to Mattanah,

¹⁹ And from Mattanah to Nahaliel, and from Nahaliel to Bamoth,

²⁰ And from Bamoth to the valley that is in the field of Moab, to the top of Pisgah which looks down upon Jeshimon and the desert.

²¹ And Israel sent messengers to Sihon king of the Amorites, saying,

²² Let me pass through your land. We will not turn aside into field or vineyard; we will not drink the water of the wells. We will go by the king’s highway until we have passed your border.

²³ But Sihon would not allow Israel to pass through his border. Instead Sihon gathered all his people together and went out against Israel into the wilderness, and came to Jahaz, and he fought against Israel.

²⁴ And Israel smote the king of the Amorites with the edge of the sword and possessed his land from the river Arnon to the river Jabbok, as far as the Ammonites, for the boundary of the Ammonites was strong.

²⁵ And Israel took all these cities and dwelt in all the cities of the Amorites, in Heshbon and in all its towns.

²⁶ For Heshbon was the city of Sihon king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and taken all his land out of his hand, as far as [the river] Arnon.

²⁷ That is why those who sing ballads say, Come to Heshbon, let the city of Sihon be built and established.

²⁸ For fire has gone out of Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon; it has devoured Ar of Moab and the lords of the heights of the Arnon.

²⁹ Woe to you, Moab! You are undone, O people of [the god] Chemosh! Moab has given his sons as fugitives and his daughters into captivity to Sihon king of the Amorites.

³⁰ We have shot them down; Heshbon has perished as far as Dibon, and we have laid them waste as far as Nophah, which reaches to Medeba.

³¹ Thus Israel dwelt in the land of the Amorites.

³² And Moses sent to spy out Jazer, and they took its villages and dispossessed the Amorites who were there.

³³ Then they turned and went up by the way of Bashan; and Og the king of Bashan went out against them, he and all his people, to battle at Edrei.

³⁴ But the Lord said to Moses, Do not fear him, for I have delivered him and all his people and his land into your hand; and you shall do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who dwelt at Heshbon.

³⁵ So the Israelites slew Og and his sons and all his people until there was not one left alive, And they possessed his land.