Numbers 5:11-31

The Voice

¹¹ (continuing instructions to Moses) ¹² Tell the Israelites that if a married woman sneaks off to commit adultery, ¹³ that is, if a man has sexual relations with her but her husband doesn’t know, even if no one can say for certain that she tarnished herself because no one saw or caught her, ¹⁴ and her husband feels suspicious and becomes jealous, whether or not she’s guilty; ¹⁵ then he should bring his wife to the priest along with the requisite offering: two quarts of barley flour. Because it’s an offering for this particular purpose, jealousy (namely, a grain offering that brings back to mind some kind of wrongdoing), he shouldn’t include any oil or incense with it.

^16-19 Then the priest will set her in front of Me, mix dust from the congregation tent’s floor into a jar of holy water, and loosen her hair. He’ll make her take an oath and hold the grain offering of jealousy while he holds the curse-causing, bitter water and says, “If you are innocent of this charge, if no man had sexual relations with you, if you didn’t reject your husband’s authority and tarnish yourself; then let this bitter water have no curse on you. ²⁰ But if you are guilty of rejecting your husband’s authority and having sexual relations with someone other than your husband,” ²¹ [here the priest should make the woman say the cursing-oath], “then may the Eternal One make your name a shunning reproach, an insult or a warning among the people, because you will have a miscarriage^[a] and your belly will swell. ²² If you are guilty, may this curse-causing water run through your bowels, make your belly swell, and your womb miscarry.” And the woman shall say, “Amen. Let it be so.”

²³ The priest will write these curses on a scroll and wash the words into the bitter water. ²⁴ He’ll then make the woman drink the bitter water that will run right through her, causing terrible pain. ²⁵ The priest will take the barley-flour jealousy offering that she was holding, raise it up high before the Me, bring it to the altar, ²⁶ burn a handful (a memorial portion) of it into smoke on the altar, and then make the woman drink the water. ²⁷ The effect (much pain with her belly swelling and her womb miscarrying) or lack thereof will show whether or not she’s guilty of marital unfaithfulness. If guilty, her name will be a curse among the Israelites. ²⁸ If innocent and pure, she’ll be free from the water’s effects and still be able to have children.