Numbers 5:17

5:17 The priest will then take holy water ¹  in a pottery jar, and take some ²  of the dust ³  that is on the floor of the tabernacle, and put it into the water.

Numbers 5:22

5:22 and this water that causes the curse will go ⁴  into your stomach, and make your abdomen swell and your thigh rot.” ⁵  Then the woman must say, “Amen, amen.” ⁶ 

Numbers 5:24

5:24 He will make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and the water that brings a curse will enter her to produce bitterness.

¹ tn This is probably water taken from the large bronze basin in the courtyard. It is water set apart for sacred service. “Clean water” (so NEB) does not capture the sense very well, but it does have the support of the Greek that has “pure running water.” That pure water would no doubt be from the bronze basin anyway.

² tn Heb “from.” The preposition is used here with a partitive sense.

³ sn The dust may have come from the sanctuary floor, but it is still dust, and therefore would have all the pollutants in it.

⁴ tn The verb is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive. It could be taken as a jussive following the words of the priest in the previous section, but it is more likely to be a simple future.

⁵ tn Heb “fall away.”

⁶ tn The word “amen” carries the idea of “so be it,” or “truly.” The woman who submits to this test is willing to have the test demonstrate the examination of God.