Numbers 5:15

5:15 then ¹  the man must bring his wife to the priest, and he must bring the offering required for her, one tenth of an ephah of barley meal; he must not pour olive oil on it or put frankincense on it, because it is a grain offering of suspicion, ²  a grain offering for remembering, ³  for bringing ⁴  iniquity to remembrance.

Numbers 5:19

5:19 Then the priest will put the woman under oath and say to the her, “If no other ⁵  man has had sexual relations with you, and if you have not gone astray and become defiled while under your husband’s authority, may you be free from this bitter water that brings a curse. ⁶ 

Numbers 9:13

9:13 But ⁷  the man who is ceremonially clean, and was not on a journey, and fails ⁸  to keep the Passover, that person must be cut off from his people. ⁹  Because he did not bring the Lord’s offering at its appointed time, that man must bear his sin. ¹⁰ 

Numbers 16:14-15

16:14 Moreover, ¹¹  you have not brought us into a land that flows with milk and honey, nor given us an inheritance of fields and vineyards. Do you think you can blind ¹²  these men? We will not come up.”

16:15 Moses was very angry, and he said to the Lord, “Have no respect ¹³  for their offering! I have not taken so much as one donkey from them, nor have I harmed any one of them!”

Numbers 18:3

18:3 They must be responsible to care for you and to care for the entire tabernacle. However, they must not come near the furnishings of the sanctuary and the altar, or both they and you will die.

Numbers 19:13

19:13 Anyone who touches the corpse of any dead person and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. And that person must be cut off from Israel, ¹⁴  because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him. He will be unclean; his uncleanness remains on him.

Numbers 19:20

19:20 But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person must be cut off from among the community, because he has polluted the sanctuary of the Lord; the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, so he is unclean.

Numbers 20:12

The Lord’s Judgment

20:12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me enough ¹⁵  to show me as holy ¹⁶  before ¹⁷  the Israelites, therefore you will not bring this community into the land I have given them.” ¹⁸ 

Numbers 22:30

22:30 The donkey said to Balaam, “Am not I your donkey that you have ridden ever since I was yours until this day? Have I ever attempted ¹⁹  to treat you this way?” ²⁰  And he said, “No.”

Numbers 24:17

24:17 ‘I see him, but not now;

I behold him, but not close at hand. ²¹ 

A star ²²  will march forth ²³  out of Jacob,

and a scepter ²⁴  will rise out of Israel.

He will crush the skulls ²⁵  of Moab,

and the heads ²⁶  of all the sons of Sheth. ²⁷ 

Numbers 26:62

26:62 Those of them who were numbered were 23,000, all males from a month old and upward, for they were not numbered among the Israelites; no inheritance was given to them among the Israelites.

Numbers 27:3

27:3 “Our father died in the wilderness, although ²⁸  he was not part of ²⁹  the company of those that gathered themselves together against the Lord in the company of Korah; but he died for his own sin, ³⁰  and he had no sons.

Numbers 35:33

35:33 “You must not pollute the land where you live, for blood defiles the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed there, except by the blood of the person who shed it.

[5:15]  ¹ tn All the conditions have been laid down now for the instruction to begin – if all this happened, then this is the procedure to follow.

[5:15]  ² tn The Hebrew word is “jealousy,” which also would be an acceptable translation here. But since the connotation is that suspicion has been raised about the other person, “suspicion” seems to be a better rendering in this context.

[5:15]  ³ tn The word “remembering” is זִכָּרוֹן (zikkaron); the meaning of the word here is not so much “memorial,” which would not communicate much, but the idea of bearing witness before God concerning the charges. The truth would come to light through this ritual, and so the attestation would stand. This memorial would bring the truth to light. It was a somber occasion, and so no sweet smelling additives were placed on the altar.

[5:15]  ⁴ tn The final verbal form, מַזְכֶּרֶת (mazkeret), explains what the memorial was all about – it was causing iniquity to be remembered.

[5:19]  ⁵ tn The word “other” is implied, since the woman would not be guilty of having sexual relations with her own husband.

[5:19]  ⁶ sn Although there would be stress involved, a woman who was innocent would have nothing to hide, and would be confident. The wording of the priest’s oath is actually designed to enable the potion to keep her from harm and not produce the physical effects it was designed to do.

[9:13]  ⁹ tn The disjunctive vav (ו) signals a contrastive clause here: “but the man” on the other hand….

[9:13]  ¹⁰ tn The verb חָדַל (khadal) means “to cease; to leave off; to fail.” The implication here is that it is a person who simply neglects to do it. It does not indicate that he forgot, but more likely that he made the decision to leave it undone.

[9:13]  ¹¹ sn The pronouncement of such a person’s penalty is that his life will be cut off from his people. There are at least three possible interpretations for this: physical death at the hand of the community (G. B. Gray, Numbers [ICC], 84-85), physical and/or spiritual death at the hand of God (J. Milgrom, “A Prolegomenon to Lev 17:11,” JBL 90 [1971]: 154-55), or excommunication or separation from the community (R. A. Cole, Exodus [TOTC], 109). The direct intervention of God seem to be the most likely in view of the lack of directions for the community to follow. Excommunication from the camp in the wilderness would have been tantamount to a death sentence by the community, and so there really are just two views.

[9:13]  ¹² tn The word for “sin” here should be interpreted to mean the consequences of his sin (so a metonymy of effect). Whoever willingly violates the Law will have to pay the consequences.

[16:14]  ¹³ tn Here אַף (’af) has the sense of “in addition.” It is not a common use.

[16:14]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “will you bore out the eyes of these men?” The question is “Will you continue to mislead them?” (or “hoodwink” them). In Deut 16:19 it is used for taking a bribe; something like that kind of deception is intended here. They are simply stating that Moses is a deceiver who is misleading the people with false promises.

[16:15]  ¹⁷ tn The verb means “to turn toward”; it is a figurative expression that means “to pay attention to” or “to have regard for.” So this is a prayer against Dathan and Abiram.

[19:13]  ²¹ sn It is in passages like this that the view that being “cut off” meant the death penalty is the hardest to support. Would the Law prescribe death for someone who touches a corpse and fails to follow the ritual? Besides, the statement in this section that his uncleanness remains with him suggests that he still lives on.

[20:12]  ²⁵ tn Or “to sanctify me.”

[20:12]  ²⁶ sn Using the basic meaning of the word קָדַשׁ (qadash, “to be separate, distinct, set apart”), we can understand better what Moses failed to do. He was supposed to have acted in a way that would have shown God to be distinct, different, holy. Instead, he gave the impression that God was capricious and hostile – very human. The leader has to be aware of what image he is conveying to the people.

[20:12]  ²⁷ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

[20:12]  ²⁸ tn There is debate as to exactly what the sin of Moses was. Some interpreters think that the real sin might have been that he refused to do this at first, but that fact has been suppressed from the text. Some think the text was deliberately vague to explain why they could not enter the land without demeaning them. Others simply, and more likely, note that in Moses there was unbelief, pride, anger, impatience – disobedience.

[22:30]  ²⁹ tn Here the Hiphil perfect is preceded by the Hiphil infinitive absolute for emphasis in the sentence.

[22:30]  ³⁰ tn Heb “to do thus to you.”

[24:17]  ³³ tn Heb “near.”

[24:17]  ³⁴ sn This is a figure for a king (see also Isa 14:12) not only in the Bible but in the ancient Near Eastern literature as a whole. The immediate reference of the prophecy seems to be to David, but the eschatological theme goes beyond him. There is to be a connection made between this passage and the sighting of a star in its ascendancy by the magi, who then traveled to Bethlehem to see the one born King of the Jews (Matt 2:2). The expression “son of a star” (Aram Bar Kochba) became a title for a later claimant to kingship, but he was doomed by the Romans in a.d. 135.

[24:17]  ³⁵ tn The verb is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive; it is equal to the imperfect expressing the future. The verb דָּרַךְ (darakh), related to the noun “way, road,” seems to mean something like tread on, walk, march.”

[24:17]  ³⁶ sn The “scepter” is metonymical for a king who will rise to power. NEB strangely rendered this as “comet” to make a parallel with “star.”

[24:17]  ³⁷ tn The word is literally “corners,” but may refer to the corners of the head, and so “skull.”

[24:17]  ³⁸ tc The MT reads “shatter, devastate.” Smr reads קֹדְקֹד (qodqod, “head; crown; pate”). Smr follows Jer 48:45 which appears to reflect Num 24:17.

[24:17]  ³⁹ sn The prophecy begins to be fulfilled when David defeated Moab and Edom and established an empire including them. But the Messianic promise extends far beyond that to the end of the age and the inclusion of these defeated people in the program of the coming King.

[27:3]  ³⁷ tn This clause begins with a vav (ו) on a pronoun, marking it out as a disjunctive vav. In this context it fits best to take it as a circumstantial clause introducing concession.

[27:3]  ³⁸ tn Heb “in the midst of.”

[27:3]  ³⁹ tn The word order is emphatic: “but in/on account of his own sins he died.”