The one who gathers the ashes of the heifer must wash his clothes and be ceremonially unclean until evening. This will be a permanent ordinance both for the Israelites and the resident foreigner who lives among them.

¹ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go up this mountain of the Abarim range, ²  and see ³  the land I have given ⁴  to the Israelites.

¹ Moses told the leaders ²  of the tribes concerning the Israelites, “This is what ³  the Lord has commanded:

Look, these people through the counsel of Balaam caused the Israelites to act treacherously against the Lord in the matter of Peor – which resulted in the plague among the community of the Lord!

So Moses gave orders about them to Eleazar the priest, to Joshua son of Nun, and to the heads of the families of the Israelite tribes.

These six towns will be places of refuge for the Israelites, and for the foreigner, and for the settler among them, so that anyone who kills any person accidentally may flee there.

And when the Jubilee of the Israelites is to take place, ¹  their inheritance will be added to the inheritance of the tribe into which they marry. So their inheritance will be taken away from the inheritance of our ancestral tribe.” ² 

In this way the inheritance of the Israelites will not be transferred ¹  from tribe to tribe. But every one of the Israelites must retain the ancestral heritage.

From the descendants of Simeon: According to the records of their clans and families, all the males numbered of them ¹  twenty years old or older who could serve in the army were listed by name individually.

“Send out men to investigate ¹  the land of Canaan, which I am giving ²  to the Israelites. You are to send one man from each ancestral tribe, ³  each one a leader among them.”

As for the censers of these men who sinned at the cost of their lives, ¹  they must be made ²  into hammered sheets for covering the altar, because they presented them before the Lord and sanctified them. They will become a sign to the Israelites.”

It was a memorial for the Israelites, that no outsider who is not a descendant of ¹  Aaron should approach to burn incense before the Lord, that he might not become like Korah and his company – just as the Lord had spoken by the authority ²  of Moses.

The Lord said to Moses, “Bring Aaron’s staff back before the testimony to be preserved for a sign to the rebels, so that you may bring their murmurings to an end ¹  before me, that they will not die.” ² 

“Aaron will be gathered to his ancestors, ¹  for he will not enter into the land I have given to the Israelites because both of you ²  rebelled against my word ³  at the waters of Meribah.

and if his father has no brothers, then you are to give his inheritance to his relative nearest to him from his family, and he will possess it. This will be for the Israelites a legal requirement, ¹  as the Lord commanded Moses.’”

So Moses and Eleazar the priest received the gold from the commanders of thousands and commanders ¹  of hundreds and brought it into the tent of meeting as a memorial ²  for the Israelites before the Lord.

¹ Now the Reubenites and the Gadites possessed a very large number of cattle. When they saw that the lands of Jazer and Gilead were ideal for cattle, ² 

So Moses gave to the Gadites, the Reubenites, and to half the tribe of Manasseh son of Joseph the realm of King Sihon of the Amorites, and the realm of King Og of Bashan, the entire land with its cities and the territory surrounding them. ¹ 

Then the heads of the family groups ¹  of the Gileadites, the descendant of Machir, the descendant of Manasseh, who were from the Josephite families, approached and spoke before Moses ²  and the leaders who were the heads of the Israelite families. ³ 

They said, “The Lord commanded my lord to give ¹  the land as an inheritance by lot to the Israelites; and my lord was commanded by the Lord to give the inheritance of our brother Zelophehad to his daughters.