Purity in the Camp
The Book of Numbers is better understood in terms of its name in Hebrew: Bemidbar, “in the wilderness,” for it described Israel’s preparations to depart from Mount Horeb/Sinai and their wanderings in the wilderness afterward. The events described therein would have taken place sometime around either 1450-1410 or 1250 BCE, depending on one’s view of the Exodus; Moses would have written the original text while in the land of Moab across the Jordan River from Jericho.
In Numbers 1:1-10:10 Moses set forth the preparations necessary for Israel to travel; while we may find such information tedious, we have records of Egyptian rulers chronicling their preparations and logistics for major campaigns, suggesting many ancient people took pride in detailing all which proved necessary to accomplish their great deeds. YHWH had commanded Moses and Aaron to take a military census of the Israelites and to organize the camp by tribe in Numbers 1:1-2:34 and then to take a count of the Levite men and assign their forms of service in Numbers 3:1-4:49. Moses, Aaron, and the Israelites had proven obedient to all which YHWH had commanded them.
In Numbers 5:1-31 YHWH would provide commandments to Moses which seem to center on maintaining purity and wholeness within the camp of the Israelites and among the Israelite people.
YHWH commanded Moses to expel from the camp all who were “leprous,” who suffered from a discharge, and who had become ritually defiled because of a corpse, and Moses and the Israelites proved obedient to YHWH’s command (Numbers 5:1-4).
Hebrew tsaura’ is often translated as “leper” but does not refer to someone afflicted by Hansen’s Disease; it instead referred to people who suffered from some kind of easily spread skin condition or disease.
Thus YHWH demanded immediate compliance with the standard first declared in Leviticus 13:45-46 for those with skin conditions, and added upon it other matters involving defilement. We today recoil at such marginalizing treatment of many people who were likely suffering to some degree or another. Yet we do well to note how exclusion from the camp did not mean complete abandonment or disregard; they would still be reckoned as Israelites, would live outside the camp, and would be considered appropriate recipients of alms and other forms of aid. Those who were rendered ritually unclean from touching a corpse would have an opportunity to become clean again and thus be restored to the camp, as would anyone whose skin condition or discharge was healed.
But YHWH’s concern was made explicit in Numbers 5:3: the camp of the Israelites needed to maintain a high standard of purity because YHWH was living there in their midst, and YHWH is holy and pure. As Christians we must be careful about the conclusions we draw regarding ritual purity in light of Jesus’ exhortations in Mark 7:8-23. None of us are fully pure and require cleansing from the Lord Jesus (Ephesians 5:22-33, Titus 3:3-8); we all suffer the effects of the decay and corruption of the creation (Romans 5:12-21, 8:18-23). Nevertheless, the theological quandary of ritual purity versus the integrity and dignity of those who suffer from disability and/or disease remains.
After this YHWH gave commands for Israel regarding confession and reparation: Israelites who sin and are found guilty must confess and make reparations, paying back fully to whomever has been wrong and adding a fifth to the total (Numbers 5:5-7). Provision was made for circumstances in which no close relative existed to whom the reparations would be paid: the reparations would go to YHWH for the priest beyond the ram of atonement offered for him (Numbers 5:8). Offerings made by Israelites would belong to them save for those portions given to the priests (Numbers 5:9-10).
In just societies reparations prove important as means by which to restore those who have suffered loss, let alone as a deterrent from causing such injury toward others. To this day one can learn a lot about individuals and/or societies who resist calls for reparations and restitutions to those who have been seriously impaired or injured as a result of individual or systemic criminal behaviors, exploitation, and/or oppression. Likewise, we can maintain confidence YHWH will not look kindly on individuals and/or societies which have built their wealth on the exploitation and oppression of others and who entirely resist any and all calls for reparations and restitution.
YHWH then set forth for Moses and Israel the test for a wife whose husband has become jealous and suspects infidelity; in Hebrew this test is known as the sotah (Numbers 5:11-31). This test was not designed for circumstances in which sufficient evidence of adultery was present; it was for situations in which a husband had become jealous and suspicious of his wife’s sexual integrity, whether the wife had actually defiled herself or not (Numbers 5:11-14). The husband was to bring his wife and an offering of barley for the offering of suspicion (Numbers 5:15). The priest would lead the wife to stand before YHWH and put some dust from the ground of the holy place in some holy water to create bitter water (Numbers 5:16-17). The priest would uncover the wife’s head and have her hold the offering of the suspicion and abjure her with an oath and a curse: if she had not defiled herself, she would be free of any curse; but if she had defiled herself and had committed adultery, YHWH would cause the wife’s reproductive system to fail by means of the bitter water she would be consuming, and the wife would thus invoke the oath and curse with a twofold amen (Numbers 5:18-22). The priest would write down the curse and scrape it into the water which she would then drink after the priest had made a wave offering and a bit of a burnt offering of the grain of the offering of suspicion (Numbers 5:23-24). If she had proven faithful to her husband, she would not suffer a curse, and would be able to bear children; if she had been unfaithful, YHWH would cause her to prove infertile and thus cursed among her people (Numbers 5:25-28). This was then described as the law for cases of jealousy, in which there is no guilt for the husband, but the wife would bear her guilt if deserved (Numbers 5:29-31).
As modern readers we are often taken aback by the misogyny we perceive in this narrative: why should the wife thus suffer because of her husband’s jealousy and suspicion, especially since no consequence seems to attend to the husband in any way?
Many interpreters, ancient and modern, would understand the sotah in similar ways as the lex talionis of Exodus 21:23-25: as a principle of limitation. Thus, just as “an eye for an eye” was established to make sure the punishment did not exceed the crime, so the sotah test was put in place to provide a means by which a husband’s jealousy could be put to the test and his suspicions allayed. In this way it would be imagined the sotah test was imposed as a benefit for the wife, as a way to provide her vindication. To this day we are aware of the prevalence of “honor killings” in some societies, situations in which family members will kill female relatives who are accused of committing sexual impropriety. Without the sotah it might well have been possible that many Israelite men would have done something similar to their wives on the basis of mere suspicion of infidelity.
It should also be noted how the sotah represents the only kind of examination or test which would compel a kind of miraculous result. In no other matter is the decision so completely left up to YHWH as in the sotah. There is nothing intrinsically in consuming water with a bit of dirt in it which would lead to infertility; such would only be possible if God turned such water into a curse for the woman.
We can therefore understand why the sotah, in our perspective, seems quite problematic, but also hopefully how and why the sotah was established as a means by which the suspicions of Israelite men could be put to some kind of test. We can perceive how important YHWH reckoned purity among the people and in the camp, and how He made provision to give confidence or a lack of confidence of a woman’s purity in the marriage relationship. In Numbers YHWH was attempting to establish a holy people for Himself which He would bless as He had promised to their fathers. In Christ God has atoned for the defilement of all who would come to find cleansing in Him, and thus to obtain the blessings of eternal life in salvation. May we obtain holiness in Christ to be able to stand before the most holy God of heaven, and share in eternal life in Him!
Ethan R. Longhenry
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