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Thursday, August 21st, 2025
the Week of Proper 15 / Ordinary 20
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Bahasa Indonesia Sehari-hari

Bilangan 5:27

Setelah terjadi demikian, apabila perempuan itu memang mencemarkan dirinya dan berubah setia terhadap suaminya, air yang mendatangkan sumpah serapah itu akan masuk ke badannya dan menyebabkan sakit yang pedih, sehingga perutnya mengembung dan pahanya mengempis, dan perempuan itu akan menjadi sumpah kutuk di antara bangsanya.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Adultery;   Bitter Water;   Husband;   Jealousy;   Priest;   Self-Incrimination;   Wife;   Women;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Woman;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Adultery;   Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Husband;   Oath;   Priest;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Consecrate;   Family Life and Relations;   Jealousy;   Offerings and Sacrifices;   Priest, Priesthood;   Woman;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Adultery;   Jealousy, Waters of;   Water of Jealousy;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Adultery;   Priest;   Water of Jealousy;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Bitter Water;   Court Systems;   Jealousy;   Jealousy, Ordeal of;   Judge (Office);   Sex, Biblical Teaching on;   Woman;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Jealousy;   Magic, Divination, and Sorcery;   Marriage;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Dropsy;   Nazirite;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Adultery;   Jealousy,;   The Hawker's Poor Man's Concordance And Dictionary - Elisha;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Adultery;   Smith Bible Dictionary - Water of Jealousy;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Bitter;   Jealousy;   Rot;   Swell;   Thigh;   Kitto Biblical Cyclopedia - Belly;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Abner of Burgos;   Abrogation of Laws;   Adultery;   'Akabia ben Mahalalel;   Hammurabi;   Hezekiah ben Parnak;   Marriage;   Mishnah;   Nashim;   Ordeal;   Sidra;   Soṭah;  

Parallel Translations

Alkitab Terjemahan Baru
Setelah terjadi demikian, apabila perempuan itu memang mencemarkan dirinya dan berubah setia terhadap suaminya, air yang mendatangkan sumpah serapah itu akan masuk ke badannya dan menyebabkan sakit yang pedih, sehingga perutnya mengembung dan pahanya mengempis, dan perempuan itu akan menjadi sumpah kutuk di antara bangsanya.
Alkitab Terjemahan Lama
Maka setelah sudah diberinya minum air itu kepadanya, bahwasanya jikalau telah dicemarkannya dirinya dan khianat ia akan lakinya, maka air yang mendatangkan laknat itu kelak memasukkan ke dalamnya celaka yang besar, sehingga busunglah perutnya dan cengkunglah pahanya, maka perempuan itulah menjadi suatu kutuk di antara bangsanya.

Contextual Overview

11 And the Lorde spake vnto Moyses, saying: 12 Speake vnto the children of Israel, and say vnto them: If any mans wyfe go aside, and trespasse agaynst hym, 13 So that another man lye with her fleshly, and it be hid from the eyes of her husbande, and is kept close that she is defyled, and there is no witnesse against her, neither she taken with the maner, 14 And the spirite of gelousie commeth vpon hym, so that he is gelous ouer his wyfe which is defyled: or if the spirite of gelousie come vpon hym, so that he is gelous ouer his wyfe which is yet vndefyled: 15 Then let the man bring his wyfe vnto the priest, and bring her offeryng with her, the tenth part of an Epha of barly meale: but let hym put no oyle vpon it, nor put frankensence theron, for it is an offeryng of gelousie, an offeryng for a remembraunce, causyng the sinne to be thought vpon. 16 And the priest shall bryng her, and set her before the Lorde. 17 And the priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel, and of the dust that is in the floore of the tabernacle, the priest shal take it, and put it into ye water. 18 And let the priest set the woman before the Lorde, and vncouer the womans head, and put the offering of memoriall in her handes, which is the gelousie offeryng: and the priest shall haue bytter and cursed water in his hande. 19 And the priest shall charge her by an othe, and say vnto the woman: If no man haue lyen with thee, neither hast gone aside to vncleannesse without thy husbande, then haue thou no harme of this bitter and cursed waters. 20 But and if thou hast gone aside from thyne husbande, and art defiled, and some man hath lyen with thee beside thyne husbande:

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

if she be defiled: Numbers 5:20, Proverbs 5:4-11, Ecclesiastes 7:26, Romans 6:21, 2 Corinthians 2:16, Hebrews 10:26-30, 2 Peter 2:10

the woman: Deuteronomy 28:37, Psalms 83:9-11, Isaiah 65:15, Jeremiah 24:9, Jeremiah 29:18, Jeremiah 29:22, Jeremiah 42:18, Zechariah 8:13

Reciprocal: Numbers 5:22 - go into 1 Kings 8:32 - condemning 2 Chronicles 6:23 - requiting 2 Chronicles 21:15 - by disease Psalms 109:18 - so let Proverbs 5:11 - when

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And when he hath made her to drink the water,.... For, as before observed, and here by Jarchi again, if she says I will not drink it, after the roll is blotted out, they oblige her, and make her drink it whether she will or not, unless she says I am defiled:

then it shall come to pass, [that] if she be defiled, and have done trespass against her husband; or has committed adultery:

that the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, [and become] bitter; the water drank by her, and having the curses scraped into it, shall enter into her, and operate and produce bitter and dreadful effects:

and her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall rot; not through any natural virtue in the water, or what is put into it, either the dust of the floor of the tabernacle, or the scrapings of the parchment roll, these could have no physical influence to produce such effects; but they must be ascribed to a supernatural cause, the power and curse of God attending this draught. A certain Jewish writer b says, though very falsely, that the priest put poison into the water, which produced such effects; but then, how could an innocent woman escape the effects of it? that must be allowed to be miraculous and supernatural, was it so; but there is no manner of reason to believe that anything of this kind was put into it, The Jews say c, as soon, or before she had made an end of drinking: the water, the effects appeared; her face turned pale immediately, her eyes bolted out, and she was filled with veins, her body swelled, and they called out, Cast her out, cast her out, that she may not defile the court. And the text seems to intimate, as if the operation was immediate; yea, moreover, they say d, that as the waters searched her, so they searched him (the adulterer), because it is said twice, "shall enter, shall enter"; and that the same effects appeared in him as in her, but in neither, unless the husband was innocent; for if he was not pure from the same sin himself, the waters would not search his wife e hence they say f, when adulterers increased (under the second temple) the bitter waters ceased, according to Hosea 4:14; see Matthew 12:39. This practice has been imitated by the Heathens; the river Rhine, according to Julian the emperor g, tried the legitimacy of children; and so lakes have been used for the trial of perjury and unchastity, as the Stygian lake for perjury, and another of the same name near Ephesus for unchastity; into which, if persons suspected of adultery descended, having the form of an oath hanging about their necks, if they were pure, the waters stood unmoved, but if corrupt, they swelled up to their necks, and covered the tablet on which the oath was written h. The priestesses of a certain deity being obliged to live a single life, were tried by drinking bullocks' blood, upon which, if false to their oath and corrupt, they immediately died, as Pausanias i relates; and Macrobius k speaks of some lakes in Sicily, the inhabitants called the Cups, to which recourse was had when persons were suspected of any ill, and where an oath was taken of them; if the person swore truly, he departed unhurt, but if falsely, he immediately lost his life in the lake. Philostratus l relates of a water near Tyana, a city in Cappadocia, sacred to Jupiter, which the inhabitants call Asbamaea, which to those that kept their oaths was placid and sweet, but to perjured persons the reverse; it affected their eyes, hands, and feet, and seized them with dropsies and consumptions; nor could they depart from the water, but remained by it, mourning their sad case, and confessing their perjury: but what comes nearest to this usage of the Jews is a custom at marriages among the savages at Cape Breton m: at a marriage feast, two dishes of meat are brought to the bridegroom and bride in two "ouragans" (basins made of the bark of a tree), and the president of the feast addresses himself to the bride thus,

"and thou that art upon the point of entering into a respectable state, know, that the nourishment thou art going to take forebodes the greatest calamities to thee, if thy heart is capable of harbouring any ill design against thy husband, or against thy nation: shouldest thou ever be led astray by the caresses of a stranger; or shouldest thou betray thy husband, and thy country, the victuals contained in this "ouragan" will have the effects of a slow poison, with which thou wilt be tainted from this very instant; but if, on the other hand, thou remainest faithful to thy husband, and to thy country, if thou wilt never insult the one for his defect, nor give a description of the other to the enemy, thou wilt find this nourishment both agreeable and wholesome.''

Now if these relations can be credited, then much more this of the bitter waters, for though there was something wonderful and supernatural in them, yet nothing incredible:

and the woman shall be a curse among her people: the time she lives; but then all this while she was looked upon as an accursed person, and despised and shunned by all.

b R. Samuel Tzartzah, Mekor Chayim, fol. 91. 3. c Misn. Sotah, c. 3. sect. 4. d Ibid. c. 5. sect. 1. e T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 28. 1. Gersom in loc. f Misn. Sotah, c. 2. sect. 9. g Orat. 2. p. 151. Ep. 16. p. 131. h Vid. Salden. Otia, l. 1. Exercitat. 6. sect. 24. i Achaica, sive, l. 7. p. 450. k Saturnal. l. 5. c. 19. l Vita Apollonii, l. 1. c. 4. m Genuine Letters and Memoirs relating to the Isle of Cape Breton, &c.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The trial of jealousy. Since the crime of adultery is especially defiling and destructive of the very foundations of social order, the whole subject is dealt with at a length proportionate to its importance. The process prescribed has lately been strikingly illustrated from an Egyptian “romance,” which refers to the time of Rameses the Great, and may therefore well serve to illustrate the manners and customs of the Mosaic times. This mode of trial, like several other ordinances, was adopted by Moses from existing and probably very ancient and widely spread institutions.

Numbers 5:15

The offering was to be of the cheapest and coarsest kind, barley (compare 2 Kings 7:1, 2 Kings 7:16, 2 Kings 7:18), representing the abused condition of the suspected woman. It was, like the sin-offering Leviticus 5:11, to be made without oil and frankincense, the symbols of grace and acceptableness. The woman herself stood with head uncovered Numbers 5:18, in token of her shame.

Numbers 5:17

The dust that is in the floor of the tabernacle - To set forth the fact that the water was endued with extraordinary power by Him who dwelt in the tabernacle. Dust is an emblem of a state of condemnation Genesis 3:14; Micah 7:17.

Numbers 5:19

Gone aside ... - literally, “gone astray from” thy husband by uncleanness; compare Hosea 4:12.

Numbers 5:23

Blot them out with the bitter water - In order to transfer the curses to the water. The action was symbolic. Travelers speak of the natives of Africa as still habitually seeking to obtain the full force of a written charm by drinking the water into which they have washed it.

Numbers 5:24

Shall cause the woman to drink - Thus was symbolised both her full acceptance of the hypothetical curse (compare Ezekiel 3:1-3; Jeremiah 15:16; Revelation 10:9), and its actual operation upon her if she should be guilty (compare Psalms 109:18).

Numbers 5:26

The memorial thereof - See the marginal reference. “Memorial” here is not the same as “memorial” in Numbers 5:15.

Numbers 5:27

Of itself, the drink was not noxious; and could only produce the effects here described by a special interposition of God. We do not read of any instance in which this ordeal was resorted to: a fact which may be explained either (with the Jews) as a proof of its efficacy, since the guilty could not be brought to face its terrors at all, and avoided them by confession; or more probably by the license of divorce tolerated by the law of Moses. Since a husband could put away his wife at pleasure, a jealous man would naturally prefer to take this course with a suspected wife rather than to call public attention to his own shame by having recourse to the trial of jealousy. The trial by red water, which bears a general resemblance to that here prescribed by Moses, is still in use among the tribes of Western Africa.


 
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