Study Desk

They are like valleys stretched forth, like gardens by the river's side, like aloes that the Lord has planted, and like cedar trees beside the waters.

God brought them out of Egypt. They have, as it were, the strength of a young bull; they will devour hostile people and will break their bones and will pierce them through with arrows.

They crouch and lie down like a lion, and as a lioness, who can stir him? Blessed is the one who blesses you, and cursed is the one who curses you!'"

Just then one of the Israelites came and brought to his brothers a Midianite woman in the plain view of Moses and of the whole community of the Israelites, while they were weeping at the entrance of the tent of meeting.

because they bring trouble to you by their treachery with which they have deceived you in the matter of Peor, and in the matter of Cozbi, the daughter of a prince of Midian, their sister, who was killed on the day of the plague that happened as a result of Peor."

So Moses and Eleazar the priest spoke with them in the plains of Moab, by the Jordan River across from Jericho. They said,

Eliab's descendants were Nemuel, Dathan, and Abiram. It was Dathan and Abiram who as leaders of the community rebelled against Moses and Aaron with the followers of Korah when they rebelled against the Lord .

The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and Korah at the time that company died, when the fire consumed 250 men. So they became a warning.

The land must be divided by lot; and they will inherit in accordance with the names of their ancestral tribes.

But Nadab and Abihu died when they offered strange fire before the Lord .

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.

But there was not a man among these who had been among those numbered by Moses and Aaron the priest when they numbered the Israelites in the wilderness of Sinai.

For the Lord had said of them, "They will surely die in the wilderness." And there was not left a single man of them, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.

And they stood before Moses and Eleazar the priest and the leaders of the whole assembly at the entrance to the tent of meeting and said,

And he will stand before Eleazar the priest, who will seek counsel for him before the Lord by the decision of the Urim. At his command they will go out, and at his command they will come in, he and all the Israelites with him, the whole community."

"‘But you must offer to the Lord an offering made by fire, a burnt offering of two young bulls, one ram, and seven lambs one year old; they must all be unblemished.

You are to offer them with their drink offerings in addition to the continual burnt offering and its grain offering—they must be unblemished.

They fought against the Midianites, as the Lord commanded Moses, and they killed every male.

They killed the kings of Midian in addition to those slain—Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba—five Midianite kings. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword.

They burned all their towns where they lived and all their encampments.