Study Desk

‘If Balak would give me his palace full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord to do either good or evil of my own will, but whatever the Lord tells me I must speak'?

Edom will be a possession, Seir, his enemies, will also be a possession; but Israel will act valiantly.

Then Balaam looked on Amalek and delivered this oracle: "Amalek was the first of the nations, but his end will be that he will perish."

Balaam got up and departed and returned to his home, and Balak also went his way.

So Moses said to the judges of Israel, "Each of you must execute those of his men who were joined to Baal-peor."

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.

When Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he got up from among the assembly, took a javelin in his hand,

So it will be to him and his descendants after him a covenant of a permanent priesthood, because he has been zealous for his God, and has made atonement for the Israelites.'"

Then the daughters of Zelophehad son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh of the families of Manasseh, the son of Joseph came forward. Now these are the names of his daughters: Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

"Our father died in the wilderness, although he was not part of the company of those that gathered themselves together against the Lord in the company of Korah, but he died for his own sin, and he had no sons.

Why should the name of our father be lost from among his family because he had no son? Give us a possession among the relatives of our father."

And you must tell the Israelites, ‘If a man dies and has no son, then you must transfer his inheritance to his daughter;

and if he has no daughter, then you are to give his inheritance to his brothers;

and if he has no brothers, then you are to give his inheritance to his father's brothers;

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, as the Lord commanded Moses.'"

When you have seen it, you will be gathered to your ancestors, as Aaron your brother was gathered to his ancestors.

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."

He laid his hands on him and commissioned him, just as the Lord commanded, by the authority of Moses.

If a man makes a vow to the Lord or takes an oath of binding obligation on himself, he must not break his word, but must do whatever he has promised.

These are the statutes that the Lord commanded Moses, relating to a man and his wife, and a father and his young daughter who is still living in her father's house.