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Numbers 5

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1 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,

2 "Command the children of Israel that they put out of the camp every leper, and everyone who has an issue, and whoever is unclean by the dead.

3 Both you shall put male and female outside of the camp; that they not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell."

4 The children of Israel did so, and put them out outside of the camp; as Yahweh spoke to Moses, so did the children of Israel.

5 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,

6 "Speak to the children of Israel: 'When a man or woman commits any sin that men commit, so as to trespass against Yahweh, and that soul is guilty;

7 then he shall confess his sin which he has done, and he shall make restitution for his guilt in full, and add to it the fifth part of it, and give it to him in respect of whom he has been guilty.

8 But if the man has no kinsman to whom restitution may be made for the guilt, the restitution for guilt which is made to Yahweh shall be the priest's; besides the ram of the atonement, by which atonement shall be made for him.

9 Every heave offering of all the holy things of the children of Israel, which they present to the priest, shall be his.

10 Every man's holy things shall be his: whatever any man gives the priest, it shall be his.'"

11 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,

12 "Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them: 'If any man's wife goes astray, and is unfaithful to him,

13 and a man lies with her carnally, and it is hidden from the eyes of her husband, and is kept close, and she is defiled, and there is no witness against her, and she isn't taken in the act;

14 and the spirit of jealousy comes on him, and he is jealous of his wife, and she is defiled: or if the spirit of jealousy comes on him, and he is jealous of his wife, and she isn't defiled:

15 then the man shall bring his wife to the priest, and shall bring her offering for her: the tenth part of an ephah of barley meal. He shall pour no oil on it, nor put frankincense on it, for it is a meal offering of jealousy, a meal offering of memorial, bringing iniquity to memory.

16 The priest shall bring her near, and set her before Yahweh;

17 and the priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel; and of the dust that is on the floor of the tabernacle the priest shall take, and put it into the water.

18 The priest shall set the woman before Yahweh, and let the hair of the woman's head go loose, and put the meal offering of memorial in her hands, which is the meal offering of jealousy. The priest shall have in his hand the water of bitterness that brings a curse.

19 The priest shall cause her to swear, and shall tell the woman, "If no man has lain with you, and if you haven't gone aside to uncleanness, being under your husband, be free from this water of bitterness that brings a curse.

20 But if you have gone astray, being under your husband, and if you are defiled, and some man has lain with you besides your husband:"

21 then the priest shall cause the woman to swear with the oath of cursing, and the priest shall tell the woman, "Yahweh make you a curse and an oath among your people, when Yahweh allows your thigh to fall away, and your body to swell;

22 and this water that brings a curse will go into your bowels, and make your body swell, and your thigh fall away." The woman shall say, "Amen, Amen."

23 "'The priest shall write these curses in a book, and he shall blot them out into the water of bitterness.

24 He shall make the woman drink the water of bitterness that causes the curse; and the water that causes the curse shall enter into her and become bitter.

25 The priest shall take the meal offering of jealousy out of the woman's hand, and shall wave the meal offering before Yahweh, and bring it to the altar.

26 The priest shall take a handful of the meal offering, as its memorial, and burn it on the altar, and afterward shall make the woman drink the water.

27 When he has made her drink the water, then it shall happen, if she is defiled, and has committed a trespass against her husband, that the water that causes the curse will enter into her and become bitter, and her body will swell, and her thigh will fall away: and the woman will be a curse among her people.

28 If the woman isn't defiled, but is clean; then she shall be free, and shall conceive seed.

29 "'This is the law of jealousy, when a wife, being under her husband, goes astray, and is defiled;

30 or when the spirit of jealousy comes on a man, and he is jealous of his wife; then he shall set the woman before Yahweh, and the priest shall execute on her all this law.

31 The man shall be free from iniquity, and that woman shall bear her iniquity.'"

   

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Moses

  

At the inmost level, the story of Moses -- like all of the Bible -- is about the Lord and his spiritual development during his human life as Jesus. Moses's role represents establishing forms of worship and to make the people obedient. As such, his primary representation is "the Law of God," the rules God gave the people of Israel to follow in order to represent spiritual things. This can be interpreted narrowly as the Ten Commandments, more broadly as the books of Moses, or most broadly as the entire Bible. Fittingly, his spiritual meaning is complex and important, and evolves throughout the course of his life. To understand it, it helps to understand the meaning of the events in which he was involved. At a more basic level, Moses's story deals with the establishment of the third church to serve as a container of knowledge of the Lord. The first such church -- the Most Ancient Church, represented by Adam and centered on love of the Lord -- had fallen prey to human pride and was destroyed. The second -- the Ancient Church, represented by Noah and the generations that followed him -- was centered on love of the neighbor, wisdom from the Lord and knowledge of the correspondences between natural and spiritual things. It fell prey to the pride of intelligence, however -- represented by the Tower of Babel -- and at the time of Moses was in scattered pockets that were sliding into idolatry. On an external level, of course, Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt through 40 years in the wilderness to the border of the homeland God had promised them. Along the way, he established and codified their religious system, and oversaw the creation of its most holy objects. Those rules and the forms of worship they created were given as containers for deeper ideas about the Lord, deeper truth, and at some points -- especially when he was first leading his people away from Egypt, a time before the rules had been written down -- Moses takes on the deeper representation of Divine Truth itself, truth from the Lord. At other times -- especially after Mount Sinai -- he has a less exalted meaning, representing the people of Israel themselves due to his position as their leader. Through Moses the Lord established a third church, one more external than its predecessors but one that could preserve knowledge of the Lord and could, through worship that represented spiritual things, make it possible for the Bible to be written and passed to future generations.