Numbers 5

The Purity of the Camp

1 The LORD said to Moses,

2 “Command the Israelites to send away from the camp anyone who has a defiling skin disease^[a] or a discharge of any kind, or who is ceremonially unclean because of a dead body.

3 Send away male and female alike; send them outside the camp so they will not defile their camp, where I dwell among them.”

4 The Israelites did so; they sent them outside the camp. They did just as the LORD had instructed Moses.

Restitution for Wrongs

5 The LORD said to Moses,

6 “Say to the Israelites: ‘Any man or woman who wrongs another in any way^[b] and so is unfaithful to the LORD is guilty

7 and must confess the sin they have committed. They must make full restitution for the wrong they have done, add a fifth of the value to it and give it all to the person they have wronged.

8 But if that person has no close relative to whom restitution can be made for the wrong, the restitution belongs to the LORD and must be given to the priest, along with the ram with which atonement is made for the wrongdoer.

9 All the sacred contributions the Israelites bring to a priest will belong to him.

10 Sacred things belong to their owners, but what they give to the priest will belong to the priest.’ ”

The Test for an Unfaithful Wife

11 Then the LORD said to Moses,

12 “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘If a man’s wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him

13 so that another man has sexual relations with her, and this is hidden from her husband and her impurity is undetected (since there is no witness against her and she has not been caught in the act),

14 and if feelings of jealousy come over her husband and he suspects his wife and she is impure—or if he is jealous and suspects her even though she is not impure—

15 then he is to take his wife to the priest. He must also take an offering of a tenth of an ephah^[c] of barley flour on her behalf. He must not pour olive oil on it or put incense on it, because it is a grain offering for jealousy, a reminder-offering to draw attention to wrongdoing.

16 “ ‘The priest shall bring her and have her stand before the LORD.

17 Then he shall take some holy water in a clay jar and put some dust from the tabernacle floor into the water.

18 After the priest has had the woman stand before the LORD, he shall loosen her hair and place in her hands the reminder-offering, the grain offering for jealousy, while he himself holds the bitter water that brings a curse.

19 Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, “If no other man has had sexual relations with you and you have not gone astray and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse not harm you.

20 But if you have gone astray while married to your husband and you have made yourself impure by having sexual relations with a man other than your husband”—

21 here the priest is to put the woman under this curse—“may the LORD cause you to become a curse^[d] among your people when he makes your womb miscarry and your abdomen swell.

22 May this water that brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries.” “ ‘Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.”

23 “ ‘The priest is to write these curses on a scroll and then wash them off into the bitter water.

24 He shall make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and this water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering will enter her.

25 The priest is to take from her hands the grain offering for jealousy, wave it before the LORD and bring it to the altar.

26 The priest is then to take a handful of the grain offering as a memorial^[e] offering and burn it on the altar; after that, he is to have the woman drink the water.

27 If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.

28 If, however, the woman has not made herself impure, but is clean, she will be cleared of guilt and will be able to have children.

29 “ ‘This, then, is the law of jealousy when a woman goes astray and makes herself impure while married to her husband,

30 or when feelings of jealousy come over a man because he suspects his wife. The priest is to have her stand before the LORD and is to apply this entire law to her.

31 The husband will be innocent of any wrongdoing, but the woman will bear the consequences of her sin.’ ”

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Numbers 5 Commentary

Chapter 5

The unclean to be removed out of the camp, Restitution to be made for trespasses. (1-10) The trial of jealousy. (11-31)

Verses 1-10 The camp was to be cleansed. The purity of the church must be kept as carefully as the peace and order of it. Every polluted Israelite must be separated. The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable. The greater profession of religion any house or family makes, the more they are obliged to put away iniquity far from them. If a man overreach or defraud his brother in any matter, it is a trespass against the Lord, who strictly charges and commands us to do justly. What is to be done when a man's awakened conscience charges him with guilt of this kind, though done long ago? He must confess his sin, confess it to God, confess it to his neighbour, and take shame to himself; though it go against him to own himself in a lie, yet he must do it. Satisfaction must be made for the offence done to God, as well as for the loss sustained by the neighbour; restitution in that case is not enough without faith and repentance. While that which is wrongly gotten is knowingly kept, the guilt remains on the conscience, and is not done away by sacrifice or offering, prayers or tears; for it is the same act of sin persisted in. This is the doctrine of right reason, and of the word of God. It detects hypocrites, and directs the tender conscience to proper conduct, which, springing from faith in Christ, will make way for inward peace.

Verses 11-31 This law would make the women of Israel watch against giving cause for suspicion. On the other hand, it would hinder the cruel treatment such suspicions might occasion. It would also hinder the guilty from escaping, and the innocent from coming under just suspicion. When no proof could be brought, the wife was called on to make this solemn appeal to a heart-searching God. No woman, if she were guilty, could say "Amen" to the adjuration, and drink the water after it, unless she disbelieved the truth of God, or defied his justice. The water is called the bitter water, because it caused the curse. Thus sin is called an evil and a bitter thing. Let all that meddle with forbidden pleasures, know that they will be bitterness in the latter end. From the whole learn, 1. Secret sins are known to God, and sometimes are strangely brought to light in this life; and that there is a day coming when God will, by Christ, judge the secrets of men according to the gospel, ( Romans 2:16 ) . 2 In particular, Whoremongers and adulterers God will surely judge. Though we have not now the waters of jealousy, yet we have God's word, which ought to be as great a terror. Sensual lusts will end in bitterness. 3. God will manifest the innocency of the innocent. The same providence is for good to some, and for hurt to others. And it will answer the purposes which God intends.

Taken from Matthew Henry Commentary on the Whole Bible (Concise)

Cross References 37

1. S Leviticus 13:2; Leviticus 13:46
2. S Leviticus 15:2; Matthew 9:20
3. Leviticus 13:3; Numbers 9:6-10
4. S Leviticus 21:11
5. S Exodus 29:45; Leviticus 26:12; Numbers 35:34; 2 Corinthians 6:16
6. S Leviticus 6:2
7. Lev 5:14-6:7
8. S Leviticus 5:5; Leviticus 26:40; Joshua 7:19; S Luke 19:8
9. S Leviticus 5:16; Leviticus 6:5
10. S Leviticus 5:15
11. Leviticus 6:6,7; Leviticus 7:7
12. Leviticus 6:17; Leviticus 7:6-14
13. Leviticus 7:29-34; Leviticus 10:13
14. ver 19-21; S Exodus 20:14
15. S Exodus 20:14; Leviticus 18:20; Leviticus 20:10
16. ver 30; Proverbs 6:34; Proverbs 27:4; Song of Songs 8:6
17. S Exodus 16:36
18. S Leviticus 6:20
19. ver 18,25
20. Ezekiel 21:23; Ezekiel 29:16
21. S Leviticus 10:6; 1 Corinthians 11:6
22. ver 15
23. ver 19
24. ver 12,29
25. ver 18
26. ver 12
27. Joshua 6:26; 1 Samuel 14:24; Nehemiah 10:29
28. Psalms 109:18
29. ver 18
30. Deuteronomy 27:15
31. Jeremiah 45:1
32. Leviticus 8:27
33. S Leviticus 2:2
34. Isaiah 43:28; Isaiah 65:15; Jeremiah 26:6; Jeremiah 29:18; Jeremiah 42:18; Jeremiah 44:12,22; Zechariah 8:13
35. S ver 19
36. S ver 14
37. S Leviticus 5:1; Leviticus 20:17

Footnotes 5

[a]. The Hebrew word for "defiling skin disease" , traditionally translated “leprosy,” was used for various diseases affecting the skin.
[b]. Or "woman who commits any wrong common to mankind"
[c]. That is, probably about 3 1/2 pounds or about 1.6 kilograms
[d]. That is, may he cause your name to be used in cursing (see Jer. 29:22); or, may others see that you are cursed; similarly in verse 27.
[e]. Or "representative"

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO NUMBERS 5

This chapter contains a repetition of some former laws, concerning putting unclean persons out of the camp, Nu 5:1-4; making restitution in case of trespass against another, Nu 5:5-8; and of giving the offering of all holy things and all hallowed things to the priests, Nu 5:9,10; and a new law concerning jealousy, in a man, of his wife, Nu 5:11-14; when she was to be brought to the priest, and various rites and ceremonies to be used, Nu 5:15-23; who was to give her bitter water as a trial of her chastity, which, if guilty, would have a strange effect upon her, and make her accursed, but if not, would not affect her, and she would be free and happy, Nu 5:24-31.