WAR WITH MIDIAN

31 The Lord spoke to Moses, 2 “Execute vengeance for the Israelites against the Midianites. After that, you will be gathered to your people.”d

3 So Moses spoke to the people, “Equip some of your men for war. They will go against Midian to inflict the Lord’s vengeancee on them. 4 Send one thousand men to war from each Israelite tribe.” 5 So one thousand were recruited from each Israelite tribe out of the thousandsB in Israel—twelve thousand equipped for war. 6 Moses sent one thousand from each tribe to war. They went with Phinehas son of Eleazar the priest, in whose care were the holy objects and signal trumpets.

7 They waged war against Midian, as the Lord had commanded Moses, and killed every male.f 8 Along with the others slain by them, they killed the Midianite kings—Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian.a They also killed Balaam son of Beorb with the sword. 9 The Israelites took the Midianite women and their dependents captive, and they plundered all their cattle, flocks, and property.c 10 Then they burned all the cities where the Midianites lived, as well as all their encampments, 11 and took away all the spoils of war and the captives, both people and animals. 12 They brought the prisoners, animals, and spoils of war to Moses, the priest Eleazar, and the Israelite community at the camp on the plains of Moab by the Jordan across from Jericho.

13 Moses, the priest Eleazar, and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. 14 But Moses became furious with the officers, the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, who were returning from the military campaign. 15 “Have you let every female live?” he asked them. 16 “Yet they are the ones who, at Balaam’s advice, incited the Israelites to unfaithfulness against the Lord in the Peor incident, so that the plague came against the Lord’s community.d 17 So now, kill every male among the dependents and kill every woman who has gone to bed with a man,e 18 but keep alive for yourselves all the young females who have not gone to bed with a man.f

19 “You are to remain outside the camp for seven days. All of you and your prisoners who have killed a person or touched the dead are to purify yourselves on the third day and the seventh day.g 20 Also purify everything: garments, leather goods, things made of goat hair, and every article of wood.”h

21 Then the priest Eleazar said to the soldiers who had gone to battle, “This is the legal statute the Lord commanded Moses: 22 The gold, silver, bronze, iron, tin, and lead—23 everything that can withstand fire—you are to pass through fire, and it will be clean. It must still be purified with the purification water.i Anything that cannot withstand fire, pass through the water. 24 On the seventh day wash your clothes, and you will be clean.j After that you may enter the camp.”