Numbers 19:1–22:1

Laws for Purification

19Now the Lord spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, ²“This is the statute of the law that the Lord has commanded: Tell the people of Israel to bring you a red heifer without defect, in which there is no blemish, ^mand on which a yoke has never come. ³And you shall give it to Eleazar the priest, and ⁿit shall be taken outside the camp and slaughtered before him. ⁴And Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger, and ^osprinkle some of its blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven times. ⁵And the heifer shall be burned in his sight. ^pIts skin, its flesh, and its blood, with its dung, shall be burned. ⁶And the priest shall take ^qcedarwood and hyssop and scarlet yarn, and throw them into the fire burning the heifer. ⁷Then the priest ^rshall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward he may come into the camp. But the priest shall be unclean until evening. ^8sThe one who burns the heifer ^rshall wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water and shall be unclean until evening. ⁹And a man who is clean shall gather up ^tthe ashes of the heifer and deposit them outside the camp in a ^uclean place. And they shall be kept for the water for ^vimpurity for the congregation of the people of Israel; it is a sin offering. ¹⁰And the one who gathers the ashes of the heifer ^rshall wash his clothes and be unclean until evening. And this shall be a perpetual statute for the people of Israel, and for the stranger who sojourns among them.

^11w“Whoever touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days. ¹²He ^xshall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so be clean. But if he does not cleanse himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not become clean. ¹³Whoever touches a dead person, the body of anyone who has died, and does not cleanse himself, ^ydefiles the tabernacle of the Lord, ^zand that person shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not thrown on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is still on him.

¹⁴“This is the law when someone dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent and everyone who is in the tent shall be unclean seven days. ¹⁵And every ^aopen vessel that has no cover fastened on it is unclean. ^16bWhoever in the open field touches someone who was killed with a sword or who died naturally, or touches a human bone or a ^cgrave, shall be unclean seven days. ¹⁷For the unclean they shall take ^dsome ashes of the burnt sin offering, and fresh¹ water shall be added in a vessel. ¹⁸Then a clean person shall take ^ehyssop and dip it in the water and sprinkle it on the tent and on all the furnishings and on the persons who were there and on whoever touched the bone, or the slain or the dead or the grave. ¹⁹And the clean person shall sprinkle it on the unclean ^fon the third day and on the seventh day. ^gThus on the seventh day he shall cleanse him, and he shall ^hwash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and at evening he shall be clean.

²⁰“If the man who is unclean does not cleanse himself, ⁱthat person shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly, since he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. Because the water for impurity has not been thrown on him, he is unclean. ²¹And it shall be a statute forever for them. The one who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and the one who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening. ²²And ^jwhatever the unclean person touches shall be unclean, and anyone who touches it shall be unclean until evening.”

The Death of Miriam

20And the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came ^kinto the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh. And ^lMiriam died there and was buried there.

The Waters of Meribah

^2mNow there was no water for the congregation. ⁿAnd they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. ³And the people ^oquarreled with Moses and said, “Would that we had perished ^pwhen our brothers perished before the Lord! ⁴Why have you brought the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, that we should die here, both we and our cattle? ⁵And ^qwhy have you made us come up out of Egypt to bring us to this evil place? It is no place for grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, and there is no water to drink.” ⁶Then Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the entrance of the tent of meeting and ^rfell on their faces. ^sAnd the glory of the Lord appeared to them, ⁷and the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ^8t“Take the staff, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water. So ^uyou shall bring water out of the rock for them and give drink to the congregation and their cattle.” ⁹And Moses took the staff ^vfrom before the Lord, as he commanded him.

Moses Strikes the Rock

¹⁰Then Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock, and he said to them, ^w“Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?” ¹¹And Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock with his staff twice, ^uand water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their livestock. ¹²And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because ^xyou did not believe in me, ^yto uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.” ^13zThese are the waters of Meribah,¹ where the people of Israel quarreled with the Lord, and through them he showed himself holy.

Edom Refuses Passage

^14aMoses sent messengers from Kadesh to ^bthe king of Edom: “Thus says ^cyour brother Israel: You know all the hardship that we have met: ^15dhow our fathers went down to Egypt, ^eand we lived in Egypt a long time. ^fAnd the Egyptians dealt harshly with us and our fathers. ¹⁶And ^gwhen we cried to the Lord, he heard our voice and ^hsent an angel and brought us out of Egypt. And here we are in Kadesh, a city on the edge of your territory. ¹⁷ⁱPlease let us pass through your land. We will not pass through field or vineyard, ^jor drink water from a well. We will go along the King’s Highway. We will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory.” ¹⁸But Edom said to him, “You shall not pass through, lest I come out with the sword against you.” ¹⁹And the people of Israel said to him, “We will go up by the highway, ^kand if we drink of your water, I and my livestock, ^lthen I will pay for it. Let me only pass through on foot, nothing more.” ²⁰But he said, ^m“You shall not pass through.” And Edom came out against them with a large army and with a strong force. ²¹Thus Edom ⁿrefused to give Israel passage through his territory, so Israel ^oturned away from him.

The Death of Aaron

²²And they journeyed from ^pKadesh, and the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came to ^qMount Hor. ²³And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron at Mount Hor, on the border of the land of Edom, ^24r“Let Aaron be gathered to his people, for he shall not enter the land that I have given to the people of Israel, because ^syou rebelled against my command at the waters of Meribah. ²⁵Take Aaron and Eleazar his son and bring them up to Mount Hor. ²⁶And strip Aaron of his garments and put them on Eleazar his son. And Aaron ^rshall be gathered to his people and shall die there.” ²⁷Moses did as the Lord commanded. And they went up Mount Hor in the sight of all the congregation. ^28tAnd Moses stripped Aaron of his garments and put them on Eleazar his son. And Aaron died there ^uon the top of the mountain. Then Moses and Eleazar came down from the mountain. ²⁹And when all the congregation saw that Aaron had perished, ^vall the house of Israel wept for Aaron thirty days.

Arad Destroyed

21When ^wthe Canaanite, the king of Arad, who lived in ^xthe Negeb, heard that Israel was coming by the way of Atharim, he fought against Israel, and took some of them captive. ^2yAnd Israel vowed a vow to the Lord and said, “If you will indeed give this people into my hand, then I will devote their cities to destruction.”^{1 3}And the Lord heeded the voice of Israel and gave over the Canaanites, and they devoted them and their cities to destruction. So the name of the place was called ^zHormah.²

The Bronze Serpent

⁴From Mount Hor ^athey set out by the way to the Red Sea, ^bto go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. ⁵And the people ^cspoke against God and against Moses, ^d“Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and ^ewe loathe this worthless food.” ^6fThen the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and ^gthey bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. ^7hAnd the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. ⁱPray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. ⁸And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” ⁹So ^jMoses made a bronze³ serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

The Song of the Well

¹⁰And the people of Israel set out and ^kcamped in Oboth. ^11kAnd they set out from Oboth and ^kcamped at Iye-abarim, in the wilderness that is opposite Moab, toward the sunrise. ¹²From there they set out and camped in ^lthe Valley of Zered. ¹³From there they set out and camped on the other side of the Arnon, which is in the wilderness that extends from the border of the Amorites, for the ^mArnon is the border of Moab, between Moab and the Amorites. ¹⁴Therefore it is said in the Book of the Wars of the Lord,

“Waheb in Suphah, and the valleys of the Arnon,

¹⁵and the slope of the valleys

that extends to the seat of ⁿAr,

and leans to the border of Moab.”

¹⁶And from there they continued ^oto Beer;⁴ that is the well of which…