God Offers the Promised Land, but 2.5 Tribes Say "No Thanks."

Numbers Chapter 32: Division of the Land East of Jordan

Numbers 32:1-42

Day 90. It is wonderful, even in an area of the province where things are still not fully opened up, to watch people ease up a little. Few masks, less worried about crossing the street when you approach them, more cars on the road, and more and more retailers opening. Life will slowly return to some point close to where it was before all this Covid-19 concern started. But it will not likely go all the way back in every respect. The government has managed to move its needle of control in the direction where individual freedom continues to decrease. They accomplished their fine-tuning towards a societal reset, a goal they are getting closer to with each ‘pandemic’ or its equivalent. Christians, however, know that God is fully in control and while the globalists and OWG (one-world-government) pushers think they’re winning, the truth is they’re bringing their treasured possession (world domination) closer to eternal doom. We continue to study our Bible and to keep alert, knowing how this all ends. Thanks for joining us.

The Passage

32 Now the sons of Reuben and the sons of Gad had an exceedingly large number of livestock. So when they saw the land of Jazer and the land of Gilead, that ^[a]it was indeed a place suitable for livestock, ² the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben came and spoke to Moses and to Eleazar the priest and to the leaders of the congregation, saying,³ “Ataroth, Dibon, Jazer, Nimrah, Heshbon, Elealeh, Sebam, Nebo and Beon, ⁴ the land which the Lord ^[b]conquered before the congregation of Israel, is a land for livestock, and your servants have livestock.” ⁵ They said, “If we have found favor in your sight, let this land be given to your servants as a possession; do not take us across the Jordan.”

⁶ But Moses said to the sons of Gad and to the sons of Reuben, “Shall your brothers go to war while you yourselves sit here? ⁷ Now why are you ^[c]discouraging the sons of Israel from crossing over into the land which the Lord has given them? ^8 [d]This is what your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to see the land. ⁹ For when they went up to the ^[e]valley of Eshcol and saw the land, they ^[f]discouraged the sons of Israel so that they did not go into the land which the Lord had given them. ¹⁰ So the Lord’s anger burned in that day, and He swore, saying, ¹¹ ‘None of the men who came up from Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob; for they did not follow Me fully, ¹² except Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite and Joshua the son of Nun, for they have followed the Lord fully.’ ¹³ So the Lord’s anger burned against Israel, and He made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until the entire generation of those who had done evil in the sight of the Lord was destroyed. ¹⁴ Now behold, you have risen up in your fathers’ place, a brood of sinful men, to add still more to the burning anger of the Lord against Israel. ¹⁵ For if you turn away from following Him, He will once more abandon them in the wilderness, and you will destroy all these people.”
¹⁶ Then they came near to him and said, “We will build here sheepfolds for our livestock and cities for our little ones; ¹⁷ but we ourselves will be armed ready to go before the sons of Israel, until we have brought them to their place, while our little ones live in the fortified cities because of the inhabitants of the land. ¹⁸ We will not return to our homes until every one of the sons of Israel has possessed his inheritance. ¹⁹ For we will not have an inheritance with them on the other side of the Jordan and beyond, because our inheritance has fallen to us on this side of the Jordan toward the east.”
²⁰ So Moses said to them, “If you will do ^[g]this, if you will arm yourselves before the Lord for the war, ²¹ and all of you armed men cross over the Jordan before the Lord until He has driven His enemies out from before Him, ²² and the land is subdued before the Lord, then afterward you shall return and be free of obligation toward the Lord and toward Israel, and this land shall be yours for a possession before the Lord. ²³ But if you will not do so, behold, you have sinned against the Lord, and be sure your sin will find you out. ²⁴ Build yourselves cities for your little ones, and sheepfolds for your sheep, and do ^[h]what you have promised.”
²⁵ The sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben spoke to Moses, saying, “Your servants will do just as my lord commands. ²⁶ Our little ones, our wives, our livestock and all our cattle shall ^[i]remain there in the cities of Gilead; ²⁷ while your servants, everyone who is armed for war, will cross over in the presence of the Lord to battle, just as my lord says.”
²⁸ So Moses gave command concerning them to Eleazar the priest, and to Joshua the son of Nun, and to the heads of the fathers’ households of the tribes of the sons of Israel. ²⁹ Moses said to them, “If the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben, everyone who is armed for battle, will cross with you over the Jordan in the presence of the Lord, and the land is subdued before you, then you shall give them the land of Gilead for a possession; ³⁰ but if they will not cross over with you armed, they shall have possessions among you in the land of Canaan.” ³¹ The sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben answered, saying, “As the Lord has said to your servants, so we will do. ³² We ourselves will cross over armed in the presence of the Lord into the land of Canaan, and the possession of our inheritance shall remain with us across the Jordan.”
³³ So Moses gave to them, to the sons of Gad and to the sons of Reuben and to the half-tribe of Joseph’s son Manasseh, the kingdom of Sihon, king of the Amorites and the kingdom of Og, the king of Bashan, the land with its cities with their ^[j]territories, the cities of the surrounding land. ³⁴ The sons of Gad built Dibon and Ataroth and Aroer,³⁵ and Atroth-shophan and Jazer and Jogbehah, ³⁶ and Beth-nimrah and Beth-haran as fortified cities, and sheepfolds for sheep. ³⁷ The sons of Reuben built Heshbon and Elealeh and Kiriathaim, ³⁸ and Nebo and Baal-meon—their names being changed—and Sibmah, and they gave other names to the cities which they built. ³⁹ The sons of Machir the son of Manasseh went to Gilead and took it, and dispossessed the Amorites who were in it. ⁴⁰ So Moses gave Gilead to Machir the son of Manasseh, and he lived in it.⁴¹ Jair the son of Manasseh went and took its ^[k]towns, and called them ^[l]Havvoth-jair.⁴² Nobah went and took Kenath and its villages, and called it Nobah after his own name.

Footnotes

1. Numbers 32:1 Lit behold, the place, a place for
2. Numbers 32:4 Lit smote
3. Numbers 32:7 Lit restraining the hearts of
4. Numbers 32:8 Lit Thus your fathers
5. Numbers 32:9 Or wadi
6. Numbers 32:9 Lit restrained the hearts of
7. Numbers 32:20 Lit this thing
8. Numbers 32:24 Lit that which has come out of your mouth
9. Numbers 32:26 Lit be
10. Numbers 32:33 Lit borders
11. Numbers 32:41 Lit tent villages
12. Numbers 32:41 I.e. the towns of Jair

Thoughts on the Passage

So, the Israelites are on the east side of the Jordan, down east of the Salt Sea. The Jordan River runs primarily from the Sea of Galilee (in the O.T. a.k.a. Sea of Chinnereth; other names include Lake or Sea of Tiberias; and Luke calls it by its Greek name, and is the only one to use the title of ‘Lake’ Gennesaret in Luke 5; we also note that there is in Hebrew there is one word for lake and sea) down to the Salt Sea, which is quite a distance north of the Red Sea.  Canaan, the Promised Land, is on the west side of the Jordan.

Now the sons of two of the twelve tribes, that is, the tribes of Reuben and Gad, look at this land on the east of Jordan, and given their large flocks, decide this is good enough for us. They decide to approach Moses and Eleazar, plus other leaders of the congregation with their thoughts. They point out that this land had already been captured by the Lord and it was most suitable for livestock. So, they asked permission to given that land as their possession and they would not cross over the Jordan to Canaan.

But Moses wasn’t born yesterday and right away pointed out the injustice of that. The implication was that while all the other tribes were to across the Jordan to take the Promised Land (and risk getting killed), these guys and their people would stay at home sound and safe. And furthermore, these leaders were discouraging their own warriors from crossing over and possessing the land God had given Israel. Sorry, says Moses, “not a good deal and the optics stink.”

Furthermore, Moses reminds them of what their ‘fathers’ had done when they went up to the valley of Eshcol, saw the land before them, and discouraged the Israelites from going into the land God had given them, just as their request now might encourage them again. And that made God angry. That was when God swore none of the men (except Caleb and Joshua) who were 20 years old and up when the Israelites left Egypt would see the Promised Land God had promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They caused God’s anger to force the Israelites to wander in the wilderness for 40 years until all those people 20 and up at the time of the Exodus from Egypt had died.

Moses was really hot now. These guys were adding more fuel to the fire and could easily have gotten God even angrier now that they were so close to the Promised Land. In fact, Moses tells them that the very lives of all the Israelites could be lost. So, basically, it’s a “no deal” situation.

But of course, the sons of Gad and Reuben would not give up. Clearly Moses’ anger had surprised them, and they had drawn back because verse 16 says they now “came [or drew] near to him”. But they must have correctly surmised that his anger was based on his objecting to the fact that their men not fighting next to their brothers and so they pressed on.

They came up with their next proposal. How about if they were to build cities for their livestock, and their families on the east side of the Jordan, but the men would go over to help the rest of the sons of Israel possess the promised land, fight with them to that end, and not return until all the others got their land, and there would be no inheritance for them (Reuben and Gad’s tribes) on the other side. Clever plan, and fair compromise I would say. Although, it seems strange to me that in verse 16 they seem to place the building of cities for their livestock ahead of the needs of their little ones. But of course, it was very much a pastoral farming culture where livestock determined many things.

So, Moses agrees that if they do as they have sworn, all will be well. If not, they will have sinned against the Lord, and that their sin would find them out. Moses passed that on to Eleazar and to Joshua, and the other heads of the various tribes. And the Reuben and Gad boys verified that in front of all. At least, this way, no one would be encouraged not to fight to take the land since even those of the tribes who would not possess the land would be fighting with them.

Now for some reason, in verse 33, where we are told what cities, etc., Moses gave to Reuben and Gad, we are also introduced to a third party added to those two. This is the half-tribe of Joseph, headed up by his son Manassah. Perhaps, in seeing what a deal Reuben and Gad’s leaders worked out, thought they’d like in on it as well.

Robert Jamieson suggests that it is possible that Moses himself invited them to partake of this deal as he observed that the land on the east of the Jordan would be sufficient to support not only the tribes of Reuben and Gad, but also that of Manassah. And he may have favored them in this way due to the role they had played in fighting the Amorites.

You will remember as we read in study.com:

“When Jacob blessed Joseph's sons, while on his deathbed, he set the two up as the replacement for Joseph's tribe, which then became called the ''House of Joseph.'' Because of the symbolism of the number 12 to Judaism (the 12 tribes of Israel, totality, wholeness), the tribes were not considered whole tribes but were instead called half-tribes. Jacob gave them double the territory the other tribes received so that, even though they were technically half-tribes, they would each have the same amount of land as Jacob's other sons.”

You will remember that Moses carried Joseph’s bones out of Egypt at the time of the Exodus as was Joseph’s desire.

The rest of the verses to the end of the chapter describe the various cities, etc., that each of the three groups represented – Reuben’s, Gad’s, and Manassah’s – built their homes and ranches in. We should note that Moses agreed to give them this land, before they actually went into battle to take Canaan. Those were the days when someone’s word meant something.

Now Chuck Smith suggests that we may see in these three tribes a lot of Christians today. They got out of Egypt which represents the bondage of sin, but they aren’t quite eager to get into the fullness of Christ – the Promised Land. They’re happy somewhere short of there. They have it nice there --- why take a risk to go for the Promised Land?

David Guzik says, based on Wenhan’s comments, that for these tribes to ask for this arrangement is “to show a disturbing indifference to the divine word, the word on which Israel's existence entirely depended."

One lesson for us to learn from this passage is that, as Guzik says, “It is a terrible thing to be used of the devil to discourage other believers to walking deeper and further with the LORD. We should ask God to guard us from ever discouraging the heart of another child of God.”

Once again, we look at our One and Only Hero of the Bible – God – when we consider this chapter. We note that He is silent in it. He is mentioned three times – once when those proposing the deal concede that God had won the land east of the Jordan for them; secondly when Moses reminds them how they had given rise to God’s anger; and finally, when Moses reminds them that if they continued they would make Him so angry, He might wipe all of Israel out. So, we see our God really forging, even when He takes no active part in the negotiations, the outcomes that result.

Here is what I take from all this. God, and God’s values and character, once imbedded in the hearts and minds of men can, without a doubt, impact our dealings and interactions.  And after all, isn’t that what being a Christian is all about.

The gems from the book of Numbers continue to be found.

It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.

It's hard to see that God's Way is based on Justice, His Promise, and His Love -- but it is.

Numbers Chapter 31: Victory over Midian

Numbers 31:1-54

Day 89 of a recommended “stay at home” policy for our area. But many people are not staying at home.  They go out, some with masks, some without. There is considerable confusion about what works, what doesn’t; what’s open, what isn’t; and what’s mandatory and what isn’t. Welcome to the new order of mass (and mask) muddling. We stay the course, going about our business as best we can. On our daily walks each morning, at a rather fast clip, it is interesting to watch people of all ages clear the way for us, making sure there is no way they will come anywhere within six (but usually to be safe they make it easily 10 or 15) feet away.  Yet the government says we can now meet with ten people at a time without social distancing, and interestingly enough each of us can meet with nine different people each time.  So, where’s the logic in all this?  There isn’t any. But there’s always logic and justice and love in God’s Word, so we continue to study it.  Thanks for joining us.

The Passage

31 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ² “Take full vengeance for the sons of Israel on the Midianites; afterward you will be gathered to your people.” ³ Moses spoke to the people, saying, “Arm men from among you for the war, that they may ^[a]go against Midian to execute the Lord’s vengeance on Midian. ⁴ A thousand from each tribe of all the tribes of Israel you shall send to the war.” ⁵ So there were ^[b]furnished from the thousands of Israel, a thousand from each tribe, twelve thousand armed for war. ⁶ Moses sent them, a thousand from each tribe, to the war, and Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, to the war with them, and the holy vessels and the trumpets for the alarm in his hand. ⁷ So they made war against Midian, just as the Lord had commanded Moses, and they killed every male. ⁸ They killed the kings of Midian along with the rest of their slain: Evi and Rekem and Zur and Hur and Reba, the five kings of Midian; they also killed Balaam the son of Beor with the sword. ⁹ The sons of Israel captured the women of Midian and their little ones; and all their cattle and all their flocks and all their goods they plundered. ¹⁰ Then they burned all their cities where they lived and all their camps with fire. ¹¹ They took all the spoil and all the prey, both of man and of beast. ¹² They brought the captives and the prey and the spoil to Moses, and to Eleazar the priest and to the congregation of the sons of Israel, to the camp at the plains of Moab, which are by the Jordan opposite Jericho.

¹³ Moses and Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the congregation went out to meet them outside the camp. ¹⁴ Moses was angry with the officers of the army, the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds, who had come from service in the war. ¹⁵ And Moses said to them, “Have you ^[c]spared all the women? ¹⁶ Behold, these ^[d]caused the sons of Israel, through the ^[e]counsel of Balaam, to ^[f]trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, so the plague was among the congregation of the Lord. ¹⁷ Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man ^[g]intimately. ¹⁸ But all the ^[h]girls who have not known man ^[i]intimately, ^[j]spare for yourselves. ¹⁹ And you, camp outside the camp seven days; whoever has killed any person and whoever has touched any slain, purify yourselves, you and your captives, on the third day and on the seventh day. ²⁰ You shall purify for yourselves every garment and every article of ^[k]leather and all the work of goats’ hair, and all articles of wood.”

²¹ Then Eleazar the priest said to the men of war who had gone to battle, “This is the statute of the law which the Lord has commanded Moses: ²² only the gold and the silver, the bronze, the iron, the tin and the lead, ²³ everything that can stand the fire, you shall pass through the fire, and it shall be clean, but it shall be purified with water for impurity. But whatever cannot stand the fire you shall pass through the water. ²⁴ And you shall wash your clothes on the seventh day and be clean, and afterward you may enter the camp.”

Verses 25-54 describe how the spoils taken from the slaughter were divided.

Footnotes

1. Numbers 31:3 Lit be
2. Numbers 31:5 Lit delivered
3. Numbers 31:15 Lit let...live
4. Numbers 31:16 Lit were to
5. Numbers 31:16 Lit word
6. Numbers 31:16 Possibly defect from the Lord
7. Numbers 31:17 Lit by lying with a man
8. Numbers 31:18 Lit female children
9. Numbers 31:18 Lit by lying with a man
10. Numbers 31:18 Lit keep alive
11. Numbers 31:20 Or skin

Thoughts on the Passage

I must confess that this is one of the most difficult passages for me to read and/or study. The reasons are many as you’ll see in my comments below. It is a history of a “holy war” and it contains all the atrocities of war.

To begin with we have God’s instructions to Moses to “Take full vengeance for the sons of Israel on the Midianites”. I don’t know what God may have had in mind when He used that phrase “full vengeance”. But it sure sounds like “no holds barred” to me. Doesn’t sound like a loving God, many would claim. We must remember that God is also “just” and we will understand His reasoning for that instruction as we study the chapter further.

Secondly, in verse 2, we note that God instructed Moses to “go against Midian (in order) to execute the Lord’s vengeance on Midian.” This was God’s war, no one else’s. As difficult as it may be for us to accept that, we must again look for God’s reasons for doing so. And we’ll see that His reason made sense to a Holy God and thus should make sense to us, His people. We also know that because it was His war, victory was guaranteed. [And note also at the end of the chapter we learn that in this case success was total – not a single soldier of Israel’s was lost in the battle.] Vengeance when undertaken by God is a positive and necessary thing. It becomes evil when we undertake it. It is similar to the idea that we are not to take the law into our own hands in our society today.

Thirdly, God is telling Moses to lead his people in this war with the Midianites, after which Moses would “gathered to (his) people”, although this was not an “immediately afterwards”. This isn’t, “Hey Moses, just do this one more thing in your role as leader, and then you can retire.” No, it’s “do this one more thing and then you will die.” What kind of motivation was that? How did Moses do it? Well, the answer is twofold. First, we know the character of Moses and his commitment to obeying God and having complete trust in Him. Second, he realized that being gathered to his people was not such a bad deal under the circumstances after all. What a role model he is for us. He knew his role; he knew when he had accomplished his role; and he understand that God’s fairness and His word had to be fulfilled.

We also note in verse 6 that those that went to war included Phinehas the son of Eleazar the high priest (after the death of Aaron) and his priests. And they took with them the holy vessels and the trumpets with which to sound the alarm for the troops.

The Israelites engaged the Midianites and killed every male, including the five kings of Midian, and Balaam (which we remember was sought by Balak to curse Israel). He did not get his wish to die like the righteous because he wasn’t righteous. He was greedy and so he died with the unrighteous.

Now what the army of Israel did was capture the women and children, and all the cattle and flocks, and also plundered their possessions. They then burned everything to the ground. And they return home with their captives and the spoils. This was all in accordance with the custom of the day with respect to battles.

Matthew Henry points out that their triumphant march home was met with great respect when even the very aged Moses walked out of the camp to meet them. But then. . .

When Moses saw them, he was angry with their officers, and here comes another hard part, because he saw that they had “spared all the women”. Henry says he may well have been moved with a holy indignation at the sight of them, for you remember the law in the case of whoredom was that the adulterer and the adulteress should surely be put to death. God had taken care of the former, now He wanted the latter to be taken care of. They were supposed to have died as well. When God says, “full vengeance”, He means “full vengeance”. And then Moses gives us God’s reasoning for all of this when he says in verse 16 that it was the women who caused the sons of Israel, “through the counsel of Balaam”, to sin against the Lord which in turn caused the plague among the Israelites. God had His reasons for what He wanted done and Moses knew it.

Also, as Matthew Henry reminds us, God had already taken vengeance on his own people for being involved in this whole mess with the Midianites – remember the plague. Now He had to complete His exercise of justice on those that caused the problem. Furthermore, it is possible that God may have wanted to allow Moses the privilege of seeing revenge on the Midianites as he had been very angry at what had happened earlier as a result.

According to David Guzik, Moses may have also been angry “because the children of Israel failed to see the great danger of sexual immorality and idolatry posed by these women who before led the men of Israel into these exact sins.”

So therefore, Moses now instructs the officers to kill all the male children they took captive and every woman who is not a virgin. And he offered them the virgins for themselves. Wow. They never taught me all this in Sunday School. What was Moses doing here? Why on earth would he give the Israelite men ungodly women to sleep with? Or was it that these women were simply to become their slaves? And why would kill young males? On this question, Guzik writes: “This was harsh, but done with the understanding that in that ancient culture, the boys would have grown into men with the solemn responsibility to avenge their father's death and to perpetuate Midianite culture - which in itself was anti-God.” And Robert Jamieson indicates that God had intended this war to be a war of extermination of an evil idolatrous people.

We stop here for a moment, because no doubt this action of God’s through the Israelites is a very hard concept for us. Chuck Smith suggests we need to understand a little about the culture of these and especially their religious practices. Marriage vows meant nothing. Bestiality was practiced. Human and especially child sacrifices to their gods were the order of the day. And God didn’t want them to pollute His children, the Israelites.

Of course, anyone who had killed any person or touched the dead were deemed unclean and had to remain outside the camp for seven days, and they along with their captives had to be purified on the third and seventh days of the isolation. And that included every piece of clothing as well as other articles (verse 20).

Verses 21-24 explain how Eleazar had them put everything through the fire, and only the precious metals that could withstand the fire would be considered ‘clean’.

In the section that describes how the spoils were to be divided, we note that everyone who went out to war was to get their share (50%) and the other half would be shared among the rest of the congregation. But a tax was to be levied on those things and given to Eleazar as an offering to the Lord (one for every 500 from the warriors and one for every 50 from the congregation’s half). In total there were over 800,000 animals that were captured (verses 32-34) and 32,000 virgins (verse 35).  And if I have this right, one wonders what the priest and his family would do with 352 virgins (32 from the warriors’ 16,000; and 320 for the congregation’s 16,000). No answer is provided to my knowledge.

The chapter ends with all the men who went out to war bringing to Moses and the Eleazar all the gold that they had taken in their plundering. And they did this because they were so thankful that not one single Israelite was lost in this battle.

What are the lessons we need to learn from this passage today?

First, what wars are we fighting? Are they ours or are they God’s? If they are ours, there is no guarantee we’ll win. If they are God’s, there is no way He’ll lose.

Second, that God’s way may not always seem right to us, but there is always validity in it. It is always based on one or more of three of His attributes as the Almighty Creator Father God: a) His execution of justice, b) His keeping of His word, and c) His love for His children. What God was doing here was exercising all three – He wanted justice for the sins of the Midianites, He kept His word as to what would happen, and He did it because He loved His people and wanted to protect them for the future. We can’t miss this.

And thirdly, this whole scenario is a foreshadowing, in my opinion, of exactly how God will deal with the world as a whole in due time. Justice will be served, His promises will be kept, and His people will be saved. That’s our God.

It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.