Numbers 16-19

Numbers 16 and 17 present the continued grumbling against the leadership of Moses and Aaron and how these issues are dealt with. Lawrence Boadt provides this helpful overview of the murmuring in the desert….

A second indication of how closely Numbers is joined to the story of the Book of Exodus lies in the great stress that both books place on how Israel grumbled and rebelled against God during the years in the desert. In fact, the two books often parallel each other in incidents....

The incidents in Exodus stress the patience of Yahweh, who always listens to Israel’s needs and intervenes to help. Numbers 11-21, on the other hand, stresses that the people’s constant rebellion led Yahweh to punish them time and again. But each time Moses intervenes and begs for the sake of the people, and God softens his anger and turns back his punishments or heals the victims.

Numbers 10-20 is one series of murmurings after another. Many are directed against the hard conditions of the wilderness, but some are directed against the authority and leadership of Moses himself. Some scholars believe that the traditions found in Exodus and Numbers reflect only a few of the many conflicts and struggles among the tribes during these formative years as different ones fought for leadership and superiority….

The constant repetition of the rebellion theme would not have been missed by the Israelite of the sixth century for whom P wrote. They could look back on the centuries of injustice, disobedience and false worship, the condemnations of the prophets, the failures of the kings, and know that the loss of their freedom and land in exile had been richly deserved. God cannot be pushed too far without asserting his own justice and honor. Yet even at a late hour, he could turn from his anger and spare them, if they would only turn to him. More than most books of the Old Testament, Numbers lets us see why the Pentateuch came to be the way it is—a gathering of very old traditions and much later added developments. For Israel, each part of the ancient faith tradition had a message for later generations.[1]

What do you think the message is for us in all the murmurings in the desert?

Numbers 18 and 19 relate more laws concerning the Levites and the sacrifices. Friedman notes:

Legal texts are worked in at various points of the wilderness narrative, thus conveying that not all of the law has been revealed at Sinai, but that the law rather continues to be elaborated upon and added to as the people move closer to the land. Also through this construction the revelation of the law comes to be pictured as an ongoing part of the people’s life, and it is understood to be part of the new, post-exodus generation’s experience—and thus the possession of the people who will carry it into the promised land.[2]

Do you think God is still revealing his law to us? Is revelation progressive?

[1] Boadt, Reading the Old Testament, 191-193

[2] Friedman, Commentary on the Torah, 491

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