Day 63: The Reubenites & the Gadites

So the fighting begins. But who are they fighting? Each other, by any chance?

War with Midian

Numbers 31:1-7

Balaam and kings of Midian slain

Numbers 31:8-18

Purification of Israelites

Numbers 31:19-24

Division of the spoil

Numbers 31:25-47

Offerings to the Lord

Numbers 31:48-54

Tribes of Reuben & Gad request an inheritance

Numbers 32:1-5

Moses reproves Reubenites & Gadites

Numbers 32:6-15

Their views explained

Numbers 32:16-27

They settle to the east of the Jordan

Numbers 32:28-42

So, the slaughter begins. Every Midianite man is slaughtered, including Balaam, despite the fact that he refused to curse the Israelites. All the plunder is lovingly detailed, which seems repugnant, but actually I suspect it was a way of being scrupulously honest. Rather than the soldiers grabbing everything they could lay their hands on, they made sure that a share was given to God. Of course the women are treated as possessions, which grates with us, but that’s the way it was then.

Next, there’s a bit of a row when two tribes ask Moses if they can be let off crossing the Jordan. Moses jumps to the conclusion that basically they are trying to get out of a hard time. However, they promise to fight with everyone else, and strike a bargain to leave their womenfolk on the east o the Jordan and come back to them when the battles are over.

It seems bloodthirsty, that peoples are going to be ethnically cleansed to make way for the Israelites. Wrong, we say. But - this was (and is) normal. Every tribe had to compete or be displaced - the Canaanites would have displaced their predecessors when they settled in the land. Some people find this so repugnant that they think “How could God allow this?” At the moment, my thought is - this was all they knew.

So funnily enough, the major atrocities (as we would call them if the happened today) of the conquest of Canaan don't upset me as much as some of the more points of the law, such as a man's right to have his wife examined if he suspect she has been guilty of adultery. If time permits, I'll post on this issue soon.