#numbers 5

1 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

2 Command the children of Israel, that they put out of the camp every leper, and every one that hath an issue, and whosoever is defiled by the dead:

3 Both male and female shall ye put out, without the camp shall ye put them; that they defile not their camps, in the midst whereof I dwell.

4 And the children of Israel did so, and put them out without the camp: as the Lord spake unto Moses, so did the children of Israel.

5 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

6 Speak unto the children of Israel, When a man or woman shall commit any sin that men commit, to do a trespass against the Lord, and that person be guilty;

7 Then they shall confess their sin which they have done: and he shall recompense his trespass with the principal thereof, and add unto it the fifth part thereof, and give it unto him against whom he hath trespassed.

8 But if the man have no kinsman to recompense the trespass unto, let the trespass be recompensed unto the Lord, even to the priest; beside the ram of the atonement, whereby an atonement shall be made for him.

9 And every offering of all the holy things of the children of Israel, which they bring unto the priest, shall be his.

10 And every man's hallowed things shall be his: whatsoever any man giveth the priest, it shall be his.

11 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

12 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man's wife go aside, and commit a trespass against him,

13 And a man lie with her carnally, and it be hid from the eyes of her husband, and be kept close, and she be defiled, and there be no witness against her, neither she be taken with the manner;

14 And the spirit of jealousy come upon him, and he be jealous of his wife, and she be defiled: or if the spirit of jealousy come upon him, and he be jealous of his wife, and she be not defiled:

15 Then shall the man bring his wife unto the priest, and he shall bring her offering for her, the tenth part of an ephah of barley meal; he shall pour no oil upon it, nor put frankincense thereon; for it is an offering of jealousy, an offering of memorial, bringing iniquity to remembrance.

16 And the priest shall bring her near, and set her before the Lord:

17 And the priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel; and of the dust that is in the floor of the tabernacle the priest shall take, and put it into the water:

18 And the priest shall set the woman before the Lord, and uncover the woman's head, and put the offering of memorial in her hands, which is the jealousy offering: and the priest shall have in his hand the bitter water that causeth the curse:

19 And the priest shall charge her by an oath, and say unto the woman, If no man have lain with thee, and if thou hast not gone aside to uncleanness with another instead of thy husband, be thou free from this bitter water that causeth the curse:

20 But if thou hast gone aside to another instead of thy husband, and if thou be defiled, and some man have lain with thee beside thine husband:

21 Then the priest shall charge the woman with an oath of cursing, and the priest shall say unto the woman, The Lord make thee a curse and an oath among thy people, when the Lord doth make thy thigh to rot, and thy belly to swell;

22 And this water that causeth the curse shall go into thy bowels, to make thy belly to swell, and thy thigh to rot: And the woman shall say, Amen, amen.

23 And the priest shall write these curses in a book, and he shall blot them out with the bitter water:

24 And he shall cause the woman to drink the bitter water that causeth the curse: and the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, and become bitter.

25 Then the priest shall take the jealousy offering out of the woman's hand, and shall wave the offering before the Lord, and offer it upon the altar:

26 And the priest shall take an handful of the offering, even the memorial thereof, and burn it upon the altar, and afterward shall cause the woman to drink the water.

27 And when he hath made her to drink the water, then it shall come to pass, that, if she be defiled, and have done trespass against her husband, that the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, and become bitter, and her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall rot: and the woman shall be a curse among her people.

28 And if the woman be not defiled, but be clean; then she shall be free, and shall conceive seed.

29 This is the law of jealousies, when a wife goeth aside to another instead of her husband, and is defiled;

30 Or when the spirit of jealousy cometh upon him, and he be jealous over his wife, and shall set the woman before the Lord, and the priest shall execute upon her all this law.

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Command the people of Israel that they put out of the camp everyone who is leprous[a] or has a discharge and everyone who is unclean through contact with the dead. 3 You shall put out both male and female, putting them outside the camp, that they may not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.” 4 And the people of Israel did so, and put them outside the camp; as the LORD said to Moses, so the people of Israel did.

5 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 6 “Speak to the people of Israel, When a man or woman commits any of the sins that people commit by breaking faith with the LORD, and that person realizes his guilt, 7 he shall confess his sin that he has committed.[b] And he shall make full restitution for his wrong, adding a fifth to it and giving it to him to whom he did the wrong. 8 But if the man has no next of kin to whom restitution may be made for the wrong, the restitution for wrong shall go to the LORD for the priest, in addition to the ram of atonement with which atonement is made for him. 9 And every contribution, all the holy donations of the people of Israel, which they bring to the priest, shall be his. 10 Each one shall keep his holy donations: whatever anyone gives to the priest shall be his.”

11 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 12 “Speak to the people of Israel, If any man's wife goes astray and breaks faith with him, 13 if a man lies with her sexually, and it is hidden from the eyes of her husband, and she is undetected though she has defiled herself, and there is no witness against her, since she was not taken in the act, 14 and if the spirit of jealousy comes over him and he is jealous of his wife who has defiled herself, or if the spirit of jealousy comes over him and he is jealous of his wife, though she has not defiled herself, 15 then the man shall bring his wife to the priest and bring the offering required of her, a tenth of an ephah[c] of barley flour. He shall pour no oil on it and put no frankincense on it, for it is a grain offering of jealousy, a grain offering of remembrance, bringing iniquity to remembrance.

16 “And the priest shall bring her near and set her before the LORD. 17 And the priest shall take holy water in an earthenware vessel and take some of the dust that is on the floor of the tabernacle and put it into the water. 18 And the priest shall set the woman before the LORD and unbind the hair of the woman's head and place in her hands the grain offering of remembrance, which is the grain offering of jealousy. And in his hand the priest shall have the water of bitterness that brings the curse. 19 Then the priest shall make her take an oath, saying, ‘If no man has lain with you, and if you have not turned aside to uncleanness while you were under your husband's authority, be free from this water of bitterness that brings the curse. 20 But if you have gone astray, though you are under your husband's authority, and if you have defiled yourself, and some man other than your husband has lain with you, 21 then’ (let the priest make the woman take the oath of the curse, and say to the woman) ‘the LORD make you a curse and an oath among your people, when the LORD makes your thigh fall away and your body swell. 22 May this water that brings the curse pass into your bowels and make your womb swell and your thigh fall away.’ And the woman shall say, ‘Amen, Amen.’

23 “Then the priest shall write these curses in a book and wash them off into the water of bitterness. 24 And he shall make the woman drink the water of bitterness that brings the curse, and the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain. 25 And the priest shall take the grain offering of jealousy out of the woman's hand and shall wave the grain offering before the LORD and bring it to the altar. 26 And the priest shall take a handful of the grain offering, as its memorial portion, and burn it on the altar, and afterward shall make the woman drink the water. 27 And when he has made her drink the water, then, if she has defiled herself and has broken faith with her husband, the water that brings the curse shall enter into her and cause bitter pain, and her womb shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away, and the woman shall become a curse among her people. 28 But if the woman has not defiled herself and is clean, then she shall be free and shall conceive children.

29 “This is the law in cases of jealousy, when a wife, though under her husband's authority, goes astray and defiles herself, 30 or when the spirit of jealousy comes over a man and he is jealous of his wife. Then he shall set the woman before the LORD, and the priest shall carry out for her all this law. 31 The man shall be free from iniquity, but the woman shall bear her iniquity.”

A PURE WALK  Numbers 5:1-4 NET          1 Then the LORD spoke to Moses: 2 “Command the Israelites to expel from the camp every leper, everyone who has a discharge, and whoever becomes defiled by a corpse. 3 You must expel both men and women; you must put them outside the camp, so that they will not defile their camps, among which I live.” 4 So the Israelites did so, and expelled them outside…

Recently, I’ve noticed a trend in the pro-choice movement of using a portion of Numbers 5 in the Bible out of context to claim God “supports abortion”. In turn, there is an attempt to shut down pro-life individuals who happen to be Christian. You tend to hear the “it’s literally in your Bible, your God supports abortion” argument. Since I have noticed more people erroneously making this claim and received an inflammatory message from someone using this argument as "evidence" (who deactivated/deleted his account after sending me hateful remarks and conveniently did so before I could write a response), I felt it was time to make a post discussing this. Not so much for the purpose of convincing pro-choice people (if I could manage to convince anyone that’s great, but I haven’t seen debates/discussions typically having that effect with controversial topics), but for the sake of spiritually young Christians who can be easily confused by lies like this. I also wanted to write this for Christians in general to know how to defend His truth on this matter if they ever find themselves presented with this false argument. The passage the pro-choice movement attempts to use in Numbers 5 is the section that refers to the account describing how a woman suspected of adultery was to be given a bitter drink and the supernatural effects that were to take place if she were found guilty (Numbers 5:11-31). Mind you, this happened before Christ came as a perfect atoning sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin (contrast this account of how to deal with adultery with how Christ stood in front of the woman being condemned for adultery and about to be stoned by the Pharisees - He protected her, caused the Pharisees to leave, and told her to go and sin no more. Because through Him, we are made new creations washed of our sins. Before He came, people had no choice but to try paying the debt of sin on their own by following the Old Testament Law/Mosaic Law- which nobody could successfully fulfill. That’s why Christ came to fulfill the Law). Note that I have provided the link above to the chapter in the NKJV translation. The pro-choice movement likes to take the NIV (New International Version) translation’s poor wording that refers to what is being described here happening to the woman’s belly/womb as “miscarrying”:

“If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.” - Numbers 5:27 (NIV)

If you look at the very same verse in the NKJV, you can see that it has a meaning that is very different and there is no reference to miscarriage at all:

“When he has made her drink the water, then it shall be, if she has defiled herself and behaved unfaithfully toward her husband, that the water that brings a curse will enter her and become bitter, and her belly will swell, her thigh will rot, and the woman will become a curse among her people.” - Numbers 5:27

When you look at the original Hebrew text/words, it is evident that the meaning is consistent with what the NKJV states, not the NIV. There is no mention of miscarriage when we read this passage in both Hebrew and the KJV/NKJV. Take a look at how this table clearly breaks down the original Hebrew phrase by phrase. Once again, absolutely no mention of miscarriage and it is extremely consistent with what we read in the KJV/NKJV. The NIV is the only translation of the Bible that uses the phrase “miscarry”. I’ve never noticed a problem before with the NIV and its consistency with other translations of the Word, but this is an example of where there’s definitely a skewed sense of wording here that isn’t consistent with other translations. I also know that while they don’t use the term “miscarry”, the Easy To Read (ERV), Common English Bible (CEB), and a couple of Catholic translations carry a similar idea of the womb “discharging”, implying a miscarriage. But as I touched upon above, this isn’t consistent with the original Hebrew. If you look at any other translation (besides these few that poorly worded this verse), it carries a very similar wording and meaning to what we see in the NKJV, which in turn is consistent with the original Hebrew. Some examples of many that carry this consistent meaning: ASV, AMP, ESV, GNV, GNT, HCSB, ISV, KJV, TLB, NASB, NCV, NLT, TLV. When we analyze the wording in the translations accurate to the original Hebrew text, we can determine medically what is likely happening during this supernatural incident. בִטְנָ֔הּ translates to the belly, abdomen, or womb. וְנָפְלָ֖ה יְרֵכָ֑הּ basically translates to thigh to fall or thigh to rot. Considering the Hebrew text and the whole context of the passage, it seems that what is actually being referred to is the punishment of becoming barren/unable to become pregnant. Take into consideration the time period that these scriptures come from. The inability to have children was generally accepted by society as something shameful and sorrowful. So it makes sense that being cursed with the inability to have children was a serious punishment. It is reasonable to consider that the “thigh to fall” or “thigh to rot” description was a more discreet way of referring to the uterus/womb dropping, perhaps something like a prolapsed uterus. There is no reference whatsoever in this passage to the woman having been pregnant. Just because a woman is suspected of adultery does not mean she is pregnant. Given the original Hebrew text and the translations that are accurately reflecting this, there’s no reason to assume this from the passage at all. Interestingly, there are actually some translations that clearly reflect this idea of the uterus falling/the woman becoming barren. For example:

“Suppose she has made herself “unclean.” She has not been faithful to her husband. And she has drunk the water that brings a curse. Then it will go into her body. It will cause her to suffer bitterly. It will make her body unable to have children. She will become a curse.” - Numbers 5:27 (NIRV)

“If the woman has been unfaithful, the water will immediately make her unable to have children, and she will be a curse among her people.” - Numbers 5:27 (CEV)