Numbers – General
And what is there in the book of Numbers; with its sacrifices and water of jealousy, with its shewbread and spoons, its kids and fine flour, its oil and candlesticks, its cucumbers, onions and manna; to assist and instruct mankind? What interest have we in the rebellion of Korah, the water of separation, the ashes of a red heifer, the brazen serpent, the water that followed the people uphill and down for forty years, and the inspired donkey of the prophet Balaam? Have these absurdities and cruelties, these childish, savage superstitions, helped to civilize the world?
Numbers 1:51 - God displays his hospitality with the admonition: "The stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death."
Numbers 3:4 - Two of Aaron's sons are killed by God for "offering strange fire before the Lord."
Numbers 3:10 - God repeats his order (see 1:51) to kill any strangers who happen to come near.
Numbers 3:38 - Once again (see 1:51 and 3:10) God tells his favourite people to kill any strangers that come near.
Numbers 4:15, 20 - Don't touch or "go in to see when the holy things are covered." God kills people who touch or look at uncovered holy things. Maybe he is scared they will see the truth!
Numbers 5:1-4 - God tells the people to expel from camp "every leper, every one that hath an issue, and whoever is defiled by the dead." So by God's instructions, the sick are abandoned and left to suffer and die alone.
Numbers 5:11-31 - The Law of Jealousies. If a man suspects his wife of being unfaithful, he reports it to the priest. The priest then makes her drink some "bitter water." If she is guilty, the water makes her thigh rot and her belly swell. If innocent, no harm done, the woman is free and will "conceive seed." In any case, "the man shall be guiltless from iniquity, and this woman shall bear her iniquity."
Numbers 10:29 - In Exodus (Ex.3:1, 4:18, and 18:5), the father-in-law of Moses is said to be Jethro, not Hobab as is said in this verse.
Numbers 11:1 - "And when the people complained, it displeased the Lord: and the Lord heard it." He then burns the complainers alive. That'll teach them.
Numbers 11:4, 19-20 - The people begin to whine about not having any meat. So God says he'll give them meat, alright. He'll give them "flesh to eat," not for just a few days, but "for a whole month, until it come out of your nostrils, and it be loathsome to you." He is so kind.
Numbers 11:31 - God sends quails to feed his people until they were "two cubits [about a meter] high upon the face of the earth." Taking the "face of the earth" to be a circle with a radius of say 30 kilometres (an approximate day's journey), this would amount to 3 trillion (3x1012) litres of quails. At 2 quails per litre, this would provide a couple million quails for each person of several million people.
Numbers 12:1, 9-10 - Miriam and Aaron (Moses' brother and sister) criticize Moses for marrying an Egyptian woman and thus breaking the law of God (see Ex.34:16, Dt.7:3, 1 Kg.11:2). But God makes it clear that his rules don't apply to his favourites, and he strikes Miriam with leprosy. Notice that only Miriam is punished, though both she and Aaron complained. God just doesn't like women much, does he?
Numbers 13:33 - "And there we saw the giants ... And we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight." This statement may have been figurative, hyperbole, typical biblical exaggeration, or an actual description of the sons of Anak, in which case they must have been about 300 feet (91.44m) tall. These are the same giants (the Nephilium) that resulted when the "sons of God" mated with "the daughters of men in Gen.6:4. Of course, these superhuman god-men should have been destroyed in the flood. So what are they doing still alive? And where is the evidence of these giants today?
Numbers 14:12, 29, 32-37 - More plagues and pestilence sent by God. God repeats one of his favourite promises: "your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness."
Numbers 14:14 - The Israelites saw God "face to face," contrary to many Bible verses that say that no one has ever seen God.
Numbers 14:18 - God punishes the children for the failings of their great-great grandfathers. Bible-believers call this justice. But this concept is denied in Dt.24:16 and Ezek.18:20.
Numbers 15:3, 13-14 and 24 - God gives more instructions for the ritualistic killing of animals. The smell of burning flesh is "a sweet savour unto the Lord."
Numbers 15:27-30 - "If any soul sin through ignorance ..." but how can someone sin through ignorance? Don't you have to know that an action is wrong for it to be sinful? Oh well, if you do happen to sin through ignorance, you can be forgiven by God if you kill some animals. Of course Paul disagrees in Heb.10:4, 11.
Numbers 15:32-36 - The Israelites find a man picking up sticks on the Sabbath. God commands them to kill him by throwing rocks at him.
Numbers 15:38-39 - Immediately after ordering the execution of the Sabbath breaker, God gets down to some more important business; like instructing the people on how to make fringes on their garments. He also, contrary to Ec.11:9, counsels us to refrain from listening to our own hearts.
Numbers 16:20-35 - Because of a dispute between Korah and Moses, God has the ground open up and swallow Korah and his family. And then, just for the hell of it, God has a fire burn 250 men (friends of Korah?) to death.
Numbers 16:41-50 - After God killed Korah, his family, and 250 innocent bystanders, the people complained saying, "ye have killed the people of the Lord." So God, who doesn't take kindly to criticism, sends a plague on the people. And "they that died in the plague were 14,700." Makes me think of people like Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Sadam Hussein etc, etc.
Numbers 17:12-13 - God threatens to kill those who murmur. To which the people reply, "Behold, we die, we perish, we all perish .... Shall we be consumed with dying?"
Numbers 18:7 - God shows us how to make new friends by saying: "The stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death."
Numbers 18:17-19 - God describes once again the procedure for ritualistic animal sacrifices. Such rituals must be extremely important to God, since he makes their performance a "statute" and "covenant" forever. Why, then don't Bible-believers perform these sacrifices anymore? Don't they realize how God must miss the "sweet savour" of burning flesh? Don't they believe God when he says "forever"?
Numbers 19:1-22 - The purification of the unclean. These absurd rituals, cruel sacrifices, and unjust punishments are vitally important to God. He even insists that they are to be "a perpetual statute" to all humankind.
Numbers 20:27-28 - These verses say that Aaron died on Mount Hor, but Dt.10:6 say he died at Mosera.
Numbers 21:3 - "And the Lord hearkened to the voice of Israel, and delivered up the Canaanites; and they utterly destroyed them and their cities." This verse demonstrates the power of prayer: If you ask God, he will destroy entire cities for you. But just don’t ask him for food!
Numbers 21:6 - Because they complained about the lack of food and water, God sends "fiery serpents" to bite the people, and many of them die.
Numbers 21:8 - To save the people from God's snakes, Moses makes a graven image in the form of a snake (breaking the second commandment) and puts it on a pole. Those who look at Moses' magic snake to not die, even if they were previously bit by God's snakes. The force is strong in you Moses… (Some Star Wars humour)
Numbers 21:34-35 - God delivers the Amorites into Moses' hands. (You're in God hands with Moses.) So Moses does the usual thing, killing everyone "until their was none left alive."
Numbers 22:9 - God asks Balaam the non-rhetorical question, "What men are these with thee?" You'd think God would already know, wouldn't you?
Numbers 22:20-22 - God says to Balaam, "If men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them." Men come, and Balaam goes with them, just as God had commanded." And God's anger was kindled because he went"; but he was just following God's instructions!!
Numbers 23:19 - This verse says that God does not repent, but other verses plainly say that he does.
Numbers 23:22 - God has "the strength of a unicorn." Oh heck, I bet he's even stronger than a unicorn. It’s just a pity they all died in the flood…
Numbers 24:7 - Balaam says "his king shall be higher than Agag." But Balaam couldn't have known about Agag since Agag didn't live until the time of King Saul. (See 1Sam.15:33 where Samuel hacks king Agag into pieces.)
Numbers 25:1-5 - After the people "commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab," Moses has them all killed. Then God tells Moses to hang their dead bodies up in front of him; God says that this will satisfy him. This must be an example of God's "plenteous mercy" that is mentioned in Ps.103:8.
Numbers 25:6-9 - While God is talking to Moses about hanging up the dead bodies, one of the Israelite men brings home a foreign woman. When "Phinehas (Aaron's grandson) sees them he throws a spear "through the man... and the woman through her belly." (Remember that Moses himself married a foreign woman (Ex.12:1). This act pleases God so much that "the plague was stayed from the children of Israel." But not before 24,000 (1 Cor.10:8 say 23,000) had died.
Numbers 25:10-13 - Because of Phinehas' javelin throw, God gave him his covenant of the everlasting priesthood. So this was the valiant deed that established the priesthood! It figures.
Numbers 26:14 - This verse says there were 22,200 in the tribe of Simeon; Num: 1-23 says there were 59,300.
Numbers 26:38-40 - There are four lists of Benjamin's sons in the Bible, and none of them agree. This one lists five (as does 1 Chr.8:1-2), Gen.46:21 lists ten, and 1 Chr.7:6 list three. Only one name (Bela) is found in all four lists.
Numbers 27:8 - If a man dies and has no son, then his inheritance goes to his daughter. But if he has a son, then the daughter gets nothing. Also no mention is made of wives, sisters, or aunts.
Numbers 28-29 - In these chapters, God provides ridiculously detailed instructions for the ritualistic sacrifice of animals. The burning of their dead bodies smells great to God. Eleven times in these two chapters God says that they are to him a "sweet savour." If he is spiritual how can he smell it?
Numbers 30:2 - In Mt.5:34, 37 and Jas.5:12 oaths are strictly forbidden. But in this verse, God gives instructions for making oaths, and says that such oaths are binding.
Numbers 30:3-16 - If men make vows, then God expects them to keep them. But a woman cannot make a vow, unless it is "allowed" by her husband or father. If it is "allowed," then she must keep it, be even so, she is not responsible (her husband or father is).
Numbers 31:1-54 - Under God's direction, Moses' army defeats the Midianites. They kill all the adult males, but take the women and children captive. When Moses learns that they left some live, he angrily says: "Have you saved all the women alive? Kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for you selves." So they went back and did as Moses (and presumably God) instructed, killing everyone except for the virgins. In this way they got 32,000 virgins -- Wow! [Even God gets some of the booty, including the virgins. (31:28-29)]
Numbers 31:25-29 - God tells Moses to make an offering of "man and beast" as a "heave offering of the Lord."
Numbers 32:13-14 - In Psalms 30:5 it says that God's anger lasts "but a moment," but these verses say that "the fierce anger of the Lord" lasted for forty years.
Numbers 33:50-52 - God tells Moses to exterminate the residents of Canaan and destroy all of their religious symbols and possessions.
Numbers 35:19, 21 - "The revenger of blood" must murder the murderer just as soon as he sees him.
Numbers 35:33 - When a murder is committed the blood pollutes the land. The only way to cleanse it is to spill more blood by killing the killer.
