Numbers Part 1

England in springtime is, to me, one of the most beautiful places in the world. This past Saturday, on the first really good day of the year, I had the great pleasure of attending a friend’s wedding and getting to enjoy the sunshine in the beautiful gardens of a manor house in Cheltenham. 

What could be more Spring-like than daffs and a chick??

Not being one of life’s great organisers, I left booking my hotel, train ticket and wedding present until less than twenty four hours before the day itself, selected my outfit the morning of the wedding (what was clean + what still fitted = wedding outfit), threw everything into a bag, and got ready during the train journey in order to make it on time.

Whilst I am very pro-marriage, I wouldn’t usually describe myself as a wedding enthusiast. I don’t have a lot of spare funds, and slightly resent having to spend what I do have on a big, self-indulgent ‘event’ that isn’t really necessary to a great marriage. Some friends and I once added up how much we’d spent on other people’s weddings, and safe to say we could have gone travelling abroad with the money for several months. I don’t like all the waiting around on the day, or the bizarre formality of a lot of the traditions.

But on this particular day I realised that I had allowed these annoying niggles to make me cynical about what was, in truth, a beautiful thing – two people finding each other and committing to each other for life, and that it was a privilege to be asked to be part of that day. The couple in question seemed so overwhelmed with happiness, and so thankful that people had made the effort to be there, that I felt ashamed of my previous attitude.

My innate cynicism smashed with a metaphorical hammer, I had a wonderful time; conversing with interesting and hilarious people, drinking champagne, chucking confetti with maniacal glee, listening to heartfelt speeches, throwing some wacky shapes on the dance-floor for three hours straight, and generally getting caught up in the joy of the occasion.

When you’ve just been witness to God’s ideal for marriage – two people promising to love each other, forsake all others, and be there for each other through good times and bad until death they do part, it’s a bit like having cold water thrown all over you to read ‘The Test for an Unfaithful Wife’ in Numbers . . . 

 Reading can be found at: Numbers 1-2, Numbers 3-4,  and (containing the text we're discussing)     Numbers 5-6.

The first thing that struck me about the passage was that there was no ‘Test for an Unfaithful Husband’, once again supporting the notion that these rules were written by Ancient Near Eastern dudes who used religion as a means of supporting their prejudice and sexism. And at first glance, the ‘test’ itself seems fairly odd. To sum up:

If a husband suspected his wife of being unfaithful, but had no actual evidence, he would take her to the priest who would administer a simple test to resolve the matter: the priest would take some water, add a little dust from the tabernacle floor, ask the woman to swear she had not been unfaithful, then make her drink it. The supposed result was that if she had been unfaithful, her stomach would swell and she would become barren. If she was innocent, she would be fine.

Loving the energy this lamb is bringing

Whilst at first this seems to smack of the sort of random tests of the Salem witch trials – if they drown, they’re innocent, if they float, they’re a witch – I have found some comments on this passage that offer some plausible explanation.

Rather than being about punishing women, this test served to protect them. Ancient Near Eastern culture was incredibly biased against women. In other tribes at the time, if a man even suspected his wife had cheated on him, he could beat her, mistreat her, divorce her or even kill her without any consequences whatsoever. Accusations of infidelity were often used as a means of disposing of a wife if the husband had grown tired of her and fancied another.

Israelites, however, were not to use any of these methods but were to follow the protocol of this test. And when you read the text closely, you realise that the water  . . . . didn’t actually contain anything! It was just water with a little dust from the tabernacle floor in it – not particularly appetising, but certainly not containing any harmful ingredients. If you believe that there is no God, then no woman would ever be convicted of adultery this way as she was just drinking plain water. Although a guilty woman may be terrified by the prospect of this test uncovering her sin, the only explanation for if something happened to a woman through this test would be if God actually intervened supernaturally. Without any supernatural intervention, the only result would be to assuage the husband’s accusations and allow the woman to return home proved innocent.

So, problemos: It does still bother me that there was no test for an unfaithful husband, but then, women in the Ancient Near East weren’t in the habit of randomly accusing their husbands of infidelity in the same way, so the men didn’t need a means of protection. The other remaining niggle is the thought that a woman may go through this test, and then still be infertile through completely natural means. I would hope that in this scenario, if she hadn’t experienced any stomach swelling or symptoms at the time of the test she would remain vindicated, or that God would grant her children if He’d known that she’d been through such an accusation (as we’ve seen Him do for other suffering women in the OT). Of course, there’s always the possibility that priests or other men in authority would misuse this test and utilise cheating methods of proving ‘guilt’, but to do so would be completely outside of God’s command and protection, and they would have to bear the consequences (either in this life or the next).

I’ve read a fair bit lately on how the rules given to the Israelites in the Old Testament were not necessarily reflective of God’s ideals or views on situations. We know from the New Testament that Jesus said divorce was permitted in the Old Testament “only as a concession to your hard hearts” (Mark 10). The implication here is that divorce, along with the other laws given to the Israelites (including those regarding treatment of women and slaves), were aimed at a harsh culture not ready to live up to the standards God had intended. We also know that the laws of the Old Testament were intended as temporary, and that a new order arrived with the resurrection of Jesus, one that called us to aim for a higher ideal.

I’m already on record as saying I’m not totally comfortable with the idea that just because Israel’s laws were more compassionate than many of the laws of the surrounding tribes and nations, this somehow makes it acceptable. But it does seem as though a lot of the laws given were concessions rather than directions i.e. “I know you’re not able to live up to this ideal, so in this less than perfect scenario, here’s what you do to ensure a fairer result . . . .”

I have to believe that if these laws came from God, they don’t reflect His opinions on women, but that He knew the Israelites, coming from such a patriarchal society, weren’t ready to accept equality for everyone, and gave laws to try and mitigate the worst levels of abuse and protect the weakest in society as much as possible. The ideal – the standard He holds to – is reflected in the values of Jesus, who treated women with respect and compassion.

*Pics by Richard Peters photography and Vedainformatics.