Numbers 25

Numbers 25:1

3. Balaam’s Corruption of Israel (Chap. 25)25:1-3 Although Balaam’s name is not mentioned in this chapter, we learn in Num_31:16 that he was responsible for the terrible corruption of the children of Israel that is described here. All of Balak’s rewards could not induce Balaam to curse Israel, but they finally did persuade him to corrupt Israel by causing some of the people to commit harlotry and idolatry with the women of Moab. Often when Satan cannot succeed in a direct attack, he will succeed in an indirect one. Balaam’s true character emerges here. Up to this point we might think of him as a godly prophet who was loyal to the word of God and an admirer of the people of God. But from Num_31:16 and 2Pe_2:15-16 we learn that he was a wicked apostate who loved the wages of unrighteousness. Balaam advised Balak how to make the Israelites stumble: get them “to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality” (Rev_2:14). His advice was heeded. This led to gross idolatry at the shrine of Baal of Peor. 25:4-8a God commanded that all the guilty leaders should be hanged out in the sun. Before the sentence was carried out, a leader of the tribe of Simeon brought a Midianite woman into the camp of Israel, to take her into his tent (v. 14). Phinehas, the son of the high priest (Eleazar), killed both man and woman with his javelin. Samuel Ridout comments: Phinehas, “a mouth of brass,” is singularly appropriate to him who was so unyieldingly faithful to God, and by his relentless judgment of sin secured an abiding priesthood for himself and family. 25:8b-13 God sent a plague into the camp of Israel, killing a total of twenty-four thousand of the offenders during the course of the plague (23,000 in one day1Co_10:8). It was Phinehas’ heroic action that stopped . . . the plague. Because he was zealous for his God, the LORD decreed that an everlasting priesthood would continue in the family of Phinehas. 25:14, 15 Zimri’s position of prominence in his tribe and the fact that the woman was a daughter of a Midianite chief might have stopped the judges from executing judgment upon him, but it did not stop Phinehas. He was jealous for Jehovah’s sake. 25:16-18 The LORD ordered Moses to war against the Midianites (who were mingled with the Moabites at this time). This command was carried out in chapter 31.