Numbers Chapter 21

January 26, 2023 ~ AlienCG ~ 1 Comment

Like much of the Bible so far, Chapter 21 is pretty unhinged. Let’s see if I get the gist of it. First, the king of Arad (a Canaanite) fought against the Israelites and held some of them captive. The non-captured ones swore to God that they would utterly destroy their towns if they could get their brethren back. God handed over the Canaanites and the Israelites killed them and destroyed the towns. I looked back at the chapter and this pretty well matches up with the first paragraph.

Then they set out again to go around Edom because they weren’t allowed to go through and they started with their whining again. So, God sent poisonous serpents down to bite the Israelites because…of course he did. Moses prayed to God (who was responsible for this) and God told him to make a poisonous serpent and put it on a pole and when anyone who was bitten looked at would live. Does this make any sense? Please, tell me I’m not the only one who is a tad bit confused.

Then we get a travel log from Oboth to the wasteland overlook before heading into the land of the Amorites. They sent messengers to King Sihon with the usual request, let us pass, no drinking, no stopping, yada yada. King Sihon got an army together and went to fight Israel, but Israel won and took his land. They did the same to King Og.

Didn’t God tell them that they wouldn’t get the land that he promised them? I guess he was just having a cranky day and needed a cookie. The Bronze Serpent thing was the only interesting part of this chapter. I’m looking forward to moving on from the Pentateuch because this section is long.

Numbers Chapter 20

January 19, 2023January 19, 2023 ~ AlienCG ~ Leave a comment

Is the God of the Old Testament petty? Well, after reading this section…yes.

Once again, the Israelites are mad at Moses and Aaron because they brought them out into the wilderness and there is no water. So they go off to the tent of meeting to tell God why the people are mad at them this time.

⁷The LORD spoke to Moses, saying: ⁸Take the staff, and assemble the congregation, you and your brother Aaron, and command the rock before their eyes to yield its water. Thus you shall bring water out of the rock for them; thus you shall provide drink for the congregation and their livestock.
Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 324). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

Simple enough. Now let’s continue…

⁹So Moses took the staff from before the LORD, as he had commanded him. ¹⁰Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock, and he said to them, “Listen, you rebels, shall we bring water for you out of this rock?” ¹¹Then Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock twice with his staff; water came out abundantly, and the congregation and their livestock drank.
Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 324). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

There we go. Moses did the thing that resulted in the thing happening and now the people are happy. Let’s see what’s next…

¹²But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust in me, to show my holiness before the eyes of the Israelites, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.” ¹³These are the waters of Meribah, where the people of Israel quarreled with the LORD, and by which he showed his holiness
Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 324). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

What? OK, it took me a couple times reading this through and then having to look up a scholarly explanation of this section. It turns out that because Moses hit the rock twice with his staff, it showed a lack of faith in God and, therefore, the Israelites won’t be allowed to take over the land of Canaan. Do I think God is petty in this case? YES!

So then the Israelites are refused passage through Edom in what sounds like it was probably a poem or the refrain of a song. They promise to stay on the King’s road, eyes forward, taking nothing, and looking at nothing. But the king threatens them with the sword. Then he shows them the sword. The Israelites turn and walk away.

Finally, Moses takes Aaron up to Mount Hor and is stripped of his vestments and they are given to his son Eleazar is. I guess means that he is now a high priest. Israel mourns for thirty days.

Genesis Chapters 34, 35, & 36

August 2, 2021July 30, 2021 ~ AlienCG ~ 3 Comments

Chapter 34

This chapter pisses me off to no end. Dinah is raped by Shechem (“he seized her and lay with her by force”) and then he wants to take her as a wife. Not surprisingly, her brothers are quite upset about this and want nothing to do with Shechem or his father, Hamor. However, it’s not because of the act of the rape, but because Shechem was uncircumcised and the best solution that they could come up with is for all the men of the city to have their junk cut off.

This is all a ruse, however, for Levi and Simeon to get their revenge by killing Hamor and Shechem, rescuing their sister, and then killing all of the men in the city and taking their wives and kids, their cattle, and their wealth. Jacob’s response to this is to say that they brought trouble on him.

³⁰Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble on me by making me odious to the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites and the Perizzites; my numbers are few, and if they gather themselves against me and attack me, I shall be destroyed, both I and my household.” ³¹But they said, “Should our sister be treated like a whore?”
Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 91). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

I’m saying anyone is right in this story. It’s a pretty barbaric story and the fact that Jacob seems not the least bit upset over his daughter being raped is pretty fucked up (excuse my language, but there is no other way to express myself). That’s all I have to say about this chapter.

Chapter 35

God tells Jacob to hightail it back to Bethel, or Luz, or whatever it’s called, and build an altar to El, the god that appeared to him in what is now called Bethel. He gathers the family together and tells them to get rid of the foreign gods which Jacob hides under an oak tree near Shechem. God also made it abundantly clear to the cities around them that they are not to be followed. When they made it to Bethel, Jacob built the altar and called the place El-Bethel because El is the name of this particular god. And then Rachel’s nurse Deborah died, who we only ever heard of in this very story.

Was this story part of a larger story that was lost to time? It was just a couple chapters ago that Jacob wrestled with God who changed his name to Israel, and now we get a repeat here at Bethel. Did Jacob not hear him or believe him the first time?

⁹God appeared to Jacob again when he came from Paddan-aram, and he blessed him. ¹⁰God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; no longer shall you be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.” So he was called Israel. ¹¹God said to him, “I am God Almighty: [El Shaddai] be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall spring from you.
Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 92). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

So God gives the land that he had given to Abraham and Isaac to Jacob and it will be handed down through his generations. Once again, Jacob…err…Israel build a stone pillar and pours oil on it like he did a few chapters earlier.

Rachel dies in childbirth giving birth to Ben-oni, but Jacob called him Benjamin. So she’s buried on their way to what will be called Bethlehem, and Jacob set up a pillar on the grave. So, this can get a little confusing, but the paragraph uses Jacob in one sentence and Israel in the next. Anyway, Israel set up camp at the tower of Eder.

I can’t remember if it ever comes up again, but Reuben, firstborn of Jacob and Leah, got it on with Bilhah, who was his father’s concubine. Israel heard about it. I’m guessing this will come up again, but not here. Then, with the birth of Benjamin, that makes twelve sons for Jacob, or twelve tribes of Israel.

The chapter concludes with the death of Isaac, and Jacob and Esau bury him.

Chapter 36

We find out that there has been another name change as Esau is now Edom. This whole chapter deals with the genealogy of Esau’s lineage. I am not going to bore anyone with the details. Not even the Oxford Bible Commentary has much of interest to say about this chapter.

I read it. That’s all that’s important.