Seder 123: Numbers 26-27, Joshua 17: Evidence of the Inheritance of Zelophehad's Daughters

 Preparation to distribute the land among the clans of Israel is one of the main topics in Numbers 26-36.  Commentator Michael Morales discusses two Hebrew words that appear repeatedly in these chapters.  

One of the words is achuzza, a word for a possession or holding.  The other is nachalah, a word for a holding that is passed down through inheritance.  

Both words appear in the case of Zelophehad's daughters, who ask for an achuzza in the land distributed to Zelophehad's brothers (Num 27:4).  God responds to their request by granting them an achuzza that is also a nachalah (verse 7).  They will be granted land that can be passed down to their descendants.  

The distribution of land to the tribe of Manasseh, including Zelophehad's daughters, is described in Joshua 17.  It appears that the clan of Hepher, to which Zelophehad belonged, would receive land west of the Jordan, while the other clans of Manasseh would receive land east of the Jordan.  The portion west of the Jordan was divided into ten portions, five of which would go to the daughters of Zelophehad (verses 5-6).  So the daughters were granted a large tract of land.  

It is interesting that evidence has been found corroborating the biblical account.  Dr. Aaron Demsky reports on evidence linking the names of the daughters with the region in which their possessions were located.  

The name Tirzah became attached to a town, apparently a Canaanite town that was renamed for her (Joshua 12:24).  This town was the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel until the building of Samaria (1 Ki 14:17; 15:21, 33; 16:6, 8, 9,15, 17, 23).  It is said to be lovely in Song 6:4.  Archaeologists have identified Tel el Far 'ah as its location.  

Demsky connects Mahlah with Abel-Meholah (Judges 7:22; 1 Ki 4:12; 19:16).  

In excavations at Samaria in 1910-12, 63 ostraca from the eighth century BC were found.  The ostraca mention seven clans of Manasseh.  Number 50 mentions Noah, and Hoglah is mentioned on numbers 45 and 47.

Seder 81: Lev 10:1-7---Nadab and Abihu

 Shortly after worship at the tabernacle began (presumably the same day), disaster struck.  Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu "each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them" (Lev 10:1).  Fire from God then quickly killed them (v 2).  

There are different possibilities for what the sin of Nadab and Abihu might have been.  The phrase "which I had not commanded them", the first-person version of the phrase "which he had not commanded them" in verse 1, occurs elsewhere in divine warnings against idolatry (Deut 18:20; Jer 7:31; 19:5), which raises the possibility that the "unauthorized fire" was connected with a pagan worship practice. 

Commentator Richard Hess finds further clues for this possibility in the names of the sons of Aaron.  Abihu means "he is my father," and Aaron was the one responsible for the golden calf (Exod 32:2-5).  Later the idolatrous Jeroboam would name his sons Nadab and Abijah (1 Kings 14).  

Hess also points out some extrabiblical evidence in a thirteenth-century B.C. clay tablet from Emar, an ancient Syrian city.  This tablet, designated number 369, describes a week-long ordination ritual for a priestess of the storm god Addu.  At the end of the week, a procession led the priestess to her new home in the temple of Addu.  Significantly, the procession included a torchbearer bringing fire to the temple.  Perhaps Nadab and Abihu were bringing pagan elements into the Israelite ceremony through their unauthorized fire.  

The Hebrew word for "unauthorized" in Lev 10:1 also appears in Exodus 30:9 in connection with incense offered at the tabernacle.  The same word appears in 2 Kings 19:24 in reference to the "foreign" waters of Egypt.  The incense that Nadab and Abihu offered could have differed from the prescribed type.  

There are two further clues in Leviticus.  In Lev 10:9, God specifies that priests not drink while on duty.  This suggests that Nadab and Abihu may have been operating under impaired judgment caused by the consumption of alcohol.  

Then in Lev 16:1-2, God gives the instruction that priests were not to enter the Most Holy Place in the tabernacle or temple, except for the high priest on the Day of Atonement.  The instruction is connected in the narrative to the deaths of Nadab and Abihu, suggesting that Nadab and Abihu may have entered the Most Holy Place with their censers.

Whatever the precise details of their infraction, their punishment sent the strong message that Israel needed to worship God on his terms.  In the initial stages of some phase of his plan, God may exercise severity to keep his program on track and guide a community in the right direction.  The punishments given to Achan (Joshua 7) and to Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5) are further examples of this pattern.

Aaron, of course, would have been shocked by what happened.  Lev 10:3 says that Aaron "held his peace," a response for which he usually is viewed favorably.  Aaron and his remaining sons were forbidden from visibly mourning in this instance.  For a high priest, mourning any death was out of the question (Lev 21:10-12).  An ordinary priest normally could mourn for a close relative (Lev 21:1-3), but that was not allowed in this case.  Commentator Gordon Wenham observes that it would have been  detrimental to the spiritual health of the whole community if the family were to imply in any way that they condoned the sins of Nadab and Abihu or disagreed with God's judgment.