Seder 117: Ezekiel 20:25---What Do You Mean, "Statutes that were not good..."?

 Ezekiel 20 takes place "in the seventh year, in the fifth month, on the tenth day of the month."  Commentator Ralph Alexander (EBC) estimates that this date is in July or August of 591 BC.  At this point some elders of Israel came to Ezekiel to "inquire of the Lord" (verse 1).  Alexander speculates that they may have been wondering whether the Egyptians would be able to deliver them from Nebuchadnezzar's dominance.  

Whatever the question, God refuses to dignify it with an answer.  Through Ezekiel, he reminds them of Israel's long history of rebellion,  going all the way back to the nation's sojourn in Egypt.  It is revealed, for example, that one reason for the length of that sojourn was the sin of idolatry (verses 7-8).  

Israel's disobedience, God declares, continued during its wilderness years.  As a result, "I gave them statutes that were not good and rules by which they could not have life" (verse 25).  

What does God mean here?  Sadly, as commentator Daniel Block explains, there have been Christian interpreters, starting with Justin Martyr in the second century (see Dialogue with Trypho, chapters 18-22), who gave an antinomian reading of this verse. By this reading, God gave Israel "bad laws" after the sin of the golden calf as a punishment.  

An examination of Ezekiel 20 shows some immediate problems with this sort of interpretation.  Whatever these "bad laws" were, they did not include the Torah revealed at Sinai, which was a blessing intended to lead to abundant life (see Lev 18:5, quoted in verses 11, 13, 21).  Also, these bad laws were given a generation later, to the children of those who were rescued from Egypt (verse 21).  

There seems to be a clue to the meaning of verse 25 in the frequent references to idolatry in the prophecy, including child sacrifice (verse 26; see e.g., Lev 18:21).  God may mean in verse 25 that he "gave Israel over" to such practices to allow them to suffer the consequences and be brought to repentance.  That is the kind of interpretation given, for example, by Walter C. Kaiser in Hard Savings of the Bible.  This kind of language is used in a number of places in the Bible (Ps 81:12; Acts 7:42; Ro 1:24-25). 

Seder 117: Numbers 20:8---"Take the Staff"--Which One? Why?

 When we turn the page to Numbers 20, the years of Israel's sojourn in the wilderness have flown by.  The rest of the book of Numbers takes place in year 40 of the nation's time in the wilderness.  Most of Israel's older generation has died, and a new generation looks forward to completing the journey to the Promised Land.  When that new generation complains to Moses and Aaron (20:2-5), they are looking forward to "grain or figs or vines or pomegranates" (verse 5), not backward to garlic, leeks, fish, and melons (11:5).  

God instructs Moses and Aaron to honor Israel's request for water:  "Take the staff, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water.  So you shall bring the water out of the rock for them and give drink to the congregation and their cattle" (verse 8).  

It's natural to compare this incident with one almost 39 years before, when the parents of these Israelites had recently crossed the Red Sea and were on their way to Sinai.  In that case God directed Moses to strike a rock with his staff, at which point water would come from the rock (Ex 17:6).  This time Moses was to speak to a rock, not strike it.

So what role was the staff to play in this case?  In answering this question, we should first note that the staff in Numbers 20:8 is probably different from the one in Exodus 17:6.  The staff in Numbers 20:8, which Moses takes "from before the Lord" (verse 9), is Aaron's staff that had budded and was subsequently placed next to the ark of the covenant as a sign for the people (Nu 17:10).

After Moses grabbed this staff, he may have handed it to Aaron.  This staff pointed to God as the source of life.  In this case, it would help communicate to the people that God was their faithful provider and would give them the water they needed.  He had not abandoned them in the wilderness; instead, he was working through Moses and Aaron to bring them into the land.  

Commentator Michael Morales proposes that the staff with which Moses struck the rock in Numbers 20:10 was his own staff, the one he had also used to strike the rock in Exodus 17.  In losing his temper and striking the rock in this case, Moses misrepresented God, who was not angry with this new generation of Israelites.  God wanted the new generation to know that he was their source of life, as symbolized by Aaron's staff.  Instead, Moses was sending a message with his own staff that the nation deserved to be judged.

Seder 117: On the Placement and Timing of Numbers 19

 In the religion of ancient Israel, one of the most serious kinds of ritual impurity resulted from contact with a human corpse.  While contact with a dead animal resulted in a minor impurity (Lev 11:31, 39) that only lasted "until the evening," contact with a human corpse was more serious.  During Israel's time in the wilderness, those who had had such contact were temporarily excluded from the camp (Num 5:2).  The high priest was to avoid it, even for the sake of close relatives (Lev 21:10-11).  It prevented a person from participating in Passover at the usual time (Num 9:6).  One who encountered a corpse during a Nazirite vow had to start the vow over again after a cleansing period of a week (Num 6:9-12).  

The ritual procedure for dealing with corpse impurity is laid out in Numbers 19.  It involves the application of a special mixture of living water and ashes of a red heifer on days 3 and 7 of a 7-day period.   

There seem to be allusions to this procedure in the Torah prior to Numbers 19.  The fact that a Nazirite's cleansing from corpse impurity requires a week (Num 6:9) is one.  When the Levites were set apart for service, the "water of purification" was sprinkled on them.  Presumably this is the mixture described in Numbers 19.  These allusions imply that the procedure in Numbers 19 was revealed to Moses at Mount Sinai and used throughout Israel's time in the wilderness.   

The placement of the description of this procedure in Numbers 19, rather than in Leviticus 11-15 or earlier in Numbers, seems to be designed to communicate a message.  In the book of Numbers, chapter 19 is located between the story of the first generation of the Exodus (up through year 39 in the wilderness) and the story of the new generation that completes the journey to the Promised Land.  Many people died during those years in the wilderness, but the nation was cleansed and renewed in preparation for the completion of the journey.

Seder 117: Numbers 20---Moses' Meltdown

 Numbers 20:1 reports the death of Miriam "in the first month."  The year is generally assumed to be the fortieth and final year of the Exodus, because of a time marker given later in the chapter.  Aaron's death is reported in verses 23-29, and we know from Num 33:38 that Aaron died on the first day of the fifth month of the fortieth year.   

By this time the older generation of Israelites had died, as the subject matter of Numbers 19 reminds us.  Verse 2 invites us to compare the next generation with the previous one.  At a time when water was in short supply, Israelites were grumbling, as had happened back in the first year of the journey (Exod 17).

On that previous occasion, God had directed Moses to strike a particular rock, and water came out of the rock (Exod 17:6).  This time God tells Aaron and Moses to speak to a rock, which again would be a source of water (Num 20:8).  

In Numbers 20 God shows no sign of being angry with the new generation of Israel.  They seem to be anxious to experience the blessings of the Promised Land rather than asking to return to Egypt.

Moses, on the other hand, loses control.  Rather than speaking to the rock, he strikes the rock in anger.  God still provides water, but he then lets Moses and Aaron know that they will not be entering the Promised Land.  Instead they will die during that year.

Why did Moses lose control?  Miriam's death could have been a factor.  It also may be that Moses was emotionally exhausted after the forty years in the wilderness, and all the accumulated frustration of dealing with the Israelites for 40 years has taken its toll.  He accuses the new generation of being rebels like their parents.  By being angry with them he misrepresents God, who is not angry with them and wants Moses to take a patient approach.  

Moses here might be compared to an old math professor who rants at a class of freshmen, "You freshmen are all alike!  You come to university unprepared, you skip class, and you're trying to take calculus when you can't even do algebra."  When a professor gets to that point, it is time to retire.

Here God does not punish Moses for a momentary slip-up.  Instead, he recognizes that Moses is not the appropriate person to lead the nation into the Promised Land.  He has served well and faithfully, and it is time to pass the baton to Joshua.    

Seder 117: Numbers 19---Dealing with Corpse Impurity

The subject matter of Numbers 19 is related to Lev 11-15, since the topic is the ritual impurity contracted through contact with dead bodies.  What role does this material play in the narrative of Numbers?   

Between Numbers 14 and Numbers 20, 38 years pass.  The text gives few specifics about what happened during that period.  One thing it does tell us is that the older generation of Israelites died during that period.  And each death resulted in ritual impurity for those who had contact with the body.

Numbers 19 gives instructions for dealing with corpse impurity.  A red cow would be sacrificed and its carcass burned up.  Some additional ingredients were added to the ashes---cedar wood, hyssop, scarlet yarn---perhaps to enhance the redness of the mixture, symbolizing blood.  

The ashes were a kind of purification offering in concentrated form.  Water containing the ashes was sprinkled on a person who had had contact with a corpse, along with any objects that had been rendered unclean through contact with the corpse.  

The instructions in Numbers 19 contain lots of fascinating details.  In Jewish tradition, these instructions are treated as a quintessential mystery, and their sometimes paradoxical nature is highlighted.  Still, the Tanakh says that there is value in meditating on these things (Ps 119:23). 

For example, those who handled the ashes and sprinkled the water contracted a minor ritual impurity. So how did the ashes that cleansed the impure cause a minor impurity for others who produced and handled them?

Commentator Roy Gane has suggested a rationale for this rule.  He is one of the modern scholars who have built conceptual models for how the rituals of Israel worked.  The ashes were going to absorb a lot of ritual impurity, and because of that potential, they were treated, even before they were used, as if that absorption of impurity had already occurred.  

This reminds us of the fact that sins throughout history have been forgiven through the death of Jesus, including sins committed before the Incarnation, because Jesus' death had as good as happened even before it occurred.  He was the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8).  

One batch of ashes from a cow sacrificed at a particular time could be used to remove impurity over some long period of time after that.  This reminds us of the fact that through Jesus' death, sins committed long after the crucifixion have been forgiven.  

Despite the great potential of the ashes to remove impurity, water had to be added and the ashes sprinkled in order for purification to occur.  Similarly, for our sins to be forgiven, we have to accept the sacrifice that Jesus has made for us.  

In a sermon at Church of the Messiah on September 17, 2022, Rob Wilson gave further discussion of the mysteries of Numbers 19.