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Tanach (JPS): Numbers: Numbers Chapter 31

Book of ChroniclesHebrew Bible TranslationJewish Publication Society Bible

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This is Numbers 31 from the Hebrew Bible (Tanach), in the 1917 Jewish Publication Society translation — a narrative passage from the Torah's legal-historical tradition. It recounts the Israelite military campaign against Midian, commanded by God as vengeance before Moses's death: twelve thousand warriors, accompanied by the priest Phinehas, kill all Midianite men and kings (including Balaam), burn cities, and return with women, children, and vast livestock as spoil. Moses, upon their return, orders the killing of all male children and all non-virgin women, citing the Midianite women's role in the apostasy at Peor, while virgin women are to be kept alive and distributed among the soldiers. The remainder of the chapter is largely procedural: detailed instructions for ritual purification of soldiers and captives, precise formulas for dividing the spoil between warriors and the broader community, and the levying of tributes to God (administered through the Levites and Eleazar the priest). The passage is notable for its bureaucratic exactness — enumerating hundreds of thousands of animals and thousands of human captives as fungible tribute items — and for presenting the slaughter of non-combatants as both divinely mandated and morally required. It is a primary text in theological and ethical debates about divinely sanctioned violence and genocide in scripture.

Tanach (JPS): Numbers: Numbers Chapter 31

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