Numbers 5:22

22 May this water that brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries.” “ ‘Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.”

Numbers 5:22 in Other Translations

22 And this water that causeth the curse shall go into thy bowels, to make thy belly to swell, and thy thigh to rot: And the woman shall say, Amen, amen.

22 May this water that brings the curse pass into your bowels and make your womb swell and your thigh fall away.' And the woman shall say, 'Amen, Amen.'

22 Now may this water that brings the curse enter your body and cause your abdomen to swell and your womb to shrivel. ’ And the woman will be required to say, ‘Yes, let it be so.’

22 Let this water that delivers a curse enter your body so that your belly swells and your womb shrivels.' "Then the woman shall say, 'Amen. Amen.'

22 May this water that brings a curse enter your stomach, causing [your] belly to swell and [your] thigh to shrivel.' "And the woman must reply, 'Amen, Amen.'

Numbers 5:22 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 5:22

And this water that causeth the curse
Upon the drinking of which the curse follows, if guilty:

shall go into thy bowels;
and there operate and produce the above effects, which are repeated again to inject terror:

to make [thy] belly to swell, and [thy] thigh to rot;
here ends the form of the oath, which begins ( Numbers 5:19 ) ;

and the woman shall say, amen, amen;
so be it; let it be as pronounced, if I am guilty; which, as Aben Ezra observes, is repeated for the sake of confirmation; though the Jewish writers commonly understand it as respecting various things, the oath and the curse, the thing charged with, and the persons suspected of ^F24.

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FOOTNOTES:

F24 Misn. ib. sect. 5. Targum Jon. & Jerus. & Jarchi in loc.

Numbers 5:22 In-Context

20 But if you have gone astray while married to your husband and you have made yourself impure by having sexual relations with a man other than your husband”—

21 here the priest is to put the woman under this curse—“may the LORD cause you to become a curse among your people when he makes your womb miscarry and your abdomen swell.

22 May this water that brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries.” “ ‘Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.”

23 “ ‘The priest is to write these curses on a scroll and then wash them off into the bitter water.

24 He shall make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and this water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering will enter her.

Cross References

• 1. Psalms 109:18
• 2. ver 18
• 3. Deuteronomy 27:15