Numbers 5:22-27

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.

25 The priest is to take from her hands the grain offering for jealousy, wave it before the LORD and bring it to the altar.

26 The priest is then to take a handful of the grain offering as a memorial^[a] offering and burn it on the altar; after that, he is to have the woman drink the water.

27 If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.

Numbers 5:22-27 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO NUMBERS 5

This chapter contains a repetition of some former laws, concerning putting unclean persons out of the camp, Nu 5:1-4; making restitution in case of trespass against another, Nu 5:5-8; and of giving the offering of all holy things and all hallowed things to the priests, Nu 5:9,10; and a new law concerning jealousy, in a man, of his wife, Nu 5:11-14; when she was to be brought to the priest, and various rites and ceremonies to be used, Nu 5:15-23; who was to give her bitter water as a trial of her chastity, which, if guilty, would have a strange effect upon her, and make her accursed, but if not, would not affect her, and she would be free and happy, Nu 5:24-31.

Cross References

• 1. Psalms 109:18
• 2. ver 18
• 3. Deuteronomy 27:15
• 4. Jeremiah 45:1
• 5. Leviticus 8:27
• 6. S Leviticus 2:2
• 7. Isaiah 43:28; Isaiah 65:15; Jeremiah 26:6; Jeremiah 29:18; Jeremiah 42:18; Jeremiah 44:12,22; Zechariah 8:13

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "representative"