Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible Recap.

Remember the Midianites? Think back to Numbers 25.

Bailum the Prophet was on the mountain with Balak, refusing to curse the Israelites.

Then immediately after this in Numbers 26 we see a scene

where the Israelite men are hoaring with the Midianite women and a plague breaks

out where God kills 24,000 people. Then Phineas, Aaron's grandson, personally kills an Israelite and the Midianite

chief's daughter he's having a little rendezvous with, and that's what led up to where we are

today. God tells Moses that his final assignment before death is to kill the Midianites.

Moses rallies 12,000 men for the task, plus Phineas, son of the high priest, who acts as

a sort of chaplain.

He takes some of the holy vessels, though he don't know which ones, and some trumpets.

They kill all the men of the land.

And you may have noticed that Bailum was included among them, because he advised Balak on how to trip up the Israelites

specifically using the wiles of the women. After winning the battle the Israelite

warriors bring the women and children back to the Israelite encampment,

which was what they typically did after winning a battle.

But this isn't just any battle.

This is a battle whose primary cause is these women. So Moses ordered the death of all the women

who weren't virgins, the women who initiated the idolatry and the loss of

24,000 lives. It's possible some of the soldiers had even brought back the very women who had led them

astray.

And even if they weren't the same women, this was still trouble waiting to happen.

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