This is the Bible Book Club.

And we're in the book of numbers.

Welcome to the club.

In episode 13, we covered chapters 24 and 25, and this was the tail end of our donkey story.

Balaam gave four more messages or oracles to King Balak's horror because they were blessings

for Israel, but curses for Moab and a few other nations thrown in. Then we read and discussed the

graphic story of Israel's seduction by Moab. Moab worshipped the fertility god Bail. The women of Moab, on Balaam's

recommendation, seduced the Israelite men in an effort to make God angry at them. God did get really

angry and then he sent a plague. Zimri brought a bail worshipping woman into the camp right in front

of Moses's face. Phineas, the priest, the grandson of Aaron, was not having any such impurity on his watch

and speared them both at the same time, killing them dead.

Yeah.

All right.

We are going to go into our second census, chapter 26.

Now, this second census is nearly 40 years after the first one.

It brings us back to the purpose of the book of numbers. We need a new count, a new number for the new

generation. It is time to pass the torch from the old generation of fighting men at the start of numbers to the new generation and new number of fighting men who will take Israel into the promised land.

Remember, that was the purpose for the first census.

There are two purposes for the census, not just one.

It is a military count and only includes men old enough to fight.

But it is also a count to determine the size of the tribes and therefore the size of their

allotted land once they take possession.

...