I'm finally going to finish Numbers here. I've been at this book for what seems like months. After all the huffing and puffing, animal sacrifices and censuses, the Israelites send 12,000 men to battle against the Midianites. The Midianites are obliterated, and every Midianite male is killed.

The Israelites take the Midianites' livestock and goods, and bring the surviving women and children to Moses. Moses is shocked, and says, "Why did you bring back ALL the women alive?!? Kill every male child, and kill every women who has had sex with a man! But all the female children that haven't had sex, keep them for yourselves!"

If you don't believe me, that's Numbers, Chapter 31:17-18.

After this proclamation, the Israelites inventory all the goods they've pillaged. It comes to:

- 675,000 sheep
- Threescore (a "score" is 20, so I'm guessing the total amount here is 72,000) and 12,000 "beeves"
- Threescore and 1,000 donkeys
- 32,000 virgin women.

And I'm not sure where these came from, but they also received an additional:
- 330,500 sheep (of which over 600 were sacrificed)
- 36,000 beeves (sacrificed threescore and 12)
- 30,500 donkeys (sacrificed 61)
- 16,000 persons (It reads as if they may have sacrificed 32 people here.)

This is the main event, but the next few chapters have a few interesting things as well, aside from the constant recordkeeping of where the Israelites move to and set up. It's also good to know that the journey from Egypt to Canaan (where the Israelites eventually wind up), for some reason they were lost for 40 years, when it would've taken a few weeks even back then. Yahweh apparently curses them to wander because the Israelites were discouraged at the sight of the land He had promised them.

In Chapter 33:50, Yahweh tells Moses to kill all the inhabitants of Canaan and make sure to destroy all their religious symbols - melt their statues and take down their 'high places'. High places is probably a reference to the Asherah's, or groves, in which the Canaanite people worshipped Asherah - who in Canaanite and Sumerian mythology is the wife of El. And El, the chief sky god of the Canaanite and Sumerian pantheon, is who Yahweh was originally (in Genesis). Pretty crazy stuff, eh?

"Yahweh" tells the Israelites to kill ALL the Canaanites, or otherwise He will make the Canaanites a thorn in the side of the Israelites. Yahweh my ass. The political leaders of Israel are using Yahweh to justify the killing of the Canaanites. This crap has been going on for thousands of years!

The rest of the chapters are just a bunch of divvying up of the spoils of war, a few begats, and a few extra rules. And that's pretty much it for Numbers - a truly horrific, and horribly written, book of the Bible.

I will close with this interesting rule from Numbers 35:16-28, which I will sum up: "If you kill a person with malice, you shall be put to death. But if it is an accident, you will be safe within the haven of the city. But if you are caught outside the city walls, it is okay for the closest relative of the victim to kill you."

I'm going to skip Chapter 17, it's basically about rules, rods and magic tricks. In fact, I'm starting to get a sneaky suspicion that's what the the Bible's really all about, if you take into account all the possible puns and implications. One interesting thing about Chapter 17 - God threatens to kill people who murmer.

In Chapter 18, the most important thing is that God says that only the Levites can sacrifice animals, and that Israelites must give a tenth of everything they have to Yahweh, and then any leftovers from that will go to the Levites.

It's starting to get repetitive, too. We're begin repeating a lot of stuff that was mentioned in all the other books: sacrifices smell good to Yahweh, non-Levites approaching the Tabernacle will be killed by Yahweh, etc. The verse in particular that says that is "strangers that come nigh", which could mean that any stranger will die, but in context it sounds like non-Levites.

Chapter 19 is more stuff about animal sacrifice. It talks about the proper purification ritual to prepare sacrificing a red heifer.

Actually, a lot of Jews and Christians are looking forward to the day that a red heifer is born. Apparently, red heifers are very rare. Well - a red heifer has been born fairly recently and both Jews and Christians are longing for the day it can be sacrificed. Somehow, the sacrifice of this red bovine will bring on the end of the world.

If it does, it's because of a bunch of crazies are out there actually pushing for the end of the world.

Imagine that you're part of a society where one small group of people enjoys special privileges over the vast majority. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that you had the balls to stand up to them, saying that everyone should enjoy the same political equality and everyone should be able to think for themselves. This might sound familiar, because those are essentially what democracy is all about.

This is what's happening in Numbers, Chapter 16. Except in Numbers, the folks with the democratic mentality are portrayed as the bad guys.


It's kind of like the American Revolution, from the perspective of the British. The simple fact of the matter is any human being can recognize when people are being treated unfairly, and when that happens, people get pissed off.

The rebels approach Moses and Aaron with the same gripe the last few people had, except with a much more indepth speech.

Two rebels named Abiram and Dathan say, "Isn't it enough that you us took out of Egypt to die here in this desert? Now, you want to make yourselves rulers over the people? You have not even brought us to this promised land of milk and honey. Do you think you can hoodwink us?"

In response, Moses talks to Yahweh, and then tells the rebels to meet him tomorrow at the Tabernacle with incense. Whoa, incense!?! Remember what happened to Aaron's sons? I smell a trap.

Sure enough, God has arranged to smite all these rebels, by having the Earth swallow them up and send them alive to "Sheol". Because of their courage (since they should've known what happens to complainers), and also because of their well-reasoned argument, the Skeptics Annotated Bible has called them the first "Freethought Martyrs".

Chapter 9 is interesting, because it describes the presence of Yahweh in relation to the Tabernacle. When the Tabernacle was set up, Yahweh appeared as a cloud covering the Tabernacle during the day, and as appeared as fire at night. And when the cloud left, the people journeyed, with the to the spot where the cloud lay.

I also think the language of the Bible is too strong. It reads that individuals are "cut off" from the people, and it implies a kind of permanence. But I'm getting the sense that those who were cut off were usually just temporarily so, because of some perceived uncleanliness of the individual. And I'm not turning into an apologist here, far from it. If we can parallel our own society with their's, we can see that their perceptions of 'uncleanliness', and any subsequent punishments, are based purely on superstition.

Chapter 10 is all about how large the Israelite population is. It gives instructions on using two silver trumpets, to get everyone moving. And Chapter 10 also talks about how great the Israelite army is. So, Chapter 10 is all 'huff and puff', so to speak.

After moving and setting up camp, moving and setting up camp, over and over, SOME people started complaining. The all-knowing Creator of the Universe (or so say modern day religious people) got angry at the complaining and just ripped into the tail end of the procession, sending fire down and basically just mangling and burning all sorts of people. SOME of whom, I presume, were not complaining. But still, what's the big deal about complaining?

Moses says a prayer and Yahweh stops the tirade.

Next, the people start bitching about the manna that has been provided to them. "We remember all the good stuff we ate as slaves in Egypt, now all we have is this manna crap," they would say.

Moses too, is upset. But not at Yahweh. He's upset at these damned soft Israelites. So upset, he even says something kind of funny. "Why do I have to be in charge of these people? Why can't you, God, take them into your bosom, as a nursing father bears the sucking child?"

Nursing father?

And then, the craziest thing has yet to happen. The people want meat. So Moses and God talk it over, and decide on a rather devious plan. "Oh, they want meat, huh? I'll show them! I'll give them so much meat that it'll come out their noses," sayeth the Almighty.

Yahweh then brings a wind that sends countless multitudes of quail dropping like flies onto the camp of the Israelites. And they, who are now happy that their prayers (and complaints) have been answered, start collecting the quail and cooking and eating them.

But they were tricked! While they were chewing on the tasty quail, Yahweh sent a "great plague" upon the people, and smote many of them. (Numbers 11:33).

What's the moral of the story here? Don't complain. Don't ask Yahweh for anything. If you do, He might send TOO MUCH, and He may very well kill you!

What the f*ck!?!