This section apparently combines various traditions of how the Israelites came into Palestine, and J, E (or JE), and P sources have been discerned in these chapters. The traditional “40 years” in the wilderness (38 or 39, according to critical calculations) were spent mostly in the wilderness of Paran, with a short stay in the oasis of Kadesh, according to P; while, according to J, they spent most of their time in Kadesh; and chapter 13, verse 26, puts Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran, thus encapsulating both traditions. The discrepancy may stem from two separate traditions of how the tribes entered Canaan: from the south or from the north through Transjordan.

The P narrative begins (chapter 10, verse 11) with the lifting of the cloud from the Tabernacle and the setting out of the Israelites for the Promised Land, with their holy Tabernacle and ark, in the order prescribed in chapter 2. According to the P account (verses 11–28), the cloud settles down over the wilderness of Paran, the signal to make camp; whereas in the JE account (verses 29–36) it is the ark of the Covenant that goes ahead to seek out a stopping place, and where it stops the Israelites rest, the cloud simply accompanying them overhead (perhaps to shield them from the blazing desert sun). Chapters 11–12 (JE) deal with the complaints of the people about their hardships and the rebellion of Miriam and Aaron against their brother Moses. When the people express their longing for the good food they had in Egypt and their disgust with the unvarying manna, God sends them a storm of quail, which remain uneaten because he also sends them a plague. This is a somewhat different account from that in Exodus, but the point is the same: the mighty, infinite power of God (chapter 11, verse 23). (Also inserted here is the story of God visiting his spirit on 70 selected elders so that they may share Moses’ burdens.) When Miriam and Aaron question God’s speaking only through Moses, God proclaims his unique relation with Moses, who alone receives direct revelations from God, not indirectly through dreams and visions, like the prophets.

Chapters 13–14 tell of the despatch of spies from Paran to reconnoiter Canaan and of the despair, rebellion, and unsuccessful foray of the people in response to the spies’ reports. Scholars discern two separate accounts of the spying incident artfully woven together. According to the JE account, the spies go only as far as Hebron in the south and return with a glowing report of a fertile land, which is, however, they warn, too strongly defended to be taken from that quarter: only one spy, Caleb, advocates attacking it. In the P account the spies reconnoiter the whole country and give a pessimistic report of it as a land that “devours its inhabitants,” who are, moreover, giants compared to the Israelites. The people cry out in despair at this report and want to go back to Egypt, while Caleb and Joshua (added by P) plead with them to trust in God and go forward to take the land. God, disgusted with the people, condemns them to wander in the wilderness for 40 years and decrees that only their children, along with Caleb and Joshua, shall enter into the land of promise. Ruefully, the people now decide to attack and go forth, against Moses’ warning, to a resounding defeat.

Chapter 15 is a P document or addition, setting forth various ritual regulations. Chapters 16–18 deal with the comparative rights and duties of priests and Levites. Chapter 16 is a composite document dealing with revolts against Moses and Aaron by certain Levites who question their special authority in a community where all are holy, as also by certain Reubenites who resent Moses’ leadership. The dispute is settled when 250 revolting Levites attempt to offer incense (a priestly Aaronic function) and are consumed by fire sent by God, while the leaders of the revolt are swallowed up in the earth. Yet the stubborn people continue their complaint against Moses and Aaron, bringing forth the Lord’s anger and a plague, from which they are saved by Aaron’s (proper and effective) offering of incense. This latter incident occurs in chapter 17 in the Hebrew text and Jewish translations but concludes chapter 16 in some Christian versions. Chapter 17 in both arrangements, with its story of Aaron’s rod, associates Levitical with Aaronic authority; Aaron’s name is inscribed on the staff of Levi, which alone among the staffs of the chiefs of the tribes of Israel blossoms and bears fruit, thus authenticating Aaron’s, and thereby the Levites’, special claims. The relative functions and payments (tithes) of priests and Levites are prescribed in chapter 18. Chapter 19, inserted here, has to do with purification from uncleanness incurred through touching the dead, accomplished through washing in water mixed with the ashes of a red heifer.

Events in Edom and Moab

Chapter 20, verse 14, resumes the narrative of Israel’s onward march, starting with their arrival in the wilderness of Zin and stay at Kadesh, marked by Miriam’s death and God’s exclusion of Moses and Aaron from entering the Promised Land because of their ascribed lack of confidence in God when Moses drew forth water from a rock in response to still more Israelite complaints, but did so in anger and impatience, striking the rock twice with his rod, instead of telling it to give forth water, as the Lord had instructed (the incident of the waters of Meribah). Refused permission by the King of Edom to pass through that land, over the much-used King’s Highway, they proceed from Kadesh to Mt. Hor, where Aaron dies and is succeeded by his son Eleazar, and from which they proceed (chapter 21) to bypass Edom in an attempt to approach Canaan from the east. Arrived at the border of what was geographically part of Moab but politically the Amorite kingdom of Sihon, they are refused passage and proceed to defeat the Amorites and take possession of their land. This is from the JE strand of the composite narrative; the P strand does not recognize the existence of settled and politically organized populations between Kadesh and the plains of Moab.

At this point, in chapters 22–24, apparently a very mixed composite of various J and E strands, is presented the fascinating story (or collection of stories) of the non-Israelite seer, or prophet, Balaam, from the region of the Middle Euphrates. Alarmed at the Israelite host encamped at his border, the King of Moab commissions the seer Balaam to put a curse on them, but Balaam refuses, at the order of YHWH, who is also the God of Balaam. On three occasions at the King’s request Balaam seeks an oracle from God against Israel, but each time, to the King’s rage, he is told by the Lord that Israel is graced with the divine blessing and cannot be cursed. The seer, who is ordered back to his own country, without payment by the disgruntled King, offers a final, unsolicited oracle prophesying the destruction of Moab and other nations by Israel’s might: “I will let you know what this people will do to your people in the latter days.”

Chapter 25 (combining JE and P strands) provides a lurid interlude in which the Israelites go whoring after Moabite women and offer sacrifices and worship to their god, Baal of Peor. Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, is so incensed at the sight of an Israelite consorting with a Midianite woman that he kills them both, thus ending a plague that has broken out and earning God’s special favour: a covenant of perpetual priesthood with him and his descendants (a forward reference to the Zadokite priesthood of post-exilic times). This account is connected by the last two verses with God’s call for Israel to harass and smite the Midianites (see below). After the plague ends, in the account (P) in chapter 26, a second census of arms-bearing men and of the Levites is taken, and again a fantastically large total, 601,730, is given, perhaps referring to a much later time. It is noted at the end that all of the previous 603,730 had died in the wilderness, as prophesied, except for Caleb and Joshua, who have been especially picked out by God. This census, coming at the end of the 40-year period of wilderness wanderings, is for the purpose of allotting lands to the various tribes and families. Hence the logical positioning of the passage (P) in the first 11 verses of chapter 27 assuring that a family may inherit through a daughter when there is no son and through a brother when there are no children and through the closest relative when there are neither.

At this point (chapter 27, verse 12) comes the impressive and poignant passage (also P) in which Moses ascends the heights, at God’s bidding, to look over the Promised Land, which he is not to enter, and calls on God to appoint a leader to succeed him. At God’s command, Moses selects Joshua, and before the priest Eleazar and the whole community he lays his hands on him and commissions him to lead Israel. It is noteworthy that Joshua is invested only with some of Moses’ authority and is to learn God’s will through Eleazar and the sacred lot (Urim), not directly, as did Moses.

Again, the narrative is interrupted by three chapters (P) dealing with various religious regulations. Chapters 28–29 stipulate the sacrifices to be made by the whole community daily, on the sabbath, at the new moon, and on these holidays: the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover), the Feast of Weeks (Shavuot), The Feast of Trumpets, i.e., New Year (Rosh Hashana), the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), and the Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot). The last two verses of chapter 29 specify that these public offerings are in addition to individual offerings, such as those specified in chapter 15. Critical scholars hold that these elaborate regulations stem from a much later (post-exilic) period, though they may go back to very ancient practices. Some see them as a liturgical commentary on chapter 23 of Leviticus, which presents the cycle of feasts and festivals (see above Leviticus). Chapter 30 gives women special exemption from keeping vows (presumably of offerings or abstinence) when countermanded by a father or husband; only widows or divorcees are bound, like men, unconditionally to keep their vows.

Chapter 31, likewise from P, deals with the annihilation of the Midianites following God’s command at the end of chapter 25. The Israelites, a thousand from each tribe, go forth to battle led by the priest Eleazar, who carries the sacred vessels and the trumpets. They kill every man and seize all the movable property but spare the women and children. Moses, however, orders every male child and all nonvirgin women killed. There follow instructions for purification for the stain caused by killing a person or touching a dead body and for the distribution of the booty, which includes sheep, cattle, asses, and 32,000 virgins. The rules are that half of the spoils go to the fighting men, half to the rest of the people; in addition, the Lord’s share is allotted thus: one five-hundredth of the fighting men’s portion goes to the priest, and one-fiftieth of the people’s portion goes to the Levites. Scholars are inclined to treat this chapter as a piece of fiction intended really to set forth the rules for purification and dividing the spoils through an invented story. The seer-diviner Balaam is here (verse 16) blamed for the whoring and apostasy incidents in chapter 25; but texts providing his connection with these events are lacking.

Chapter 32, dealing with the settlement east of the Jordan, concludes the narrative portion of Numbers and thus of the Tetrateuch (a story that is continued in chapter 34 of Deuteronomy and in the Book of Joshua). This very composite account (JEP) tells how the tribes of Reuben and Gad, after an initial angry remonstrance from Moses, are granted permission to settle in the rich pasturelands east of the Jordan on the assurance that after they erect sheepfolds and fortified towns for their flocks and families, they will provide the shock troops spearheading the advance of the Israelites into Canaan, and will not return to their homes until their brethren hold the land. Thereupon Moses allots the various conquered kingdoms and towns east of Jordan to the Gadites and Reubenites. The various Gadite, Reubenite, and Manassite towns are listed.

The rest of the book of Numbers (P in its final form) consists of an itemized summary of the route from Egypt to the plains of Moab outside Canaan (chapter 33) and various additional materials (chapters 34–36). Verses 50–56 of chapter 33 present the divine command to dispossess the people of Canaan, destroy their idols and cultic places, and apportion the land to each clan by lot. In chapter 34 the Lord specifies the boundaries of the whole land of Canaan that is to be Israel’s inheritance and names the tribal leaders who, along with Eleazar and Joshua, are to oversee the division of the land by lot. In chapter 35, the Lord orders 48 towns with extensive pasturelands to be set aside for the Levites; six of these are to be cities of refuge for manslayers whose guilt of intentional murder has not yet been determined and who are provided sanctuary from the traditional blood vengeance. Although these settlements do not constitute an independent tribal territory but are scattered through the territories of the other tribes, the contradiction with chapter 18, verse 24, of Leviticus, commanding that the Levites are to have no share of the land but are to subsist solely on tithes, is obvious and raises critical questions. Finally, chapter 36 concludes the book of Numbers with a supplement to the law of inheritance through daughters laid down in chapter 27, enjoining daughters from marrying outside the tribe, so that the tribe will hold its portion of the land, which was given from God, in perpetuity. As before, the general injunction is laid down in a story dealing with a particular case (the daughter of Zelophehad).