BibleProject - What’s a Nazarite Vow? – Numbers E2

Episode Date: August 8, 2022

Confession of sins, strange water rituals, Nephilim, and Nazarite vows—Numbers 5 and 6 might feel like a confusing mix of laws, but the scroll’s author is cleverly reminding us of the Hebrew Bible melody we first encountered in Genesis 1-9. In this episode, Tim and Jon talk about four odd laws that are part of the intricate story we’ve been following through the Torah. View full show notes from this episode →Timestamps Part one (00:00-9:03)Part two (9:03-22:31)Part three (22:31-39:27)Part four (39:27-57:55)Referenced ResourcesInterested in more? Check out Tim’s library here.You can experience the literary themes and movements we’re tracing on the podcast in the BibleProject app, available for Android and iOS.Show Music “Defender (Instrumental)” by TENTS"Fizzle Pop" by Tyler Bailey"Goofy Nights in Tokyo" by Sam Stewart"Today Feels Like Everyday" by Mama AiutoShow produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gummel, Tyler Bailey, and Frank Garza. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder. Podcast annotations for the BibleProject app by MacKenzie Buxman.Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Last week, we began reading the scroll of numbers. It's the fourth scroll in the Torah. Torah means teaching, often translated law. And it's easy to think of the Torah as a big list of laws because it has many of Israel's ancient law code in it. But the Torah is predominantly a story. With law code sprinkled in between narratives, it's important to remember that the laws that we have here are not a complete law code,

but a highly curated sample of laws. And this is essential to keep in mind as we get to these four laws in the book of numbers that we'll look at today. These four laws, each of them, were probably actual rituals and laws in the life of ancient Israel. But the author of the Torah has selected out and arranged them in a sequence to communicate a literary message through the cycling of themes. This whole section is a riddle.

So we're going to read four laws about ritual impurity, disputes between brothers, adultery, and a custom known as the Nazarei vow. Why are these here? Why are these in the order that they're in? Why is this so strange? Just get ready, these are four really odd stories. We're going to take these odd stories and read them through the lens of what we've been calling the melody,

a narrative pattern that's been building from the very first stories in Genesis. God creates order out of chaos. He appoints someone specific to rule on his behalf. God gives the human access to his own life, but the human fails to take it. And now finds himself in a new, disordered reality. So this law is here to activate the next step of the Genesis storyline about

stippling rivalry and brothers wronging each other, resulting in violence. It's about how you make yourself right with God and right with your brothers. So we're trying to undo the failures of Adam and Eve and now undo the failure of stippling rivalry. I'm John Collins. This is Bible Project Podcast today, Tim Mecky and I. Read four confusing little ancient laws. These four laws, it's a meditation on what it means for all Israel to become the kingdom of priests, playing the host to the author of all life and goodness and beauty. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Hello Tim. Hey John.

Hi. Hi. We're in the book of numbers. Yes we are. In the wilderness. In the wilderness is where we are. Yes. And he brewed the book of numbers is called...

Bommid Bar. Bommid Bar. Yes. In the wilderness. In the wilderness. Yep. This is the fourth scroll in the Torah collection. And we've been going through the whole Torah and

We won't do a big overview here But this is the story of God working with The people of known as Israel. Yeah, Abraham's family who is now in the wilderness and the Middle East Northern Sinai Peninsula Northern Sinai Peninsula. Northern Sinai Peninsula. Left Egypt and they've gone through the wilderness, two Mount Sinai, they've made this covenant agreement

with God to represent him and to be a holy people, meaning set apart to live in proximity and in service to God to then bless the whole world, which then brings us to the whole overall story of the Bible. Yeah, that's right. But here we are in the wilderness. They have this tabernacle, and what we just looked at in the beginning

of the scroll of numbers is that there's a head count done, and then they're organized around the tabernacle in this design that brings to mind this how the Garden of Eden is organized. Yeah, through very sometimes overt and other times subtle. Echoes and hyperlinks and use of the vocabulary from the early chapters of Genesis, the biblical author, paints Israel camped out at the foot of the mountain with the garden tent in the middle of their camp, paints it as a garden of Eden picture with Israel appointed altogether as God's kingdom of priests, and then within that kingdom of priests, there is a specially selected tribe,

the Levites, and then among there is a specially selected tribe, the Levites, and then among that tribe a specially selected family, Aaron and his sons as the high priests who actually go in and out of the tent at the center of all of them, and then the Levites are around them. And what the author also assumes that we recall is that living in proximity to the nuclear reactor of holiness, as it were, the fusion center source of all life. That, yeah, is the source and sustainer of all life and order, living in the middle of your camp. That is both a good thing because you can get extra abundance and extra blessing. Man, you can get water from a rock. You can get sky-bred, you know, falling down

every day to feed you, and you can be blessed. But also it puts you in proximity to something that is at the same time dangerous. And whether Israel will adapt itself to a place of holiness and moral integrity and ritual purity, that is the responsibility they now bear. And it's what they said yes to. When God said, I want to come moving to your camp. And so is that drama? And the crisis created by that possibility for danger that is connected to the stories we're going to begin looking at today? Actually, they're not stories at all. They're mostly ancient and eastern laws. Okay. So, okay. So we're in the first movement of numbers. Yeah. And focusing on the theme of the temple or of God's presence in the middle of the people,

which is the main kind of focus of these early chapters. So we just left where what you just described, which is God selects the Levites and makes them the first born. Well, the people are numbered. And the 12 tribes are numbered. It's become clear that they have been fruitful in multiplying because there's lots of them.

Lots of them. Lots of them, hundreds of thousands. And then there are a range in a nice series of concentric circles with the tent at the center. And then the Levites, who's one of the tribes, is selected out. Okay. So let's jump in. Yeah.

In the last episode, we covered numbers one through four. Okay. And as you've been trained to read through the Hebrew Bible, when you hear Garden of Eden music, and the selection of a special chosen one to live and work in the garden, you're trained to think, hooray and watch out. Watch out, because something's gonna go wrong.

So here's what's super fascinating, is that what going to go wrong. So here's what's super fascinating, is that what's going to go wrong in terms of somebody failing to trust God or doing what's good in their own eyes, that's actually all going to happen when they leave Mount Sinai after chapter 10. But because the biblical authors want to keep the music of the melody going, they're going to construct this opening section of numbers by still going through the sequence of themes. That's something we'll go wrong.

Yeah, but the something that's going to go wrong, you just have to see how this works. So we're going to session for a little bit here is essentially what we call numbers, chapters five and six. And this section is such a great example. It's a straight up riddle. It's four random little paragraphs that each one by its own. You're like, okay, I get it. But you're like, why are these here? Why are these in the order that they're in? Why is this so strange? And the sense that it does make is if you know

how to hear the music and the vocabulary from Genesis 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. And it's exactly like what happens here in sequence. Wow, it's really cool. I've never heard a sermon on Numbers Chapter 5. Yeah, so I'll just get ready. These are four really odd stories. So, Numbers 5, Verse 1. You always spoke to Moses, command the sons of Israel that they send away out of the camp every person with a skin disease, every one who's had some kind of reproductive fluid leak out of their body, and everyone who

has become impure because they've touched a dead body. So this is harkening back to the Leviticus scroll. Yep. Right in the center of the scroll. There's purity laws. Yeah, that's right. Rich, ritual purity. What makes you pure and impure, richually? And so this is a whole rabbit hole, but yeah, skin disease, bodily discharge of reproductive fluids and touching dead people. Yeah, we're three of like the five things. Correct. That's right. This is a cultural taboo system where within ancient Israel, you become richly impure when you've come into contact with something associated with death or dying.

And it's not morally wrong to be richly impure, but... But don't go to the tabernacle. Yeah, if you've contracted ritual impurity by touching something that's after dying, is dangerous and violates God's holiness as to waltz into the courtyard of the tent when you're in an impure state. So ritual impure states are temporary. You wait a period of seven days, sometimes 14,

you wash your body, offer a sacrifice of purification, and you're good to go. So, you don't have to go outside the camp, you just got to wash. Here is something news happening. Uh, next level, and actually correct, yeah, so here's something new. Now that we have fully dialed in the camp as a little model of Eden. Then anyone who has, who is originally in pure state, has to go live outside the camp. So, verse 3, you shall send outside, anybody, male or female, send them outside the camp so that they don't pollute the camp, make it impure, make it impure, the camp where I live in the middle. Yeah, because actually like you just being there, well not it's not only are you

richly impure, but now you're actually gonna the space that you're in is gonna become richly impure. Yeah, so remember this is from our last conversation. Number is one through four painted a picture of outside is the wilderness, but God's created a little oasis. So the fruitful and multiplying tribes that are arranged in a big circle are like the fruitful land of Eden. And then the inner circle from that is the Levites and the priests who are like in the garden.

And then at the center of them is the tabernacle and the tent, which is like the tree of life in the middle. It's a very specific detail in the Eden story. And so if on analogy to that, the whole camp is Eden, then to honor the sacred, dedicated to life status of the whole camp means that people who are in a richly impure state, that is, they've contracted death. A state where like the reality of death is just obvious and clear and it's not wrong. Nope. Nope.

But it's just a realization of like, yeah, that's right. It's a realization that things aren't right, yet. But being in that state isn't wrong. But if you're going to visualize a state that is right, then that needs to be moved out. That's right. Yeah, skin disease, leaking bodily fluids, having touch a dead body. Those are all realities that in the biblical story only happen outside of Eden as a sign of the fact that we're dying. And so as a way to honor the ritual drama, that we're dying. And so, as a way to honor the ritual drama that this camp tells a story just by its arrangement,

people for however long they need to, period of go seven days, needs to go live on the edge of the camp and travel at the edge of the camp when they do it. But this language you're being sent away onto the outside, This is the language from Genesis 3, 22 to 24 about Adam and Eve being sent out. So I feel like a freshman. Or consequence. Yeah, and it's a consequence not because being richly impure as wrong, but because ritual impurity

is about contact with death. And death is a sign of living outside of Eden. And why are we outside of Eden? Because of the folly and rebellion of humanity. Okay. So my point here is that it's an interesting little forverse paragraph. And you can link it to the Leviticus and be like,

okay, I get it, that makes sense. But look at how it comes right after the Leviticus 1 and 2, describing the camp like a need in Leviticus 3 and 4. They're really trying to create the perfect space here. Appointing the Leviates and their jobs are the same words used to describe Adam and Eve's job. And now we are casting out of the camp. Ah, but this is both to honor the purity of the camp that was just set up and to exile

those who were richly impure. Okay, so that's that paragraph. Is the idea then that when I am richly impure, I do got to go live outside of camp? Or was this just kind of like this one time thing they were doing during this moment in their time of ordering? Oh, that they're in the camp? Yeah, it's interesting. Well, was this kind of like, hey, we're all set up.

Now let's just do this ritual where everyone is unclean. Go to the outside and let's just mark this moment. Or is this something that every time I come into contact with a dead body, not only do I wash and do the whole thing, I got to go outside camp. Yeah, I think for the period in the wilderness, that's the idea. Okay. Yeah, because it's going to get brought up again later on in the book. But once they got into the land and Jerusalem, it was a different circumstance. And so, you know, it changed. But these laws

stood here in the Torah. Right. As Torah. Communicating. Yeah. Communicating wisdom and a message in a storyline. Interesting. Okay. So starting verse five, chapter five, there's a new law. You always spoke to Moses saying, say to the sons of Israel, when a man or a woman commits any of the sins of Adam, Adam, acting unfaithfully against the Lord, well, that person will become guilty. So what they should do is confess the sins that they have committed. So at first, let's just remember, if any man or woman commits any of the sins of Adam,

it's great. We're the great, we're the great, yeah, we're the kind of, yeah. The word is Adam. The word is Adam. Yeah. But we've got Adam and Eve on the brain. Oh yeah. Yes.

From everything that's come before. Right. So let's just say there's a human that commits one of the sins of Adam. Yeah. That's what it says in Hebrew, one of the sins of Adam. Yeah. Then that person becomes guilty. What they should do is confess their sin.

What did Adam and Eve not do when God came up to them? Yeah, they didn't trust the head. What is this that you have done? The woman, she did it. Yeah, they hid and then they blamed. Yeah. And the snake, he deceived me. So it's this interesting little, this is a good meditation literature point.

This later, little kind of riff off the Eden narrative draws attention to something. They could have just confessed right there. Then when you go back and think about it, you're like, why didn't they just say they're sorry? Yeah. We could have been spared a lot of trouble. They just said they were sorry. Isn't that interesting?

It's interesting. They were told like, hey, you eat this, you're going to die. Yeah. Maybe they didn't think sorry was going to cut it. Yeah. Maybe. Anyhow. So let's just say that there's, you know's a human that commits one of the sins of Adam, then they

shall confess their sins, and then they shall offer a restitution in full for that wrong, and even add one fifth to it. So you've quoted this before. This is where this comes from. That if I injure someone, yes, I pay them back plus a fifth. But then on top of that, I'm gonna go and do the, what's the offering? It's called the Asham in Hebrew. The Asham.

It's the noun of this word guilt. It's often called the guilt offering or the restitution offering. Okay. Yep. Because we've learned about that offering already. Yeah, in Leviticus. In Leviticus.

Yeah. We don't have this detail about the fifth in Leviticus. Adding one fifth. Yes. Yeah, that was in Leviticus. It was. Yeah. Yeah. We don't have this detail about the fifth in Leviticus. Adding one fifth. Yes. Yeah. That was in Leviticus. Yeah. That's right.

So what's interesting here is this little law about the guilt offering, the restitution offering. It's almost copy and pasted from Leviticus, chapter five, new material. No, but there's a couple of differences. Okay. So once again, this high demand literature. So you're invited to go

compare this restatement of a law that was already given in Leviticus. Okay. And when you do that, you go to what we call Leviticus chapter six. And it's the same laws about the same offering just a little bit different. So here's the love, starts in verse two. When a person sins and acts unfaithfully against the Lord, and let's just say deceives their companion, deceives their brother in regard to some deposit or security that was trusted to them, or maybe robbery, or maybe he has extorted his neighbor like his brother.

He found something that was lost and lied about it, you know, and any of these things that a person might do. So here it begins by saying, let's just say there's two Israelite neighbors, the brothers, and one brother wrongs the other in some way. Yeah, let's just imagine that. It may happen. It may happen.

Then, when he becomes guilty, he has to restore what he did and then add one fifth to it and then offer this asham or guilt offering. So that's the law from Leviticus chapter 6. So this numbers law, this restatement of it in numbers is worded a little differently, and it doesn't mention the brother of the neighbor. It just says, when you commit any of the sins of Adam, and act unfaithfully, then you're guilty. So it doesn't give examples. And it doesn't give any examples, but you go back to the source of it,

where it was first stated, and what you get is a story about, let's say there's some guy who wrongs his brother. Let's say you were trusted with something. But then you wronged your brother. And you're like, oh yeah, I know a story about that. The story about the sons of Adam and Eve. Am I my brother's keeper? What, you think like, I'm responsible for my brother? Can't enable. Can't enable. Yeah. So I think, because you have to ask the question,

why is this law being restated? I already got this law in Leviticus. And when I go look at that one, oh. So we've just established Eden. We've brought death to the outside of the camp. And we've ordered this Eden and then God says, and when there becomes a can-enable kind of situation, the can is how to deal with it. How to deal with it, yeah. And can is replaying, in the design of Genesis, Genesis 3 and 4,

have all these important connections to show that Cain is replaying and intensifying the failure of his parents. And so here at this law, let's say somebody commits one of the sins of Adam and does this thing that if you go look at where I'm getting this loft realm, it's all about when a guy wrongs his brother, then here's what you're supposed to do. So this law is here to activate then here's what you're supposed to do. So this law is here to activate the next step of the Genesis storyline about sibling rivalry and brothers runging each other in the violence and yeah, yeah, resulting in violence. So just like the exile of Adam and Eve was sad, right? It's the loss of being in the Eden of life. But here in Numbers, when that story was echoed, it's about protecting the purity of the camp. So here, when the Cain and Abel story is echoed,

it's about a law about how you make yourself right with God and right with your brothers. So we're trying to undo the failures of Adam and Eve and now Undo, the failure of sibling rivalry. I see. Yeah. So you're saying the melody's here, but as like, in a way of like, here's how to take yourselves from it. Yeah, kind of to invert it, okay?

All right, so that's that story. What's the next law about? Soap is R. Numbers 5 or 11 Are we having a good time? Yeah. You always spoke to Moses saying, speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, let's say there's a man whose wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him. And let's say some other man has sex with her and it's hidden from the eyes of her husband

and it is undetected, hidden. Let's say there's no witness against her and nobody caught them in the act, but let's just say a wind of jealousy. A ruck. A ruck of jealousy comes over him and he's jealous for his wife. He's passionate. He has a passion, a protective passion for her. And whether she's slept with another man or whether she hasn't slept with another man,

here's what the guy is supposed to do. We'll talk about the ritual in a minute, but this is a whole law about what happens when a guy is pretty sure his wife has committed adultery and slept with another man. And had illicit sex outside of the balance of their covenant, what's he supposed to do? Okay. Now here's the thing, you can read this law. It's weird, even offensive to many sensibilities. I think that I and you and many of us listening to the podcast would read it and it's disturbing

for all kinds of reasons. And you can read it and just be like, okay, I guess this was some weird, ancient Israel, I think, why is it here? Like, what's it doing here? Yeah. This is a random, like, hodgepodge of relays that we're reading through. Yeah. So here's what is fascinating about this law. This law is echoing the vocabulary and the sequence of Genesis 6 through 8 about the illicit sexual liaison between the sons of Elohim and the daughters of Adam

and then the resulting passionate justice that God had for his creation to wash it clean with water and to spare a remnant out the other side, that is righteous. You're talking specifically that humanity's violence had grown. Yes.

And so there was that, then you need to be reckoned with. But then there's a story where the sons of Elohim, meaning like, spiritual beings, yeah, skybings, have sex with human women and create an offspring that are they called the Nephilim there? They're called the Nephilim and the Ghiburim. The Nephilim. Yeah, the violent warriors of old and the first Ghiburim. The Neffanian. Yeah, the violent warriors of old. And the first Ghiburim that we meet after the flood is a guy named Nimrod, who's the founder of Babylon. So this is an origin story about what was a common motif in ancient Near Eastern propaganda for Babylon and Egypt, which is to say their kingdoms were founded by half human half-gods.

Yep. And while that's celebrated in Babylon, in Genesis here, it's going, that was not good. It's targeted as the sign of cosmic rupture. Cosmic failure. Yeah. And it's the fall narrative of sorts of the angels. Yep. And it's a mirror and an inversion of the woman and the spiritual being and the seeing and taking the happens in Eden.

It's on the other side. That's part of the reason why the flood comes. Yeah, and specifically that the Gible Reame or those Nephilim are violent warriors who like Cain and like Lemek in the previous story before that begin, you know, by implications, billing innocent blood all over the land, because God looks at the land after this happens and is like the land is full of violence. And so what God does is send the flood to purify the land, to respond to the outcry of the innocent that there is not before him and then to purify the land with the waters of the flood.

But there is one who is righteous and blameless, Noah, and his righteousness covers for his family, and so God delivers him through the waters out the other side of the flood. And Noah gets off and he offers sacrifice when he gets off the boat. And God says, I will never again curse the land. I will never again flood it with waters or strike all life. So the flood is equated with cursing the land and striking life on the land. So that's the flood story. And I guess what I'm going to try and show is that this law placed right here in the sequence of numbers is filling the slot of the flood

story melody. It's activating flood story. Yeah, totally. And because here is the law, verse 15 of Numbers chapter 5. So the guy is going to bring his wife and bring as an offering like a grain offering. And the priest will have her stand before Yahweh. The priest will take sacred water in a clay jar and he'll pick up some of the dust that's on the floor of the tabernacle. So he's going to take sacred dust and put it into the water. Then the priest will have

the woman let her hair go loose. He'll put the grain offering in her hands. That's the offering of jealousy. And in the hand of the priest is to be the bitter waters that brings about a curse, waters of the curse. And that's different than the waters with the temple dust, the holy waters and the temple dust. He is the waters of the curse or it's different. This is. No, he takes a jar, gets sacred water, puts temple dirt, temple dirt in the water.

And that's the water of bitterness of his curse. It's called the water of bitterness that brings a curse. The word bitter is spelled with the same letters as the word curse. So it's the water of cursing that brings about a curse, but it's going to taste bad. You said the flood in Genesis 6 is described as a curse. Genesis 8. The flood waters is called the curse on the land. Yep. So the priest will have her take a note and say, listen, if no man has had sex with you, and if you haven't been unfaithful to your husband, then guess what? These waters of bitterness that bring about a curse, you'll be innocent, you'll be fine.

They won't do anything bad to you. However, if you have committed adultery, and if some other man has had sex with you, then the priest will have the women swear an oath. When you drink the water, your thigh will fall and your abdomen will swell. And the water that brings a curse will go into your innards and make you swell and your thigh will waste away. And the woman shall say, Amen. Amen.

So straight. Yeah, this feels very like a shaman kind of thing. Super bizarre. Like, medicine man kind of stuff. Yeah. So what it goes on to say is that the woman who hasn't committed adultery will be just fine. Her womb will produce seed. But the woman who has committed adultery essentially she'll become infertile.

And that's why the rest of the law ends. So the woman who is righteous and innocent, the waters will wash over her and she'll come out the other side and be able to produce much seed. But the one who has been unfaithful will produce no seed anymore. Her family will die out with her, so to speak. So, if you take this out of its narrative context and just think about it as a ritual practice, this is really. I remember sitting in one of my first Bible classes at Molnoma University, and I was in class on the Pentateuch, and I remember a friend of ours. We both know sitting next to me when we were talking about this law And he was just like does this ever happen to men? Right.

Like do men ever have to do this? Like this is so I was I remember It was the first time where for him the Bible was becoming an obstacle to his faith He was really bothered by this law Mm-hmm And it does it seems shamanistic, even chauvinistic, and speaks to the patriarchal cultural setting. You could just see, because if a guy even if a husband is suspicious, suspicious, then he'll have to put his wife through this, and you're just like, that's screwed up. Yeah.

And that's how ideal to- This could be abused. Totally. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So all of those things are true. And all the things are valid. Like as readers, we are experiencing the text that way in mind of our social location.

And that doesn't mean it's not important. It means it's what we experience. So what I want to do though, is make sure that my experience of this and light of my social location, and that's important to honor that, shouldn't cancel out the process of trying to hear this on its own terms.

But what does it mean to hear it on its own terms? You could try and hear this law as it expresses ancient Israelite folk religion But that's not it's purpose in in the Yeah, you think if that's the purpose of the Torah there'd be a whole lot more of this and it'll be a little bit more organized Yeah, exactly. That's right because there's like this is yes, there's nothing well There may be some other things sort of like it, but it kind of stands alone and it's in this fairly kind of just random place. Yeah. This is not like a guide for shaman's. No, and this is a great example of the laws of the Torah, aren't just a copy and

paste. Everybody of all places and all times, if you want to do the will of God just live by the laws of the Torah So this is a great example of where the law it's a parable as it were it's placed here this whole section is a riddle Hmm of these four laws put next to each other. This is the third one. We'll look at the next one next and each of them We're probably actual like rituals and laws in the life of ancient Israel But the author of the Torah has selected out stories, poems, and laws and arranged them in a sequence to communicate a literary message through the cycling of themes. And the reason this law is here is because it communicates something within this larger section of numbers as it participates in the larger

themes of the Torah. And so this is the other thing is in the Torah, the words for adultery or prostitution primarily refer to Israel and idolatry and idols. Israel mixing with other gods. And the first act of prostitution in the Bible that's applied to the whole people of Israel is the golden calf. Hmm, it's called Israel's act of adultery and prostitution. And so the idea that one who has been unfaithful to the covenant is washed with the flood waters, and only the righteous will survive out the other side to produce seed and be fruitful and multiply. This is standard prophetic imagery for talking about Israel's exile from the land as a flood of God's judgment, and the righteous remnant who survives out the other side to produce much seed and so on. So this little law is actually

in a microcosm talking about the moment of the biblical melody of the God decreating but the righteous remnant being spared to produce seed out the other side. And then the next law, what we call numbers chapter 6, is a picture of a righteous remnant Israelite and who they are and what they're all about. And that's called the Nazarete vow. But for the moment, I just want to honor that this is a really uncomfortable law, but when you see it in its literary context, it makes sense. And again, the context is, man, there's so much subtext here.

So much subtext. Yeah. That Israel has been ordered around God's presence and a way for us to imagine Eden. And all of Israel is being appointed to be the new humanity, to bring blessing to the world. But then even more so, the fractally of it is that the Levites have been chosen to be the new humanity on behalf of Israel. So then you have that arrangement. We've got the sense of Eden, and then we've got the ritually impure, meaning those signs of death that are still around moved outside the camp.

And Adam and Eve were exiled, but here, like, humanity gets to stay, but there is an exile of sorts. Yeah, yeah, but it's death being exiled. You separate death from the source of life. And those people get to come back when they're ritually pure, but it's a symbol of death being exiled. You separate death from the source of life. And those people get to come back when they're richly pure, but it's a symbol of death being exiled. And then you get this reflection on the sin of Adam's sons, which is that not only does our foolishness bring death, it brings violence against each other and conflict between our brothers. And so you get this reflection on that.

Yep, with that guilt offering. With the guilt offering. And how to make it right. How to make it right? Yeah, that's right. And so then if you follow the story of Cain and Abel, and you follow all the violence that comes from all these descendants of Cain

that just gets multiplied, and like this guy, Lemic, who just is like, I get to just kill whoever I want, it's gonna be great. And then you get the story of the like half gods, who are like the most violence. Yeah. And so God has to come and wash it clean with a flood of water,

where a remnant could come through and that's called a curse on the land. This story, which on its face is just a weird, shamanistic kind of story of like, what if a guy's suspicious of his wife committing adultery? That practice of whatever that was is taken and then put here and crafted and used the language to then bring us into the next part of the melody, which is things are going to get so bad that there's going to have to be a washing. And only those who are innocent, a remnant will come through. And what you've said is, yes, they're using the imagery of someone being unfaithful and marriage. But where does that imagery really come to life

in the Hebrew Bible the most? Yeah. And that is. Yeah, Israel's violating their covenant with Yahweh by giving their allegiance and worship to other gods, which is depicted as adultery and sex, with someone who's not your covenant partner. And in fact, in a matching part on the other side of Numbers in chapter 25, there's going to be a whole story about Israelites marrying and having sex with and participating

in worship rituals to the gods of Moab and Midian. And it's actually precise match in the design of the book. So what I'm saying is the author of numbers assumes that the reader is able to make all those connections and parallels. So I don't expect everybody who's listening to the podcast right now to be persuaded by that, but I have yet to come across anyone who can explain what this law is doing here in the location and sequence that it is, and much less the two laws that came before it and the law that comes after this one. So, let's check this out. This will be confirmation of my thesis. Okay. Here's check this out. This will be confirmation of my thesis. Okay.

Here's the next one. So, if we just went through the flood waters, what I expect is somebody to come out the other side, whose, you know, righteous or blameless, something to do with maybe the righteous offering of Noah, and then... Which is a thanks-thank offering? It was an ascension offering. That was a such offering. Yep, no loan. Yep.

And to come off the boat as a new humanity, let's told to be fruitful and multiply and keep their covenant with God. Then what happens with Noah, will he plant the garden? Oh yeah, he drinks from the fruit of the vine and gets really drunk. And the melody starts over. Gets really drunk and the melody starts over. Number is chapter six, verse one. Again, you always spoke to Moses saying,

speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, let's just say there's a man or a woman who makes a special vow of dedication, the vow of the Nazir, so that they want to his ear themselves to y'all win. This is a new category. Yeah, this is new. Where's the...

We're not being a Levite. We're leveling up here of a dedication. This is something else. Yeah, a Nazir. A Nazir. Yeah, the Nazir. A Nazir. Yeah, the word Nazir means to set one apart. And so it's called the vow of the Nazir referring to someone who his ears, themselves, to Yahweh, to his ear.

It means to literally select out of and dedicate it to something else. Is that holiness? Is that a gift of holiness? Yeah. But the word holiness is a gift of holiness? Yeah. But the word holiness is a different word than Nazir. It's different. Oh, to be kadoosh is to be set apart for being in the proximity of the source of all life.

And this is being set apart. This is just referring to the selection out of one who is set apart. Okay. Selected out of. So what's interesting is that that word, those three letters, N-Z-R, or noon, Zion, R-E-S, are the same three letters as the that the high priest wears. And so what's interesting? That says belonging to the law. And what the plaque says on it is, I belong to Yahweh. Yeah. And let's just say there's just averages Relight who wants to take on

The life of a nauseaer, one who is Set apart for Yahweh. Like you want to be Your own little high priest. What this whole chapter is going to on is he's gonna take on the lifestyle of the high priest. But any Israelite man or woman can do it. Oh wow. That's what the Nazarete Valley for hours. Yeah, it's any Israelite among the kingdom of priests can take on the lifestyle and live as if you are the high priest.

Oh. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. It's also pretty intense intense move to that. Yeah, I always knew that like the Nazarite Vow was a pretty baller move, but I'm excited to learn. Yeah, so lifestyle rule number one, no drinking wine or strong drink. Oh, well that like rings a bell. It should in two ways.

Should ring two bells. The first bell is Noah first bell is Noah. Yeah, don't be like Noah made the vineyard. He gets drunk and There's a problem. Yeah, second bell is Aaron's sons. Mm-hmm. They like in the middle of Leviticus and sons. They like in the middle of Leviticus, the priesthood set up, everything's awesome, and they go in with strange fire, their rogue liturgy. They just go into the holy of holies on their own terms. And later, as a consequence, God says through Moses, hey knew rule. Yeah. Don't drink. No drinking on this job. Yeah, totally.

Yep. So now here, right after the flood waters of curse, right after that law, is about a new Noah who is to dedicate themselves as someone who is righteous and blameless, set apart the Yahweh and no drinking when you're in Nazareth. Verse four, all the days of his, his ear that he has set apart, he shall not eat anything produced by… This is just for a time period. Yeah, as long as you're in Nazareth, as long as you are fulfilling your commitment to

becoming a Nazareth. So this isn't like a lifetime vow. It's as long as you want to do it. Okay. Yeah. All the days of this vow of his nezor, no razor will pass over his head. Mm. Yeah. You can get hairy.

Yeah. Like Adam. Why, what? Like a primal human. Ha, ha, ha. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Cause he's, who's cutting Adam's hairs, are you saying? Yeah. Totally. Who's cutting atoms here? Is that you're saying? Yeah, totally Who's cutting Adam and he's here? They could cut they could cut their own hair with what with a twig

What are they what are they cutting with you know scissors? There's sharp stuff around no, dude. We're for sure reflecting on he's gonna look like Adam really? Yeah, let the locks grow long you You think the picture of Adam is, you're supposed to think of a barbaric human? Well, just what I'm saying is, I'm trying to make sense of this description. What's up with the hair? Yeah, that's okay.

So, where you let your hair grow, and then often the shaving of hair is often a transition ritual in many cultures. Yes. But the letting of one's hair grow long is often about like- Becoming like a beast of the field. Yeah, tall long hair. Yeah. So yeah, it's like this person takes on the Oh, and wine and strong drink speaks to this issue of fermentation in the Bible. Because in the same way that 11 or yeast is like no leaven or yeast during the after the days of Passover. Right.

And it's the concept of that fermentation is like this distorted, you're distorting something's natural form. Even though fermentation is a natural process, there's like this concept of there's food in its pristine form. Okay. But then there's food that has been rotted, that's become rotten or fermented. Yeah, there's truth to that and there's truth to that So grape juice is one thing wine is like a rotted fruit of the vine Yeah, and so the Nazir is none don't even nothing produced by the grape vine not even pre or post fermentation just great vine, not even pre or post fermentation, just nothing. So you have a law about, don't eat from the fruit of the vine. Oh yeah. And let your hair grow long like your primal human. Okay. And that one shall be dedicated as holy to Yahweh. All the days of his separation, he is not

to go near or touch a dead body. So we're echoing back to, yeah, the high priest couldn't ever touch a dead body. Yeah, not he couldn't even bury his own parents. Yeah. Yeah. So, because other people could, they just become virtually impure. Correct. You can,

and you just got to wash, stay saturated. And it's not sinful to do that. But for the high priest, don't do it. It would be because at any moment, he needs to be able to be, he's on call. He's on call. He's on call. To go into the temple. Yeah.

Yeah. But this is for just, never just, to start living like the high priest. Yeah. All the days of his Nazir, he is holy to Yahweh. But let's just say that all of a sudden death strikes. Somebody dies really suddenly next to him. My mic falls on him. Yeah, okay. You know, how could happen? Yeah, they're in the wilderness.

Yeah, so, over nine. Let's say there's somebody like, you know, to die is right there. And they fall over and touch them and maybe it touches those long locks of hair. Well, then you got to shave it off. You have to shave his head on the day when he becomes clean. He shaves it on the seventh day. So he's going to be ritually impure for a cycle of seven days, and then you have to shave it off. And then on the eighth day, he will come and bring an ascension offering that will cover for his contact with death, his ritual impurity, and he will re-consecrate, he will make his head holy again. And then it's this long law about when he finishes his vow. This days he needs to bring a series of offerings for himself and present them before Yahweh. And when a Nazarite finishes his or her vow, they're to cut off their hair and then put it

on the fire with the offering and burn up the hair. And that's numbers chapter 6. Okay. So where we've gone here is that this whole little section is playing through the themes of Genesis 1 through 9, the first cycle of the core melody of the Hebrew Bible. But we're doing it all in the context of the camp of Israel and the wilderness, which is like a new Eden. And so all contact with all signs of death are to be sent outside the camp.

All situations where a brother rungs a brother, there to be reconciled, all acts of covenantal unfaithfulness are to be identified and put through a flood water of testing so that righteousness and seed, much seed, can emerge out of the other side, resulting in an Israel so that any of us relate, can set themselves apart as a new Adam or Eve, holy to God, dedicated to being in the presence of God and near the holiness of God's life source. There you go. That's numbers five and six. So you think this like concludes your thesis

of this is replaying the melody because the Nazarite vow what is it other than putting a special attention on the call of God on an individual to be his elect remnant, to them be the new atom, to then go. And while that is the role of the high priests, or the high priest, and then in the fractal, then also the priests, and then also all of Israel. There's a special little thing that happens that anyone could go, yeah, I want to identify with that in like this hyper-intense way. Hyper-intense way, yeah, totally.

And that's the Nazarene vow. Yeah, yeah. So these four laws are all, it's a meditation on what it means for all Israel to become the kingdom of priests, playing the host to the author of all life and goodness and beauty, and adapting themselves. And these four laws are meditations on that as a general theme, but they do it in the language and literary sequence, matching Genesis one through nine. It's remarkable. And culminating with the Nazarete, who when their Nazarete vow is done, you go through a cycle of seven, and now we're all the way back to Genesis 1

again, recreating themselves at the end of their vow through a cycle of seven, when the vow is over. The melody is complete. And the next law is going to be the blessing of Aaron, Melody's complete. And the next law is going to be the blessing of Aaron, which is about Yahweh bringing light, may his face bring light to you. And we're back today one of creation and blessing. And we're just going to keep cycling it over and over again. So literature so remarkable. I just, it's really amazing. That is amazing. So the famous Nazarite in my imagination is John the Baptist. Yep. Yeah. That's right. Where are some other ones in the scripture? Stampson. Oh yeah. Stampson. He was in Nazarite. Yeah. And the whole narrative is about how he violates it every day of his life. That's why his hair is important. That's why his hair is important.

Oh. Yeah. Okay. And why is not supposed to get drunk, but he keeps getting drunk. And why he's not supposed to touch dead bodies, but he just finds that honey and the carcass of a lion. He's like, I got to have that honey. The weird, all the weird details. All the details happen to play the hair touching dead bodies, not getting drunk. Samson just like breaks all the Nazarite vows. And, so fascinating, the Samson story. So those are the two main Nazarites in the Bible. Samson and John the Baptist. Yeah, such a strange little practice that's highlighted.

What's cool is that it shows that even though the high priest was super set apart and the holy of holies was only accessible to that one person and that one role, with the Nazarite, it's democratizing the role of the high priest that any is or light man or woman could take on the status or role of not the status but the role of the high priest and become an image. It's very similar to this corporate and individual concepts of the way in the New Testament. Paul talks about being in the Messiah or in the body of the Messiah.

So what's true of the Messiah is true of anybody who belongs to the Messiah. Those are categories that are actually all rooted back in the storyline of the Hebrew Bible and this concept of the anointed one. Oh, because the high priest is the first Messiah. It's the first anointed one. Yeah. So in Israel, who is in the Messiah that is represented by the high priest, it's cool. Can act like a high priest?

Can, yeah. Go around and kind of play act as a high priest of sorts. Yeah, but the idea is that I could dedicate myself to Yahweh so holy Uh-huh, and Adapt my life to the fact that I get to live in the camp Yeah, Yahweh dwells. Yeah, and I want to honor But otherwise you're kind of just doing your business as usual. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah, totally Yeah, it's right. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

You're just going to have some longer hair. Have some longer hair. You're not going to drink wine at Passover. And you can't bury touch any dead bodies. Is there any corollary to this in modern Judaism still? Well, sorry, I forgot. Let's go back to the New Testament. When Paul makes a vow and a Nazarete vow.

Oh, he does? Yeah, and he goes to Jerusalem and chaves his head. Remember that's mentioned in the book of Acts? Oh, yeah, I didn't know that that's what he was doing. Yeah, next chapter 21, when Paul wants to go back to Jerusalem and a bunch of his friends say, like, hey, people don't like you. The religious leaders in Jerusalem don't like you. So religious leaders. And through some don't like you. So Paul,

yeah, takes a Nazarete vow. He goes to the temple. Oh, when he gets arrested, is when he goes to the temple to offer the offering when his vow is complete. Oh, yeah. So anyhow, sorry, that's the other mention of the Nazarete vow. So, yes, there is actually a whole other mention of the Nazarete vow. So yes, there is actually a whole section of the Mishnah and the Talmud that's dedicated to fleshing out more detail to the Nazarete vow. So yeah, it was a practice and it's been transformed and developed in lots of different Christian traditions. It's kind of the equivalent of what became like a vow of solitude or the vows of becoming a monk or a nun in the Christian tradition. It's like there's this subset of people that can dedicate their lives to a higher degree of holiness and dedication to the service of God. And they

become beautiful images to us of what's possible for a human life totally dedicated to God. And they're in little Edons. Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So that's the numbers one, three, six. And so what's going to happen in the rest of the section, we're just going to keep working the themes of portraying Israel as a Eden that is being recreated by the life and light of God's presence. And as they get ready to leave and go out into the wilderness. And so in the next conversation, what we'll do is take on what we call numbers, chapters 6 through 10. 6-10, and it's the same thing. We're gonna work through the themes of Genesis 1-9 again, beginning with the blessing of Aaron may always shine his light, just like day 1 of Genesis may always shine his light upon you.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project Podcast. Next week, we're wrapping up the first movement of the scroll of numbers, where the narrator once again, you guessed it, rifts on the themes of Genesis. In chapter 6, verse 22, a new cycle of humility that's going to depict this Israel and its encampment all over again. So the first cycle, and one through six, was about establishing the camp as a new Eden. This cycle is going to establish the new Eden to get ready to go.

Today's show is produced by Cooper Peltz, edited by Dan Dumbledore and Tyler Bailey, Lindsey Ponder with the show notes. Ashlyn Heiss and Mackenzie Buxman provide annotations for our annotated podcast in our app. Bible project is a crowdfunded nonprofit. We exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. Everything that we make is free because of the generous support of thousands of people,

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