Numbers
Chapter 5
1 God spoke to Moses, saying,
2 Tell the Israelites to send out of the camp anyone with a skin disease, anyone who has a bodily discharge, and anyone who is unclean because of a dead body.
3 Remove both men and women from the camp; do not let them make your camps unclean where I live among you.
4 The Israelites did what was told and sent them outside the camp; just as God told Moses, that’s what the Israelites did.
5 God spoke to Moses, saying,
6 Tell the Israelites, when a man or woman does any sin that people do and wrongs God, and that person is guilty;
7 They must admit the sin they committed, then pay back the main amount plus an extra fifth of it to the person they wronged.
8 If the man has no relative to pay the debt to, give the payment to God, to the priest, plus the ram for making things right with God.
9 Every gift of the sacred things the Israelites bring to the priest will belong to him.
10 Everything a man sets apart as holy belongs to him; whatever someone gives to the priest becomes the priest’s.
11 God spoke to Moses, saying,
12 Talk to the people of Israel and tell them, if a man’s wife goes away and is unfaithful to him,
13 If a man sleeps with her sexually, and it is secret from her husband, and it is hidden, and she is unclean, and there is no witness against her, and she is not caught in the act;
14 If he feels jealous because he thinks his wife has been unfaithful, or if he feels jealous even if she hasn’t been unfaithful:
15 The man must take his wife to the priest, along with her offering, which is a tenth of an ephah of barley flour. He must not add oil or frankincense to it because it is a jealousy offering, a reminder offering that brings sin to mind.
16 The priest will bring her close and place her before God.
17 The priest will take holy water in a clay pot and then take some dust from the floor of the worship place and add it to the water.
18 The priest will bring the woman before God, uncover her head, and give her the jealousy offering to hold as a reminder. The priest will also hold the bitter water that brings a curse.
19 The priest will make the woman take an oath and say to her, “If you have not slept with another man and have not been unfaithful to your husband, you will not be harmed by this cursed bitter water.”
20 But if you have been unfaithful to your husband and have been with another man:
21 The priest must make the woman take a curse oath, and the priest will say to the woman, “May God make you a cursed example and a warning among your people when God causes your leg to rot and your stomach to swell.”
22 This cursed water will enter your stomach, making it swell and your thigh waste away. And the woman will say, “Yes, yes.”
23 The priest will write down these curses in a book and then wash them away with the bitter water.
24 He will make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse; this water will go into her and become bitter.
25 The priest will take the jealousy offering from the woman’s hand, wave it in front of God, and put it on the altar.
26 The priest will take a handful of the sacrifice, remembering it, and burn it on the altar; then he will make the woman drink the water.
27 After she drinks the water, if she has been unfaithful to her husband, the water that brings a curse will enter her, turn bitter, her stomach will swell, her thigh will waste away, and she will become cursed among her people.
28 If the woman is not impure but is clean, then she is free and will have children.
29 This is the rule for when a wife is unfaithful to her husband and becomes unclean with another man.
30 If a man is overcome by a jealous spirit and suspects his wife, he must bring her before God, and the priest will carry out these laws on her.
31 Then the man will be free from guilt, and the woman will carry her own guilt.