The people fall into fornication and idolatry; for which twenty-four
thousand are slain. The zeal of Phinees.
25:1. And Israel at that time abode in Settim, and the people committed
fornication with the daughters of Moab,
25:2. Who called them to their sacrifices. And they ate of them, and
adored their gods.
25:3. And Israel was initiated to Beelphegor: upon which the Lord being
angry,
Initiated to Beelphegor... That is, they took to the worship of
Beelphegor, an obscene idol of the Moabites, and were consecrated, as it
were, to him.
25:4. Said to Moses: Take all the princes of the people, and hang them
up on gibbets against the sun: that my fury may be turned away from
Israel.
25:5. And Moses said to the judges of Israel: Let every man kill his
neighbours, that have been initiated to Beelphegor.
25:6. And behold one of the children of Israel went in before his
brethren to a harlot of Madian, in the sight of Moses and of all the
children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle.
25:7. And when Phinees the son of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest
saw it, he rose up from the midst of the multitude, and taking a dagger,
25:8. Went in after the Israelite into the brothel house, and thrust
both of them through together, to wit, the man and the woman in the
genital parts. And the scourge ceased from the children of Israel.
25:9. And there were slain four and twenty thousand men.
25:10. And the Lord said to Moses:
25:11. Phinees the son of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest, hath
turned away my wrath from the children of Israel: because he was moved
with my zeal against them, that I myself might not destroy the children
of Israel in my zeal.
25:12. Therefore say to him: behold I give him the peace of my covenant,
25:13. And the covenant of the priesthood for ever shall be both to him
and his seed, because he hath been zealous for his God, and hath made
atonement for the wickedness of the children of Israel.
25:14. And the name of the Israelite, that was slain with the woman of
Madian, was Zambri the son of Salu, a prince of the kindred and tribe of
Simeon.
25:15. And the Madianite woman, that was slain with him, was called
Cozbi the daughter of Sur, a most noble prince among the Madianites.
25:16. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
25:17. Let the Madianites find you their enemies, and slay you them:
25:18. Because they also have acted like enemies against you, and have
guilefully deceived you by the idol Phogor, and Cozbi their sister, a
daughter of a prince of Madian, who was slain in the day of the plague
for the sacrilege of Phogor.