Numbers 5

5 ¹ Our Father spoke to Moses:

Purity in the Camp

² "Command the children of Israel to send out of the camp everyone with a skin disease, everyone with a discharge, and everyone defiled by contact with a dead body. ³ Male and female alike you must send away; send them outside the camp, so that they do not defile their camp, where I dwell among them."

⁴ So the children of Israel did this, sending them outside the camp; just as our Father had spoken to Moses, so the children of Israel did.

Confession and Restitution

⁵ Then our Father spoke to Moses:

Making Things Right

⁶ "Tell the children of Israel: When a man or woman commits any of the sins people commit, breaking faith with me, that person is guilty, ⁷ and they must confess the sin they have committed. They shall make full restitution for their wrong, add a fifth to it, and give it to the one they wronged.

⁸ But if that person has no close relative to whom restitution can be made, the restitution for the wrong belongs to me and is given to the priest, along with the ram of atonement to make atonement for the guilty one.

⁹ Every contribution from all the holy gifts the children of Israel bring to the priest shall belong to him. ¹⁰ Each person's holy gifts are their own, but whatever anyone gives to the priest belongs to the priest."

The Jealousy Ordeal

¹¹ Then our Father spoke to Moses:

A Husband's Suspicion

¹² "Speak to the children of Israel and say to them: If any man's wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him, ¹³ if another man sleeps with her, and it is hidden from her husband, and she keeps it concealed though she has defiled herself — with no witness against her, and she was not caught in the act — ¹⁴ and a spirit of jealousy comes over the husband so that he is jealous of his wife who has defiled herself — or a spirit of jealousy comes over him and he is jealous though she has not defiled herself — ¹⁵ then the man shall bring his wife to the priest and bring the offering required for her: about two quarts of barley flour. He must pour no oil on it and put no frankincense on it, because it is a grain offering of jealousy, a grain offering of remembrance, calling iniquity to mind.

¹⁶ The priest shall bring her near and set her before our Father. ¹⁷ The priest shall take holy water in a clay jar, and take some of the dust from the floor of the tabernacle and put it into the water. ¹ 1 v17 This bitter-water ritual was a divine trial by ordeal: if the woman was guilty, she would suffer physical harm; if innocent, she would be unharmed.

¹⁸ The priest shall set the woman before our Father, loosen her hair, and place in her hands the grain offering of remembrance, which is the grain offering of jealousy; and in the priest's hand shall be the bitter water that brings a curse. ¹⁹ Then the priest shall put her under oath and say to her: "If no man has slept with you and you have not gone astray and defiled yourself while under your husband's authority, then be free from this bitter water that brings a curse. ²⁰ But if you have gone astray while under your husband's authority and have defiled yourself, and a man other than your husband has slept with you" — ²¹ then the priest shall put the woman under the oath of the curse, saying to her: "May the Sovereign Father make you a curse and a disgrace among your people, when he makes your thigh waste away and your belly swell; ²² may this water that brings a curse go into your body and make your belly swell and your thigh waste away." And the woman shall say, "Amen, Amen."

²³ Then the priest shall write these curses on a scroll and wash them off into the bitter water. ²⁴ He shall make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and the water that brings a curse will enter her and cause bitter suffering. ²⁵ The priest shall take the grain offering of jealousy from the woman's hand, wave it before our Father, and bring it to the altar. ²⁶ The priest shall take a handful of the grain offering as its memorial portion and burn it on the altar, and afterward make the woman drink the water.

²⁷ When he has made her drink the water, then if she has defiled herself and been unfaithful to her husband, the water that brings a curse will enter her and cause bitter suffering; her belly will swell and her thigh waste away, and she will become a curse among her people. ²⁸ But if the woman has not defiled herself and is clean, she will be cleared and able to bear children.

²⁹ This is the law of jealousy, when a wife goes astray while under her husband's authority and defiles herself, ³⁰ or when a spirit of jealousy comes over a man and he is jealous of his wife. He shall set the woman before our Father, and the priest shall apply this entire law to her. ³¹ The husband will be free from guilt, but the woman will answer for her own sin.