War Against the Midianites

(Book of Numbers 31:1 - 31:24)
Jehovah told Moses, "For the sake of the Israelites you must take revenge upon the Midianites.  After that, you may join your ancestors."

Moses ordered his people, "Recruit a troop of men and arm them so that they can execute Jehovah's vengeance upon the Midianites.  Send into battle 1000 fighting men from each of the tribes of Israel."

And so the clans supplied 12,000 fighting men, 1000 from each of the tribes of Israel.  Moses sent them into battle, the 1000 from each tribe, along with Phinehas son the Eleazar the priest, who took with him several sacred articles from the Sanctum as well as trumpets to sound the attack.  As Jehovah had commanded Moses, they waged war against the Midianites and killed them to a man.  Among the dead were the five kings of Midian, Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba.  Also fallen by the sword was Balaam son of Beor.  The army of Israel then captured all the Midianite women and children and seized as plunder the Midianite herds and flocks as well as all their valuables.  Every town where the Midianites lived, all their camps and settlements were burned to the ground.  The Israelite army gathered together their spoils and all they had plundered, including captives and livestock, and transported them back to Moses, Eleazar the priest, and the entire congregation of Israel that was encamped on the plains of Moab across the River Jordan from Jericho.  Moses, Eleazar the priest, and the tribal leaders went to greet them outside of camp. 

Moses, though, was angry with the generals and captains who returned from battle.  "Why have you let all the women live?"  he questioned.  "These are the very women who, at the urging of Balaam, made the Israelites betray Jehovah at Peor and caused the plague that raged against the people of Jehovah.  Kill all the boys and all the women who have had sex with a man.  You may spare the young girls who are still virgins.  You can keep them for yourselves!

"Anyone who has killed someone or who has touched a dead body must remain outside of camp for 7 days.  On the 3rd and 7th days you must purify yourselves and your captives.  Purify every garment and every article of leather, goat hair, or wood."

Eleazar the priest told the soldiers who had gone into battle, "The law that Jehovah has given Moses demands that metals, gold, silver, bronze, iron, tin, and lead, anything that will not burn, must be passed through the fire in order to be ritually pure, although to be completely purified they must also be cleansed by water.  What cannot withstand fire must pass through the cleansing water.  On the 7th day you must wash your clothes, and then you will be ritually pure once again.  After that, may you reenter camp."

Notes
1. The war against the Midianites seems less in the Israelite interests than a means of avenging Jehovah and mollifying his wounded pride.  No quarter was given, and the war was all but genocidal.  All the men are killed and later all the captive boys were exterminated.  The women are also killed and the virgins are given over to the men, presumably to use as they wished, probably to be raped and abused as sex slaves --  the custom, as you know, in ancient times.  Captives of war ceased to be human beings; they were merely property.  Most slaves at this time had been captives of war.

2. As a result of his conduct as the leader of Israelites in the Midianite war Moses can proudly add to his resume the title of war criminal, although, to be fair, in ancient times the concept scarcely existed.  We would not expect the early Israelites to embrace the principles of honorable combat espoused by the later Romans.  Still, Moses exhibits greater brutality than even the ruthless Assyrians generally exercised.  "Love your enemy, forgive your enemy" are precepts of Christianity that have not yet supplanted the Old Testament exhortation to "hate your enemy and destroy him utterly without mercy or compassion and with no consideration for justice or humanity."

3. The requirement for ritual purity comes into play after the war when the returning soldiers more or less go into quarantine for a week.  (It's as if they've come back from a trip to moon.)  One imagines, though, that the purification ceremony allowed the soldiers to ease their transition back into what we would call civilian life and to feel justified in the brutal acts they have just committed.

4. Moses seems to have few qualms about completely exterminating his wife's tribe.  Is his wife, Sephora, a Midianite, still alive and, if so, what is her view of this war?  Sephora does not seem to be a factor during the Exodus, except, at one point, when she, a "foreigner" becomes a reason for the people to rebel against Moses.  The authors certainly give her short shrift.  Miriam, Moses' sister, seems to be the only woman who had political influence -- and that is presented in a negative light.