Big Idea: God’s people must deal with immorality and idolatry.

Understanding the Text

Numbers 25 moves from the story of the Balaam cycle to Israel’s last act of rebellion in the book of Numbers: its idolatry with Baal of Peor. At first glance, this story seems unrelated to Numbers 22–24, simply picking up where Numbers 21 left off with Israel camped on the plains of Moab after defeating Sihon and Og. But that initial impression is wrong. First, this unit provides a contrast: Balaam and Balak cannot curse Israel externally, but Israel can bring on a self-inflicted curse. Second, Balaam in fact has orchestrated this whole affair in a partially successful attempt to get Yahweh to curse Israel (see Num. 31:15–18). The Moabites (Num. 25:1–2) and their Midianite allies (Num. 25:6, 14–15) have…