How does Numbers 5 deal with a husband’s suspicion when adultery has not been proved?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

The husband must bring his wife and a specified offering to the priest. The priest follows the written procedure, including an oath and bitter water. The law distinguishes a guilty wife from one who has not been defiled; suspicion alone is not stated as proof.

Chapter breakdown

Numbers 5 gives laws about removal from the camp, confession and repayment, priestly offerings, and marital jealousy. The Lord tells Moses to send out of the camp every leper, everyone who has an issue of seed, and anyone defiled by the dead. Male and female alike must be sent out so they do not defile the camp where God dwells with them. The children of Israel do as the Lord commanded Moses.

The Lord tells Moses what must happen when a man or woman commits one of the sins people commonly commit, negligently breaks the Lord’s command and offends. They must confess their sin and repay the full amount to the person wronged, adding a fifth.

Challoner’s note describes this Old Law confession and satisfaction as a figure of the sacrament of penance. This is the commentator’s explanation, separate from the law’s own words.

If there is no one to receive the repayment, it must be given to the Lord and belong to the priest, besides the ram offered for expiation to make atonement. All the firstfruits that Israel offers belong to the priest. Whatever is offered in the sanctuary and delivered into the priest’s hands is his.

The Lord gives Moses a law for a wife who goes astray and despises her husband. She has slept with another man, but her husband cannot discover it; the adultery is secret, cannot be proved by witnesses, and she has not been caught. The law then addresses a husband moved by jealousy, whether his wife has been defiled or his suspicion is false.

Challoner’s note says this ordinance was designed to clear the innocent, prevent jealous husbands from harming their wives, and give everyone a horror of adultery through its remarkable punishment. These stated purposes belong to the annotation; they are not a separate event narrated in the chapter.

The husband must bring his wife to the priest with a tenth of a measure of barley meal as an offering for her. He must put neither oil nor frankincense on it, because it is a jealousy sacrifice searching out adultery. The priest must offer it and set it before the Lord. He takes holy water in an earthen vessel and puts in a little earth from the tabernacle pavement. He sets the woman before the Lord, uncovers her head and places the remembrance sacrifice, the jealousy offering, in her hands. The priest holds the most bitter water, in which he has spoken curses.

The priest puts her under oath: if no other man has slept with her and she has not been defiled by leaving her husband’s bed, the bitter water containing curses will not hurt her. If she has turned aside from her husband, been defiled, and slept with another man, the oath calls for the Lord to make her a curse and example among his people, with her thigh rotting and her belly swelling and bursting apart. The water is to enter her belly, making her womb swell and her thigh rot. She must answer, “Amen, amen.” The priest writes these curses in a book and washes them off with the bitter water.

The text directs the priest to give her the water to drink. It then describes taking the jealousy offering from her hands, raising it before the Lord and putting it on the altar, but first taking a handful and burning it on the altar. It directs him to give her the bitter water to drink after this offering. Both the earlier drinking direction and the stated first step are retained here.

If she has been defiled, despised her husband and is guilty of adultery, the curse passes through her: her belly swells, her thigh rots, and she becomes a curse and example to all the people. If she has not been defiled, she will not be hurt and will bear children. This is the law of jealousy when a wife turns aside and is defiled, or when her husband is moved by jealousy and brings her before the Lord. The priest must do everything written here. The husband will be blameless, and she will bear her own iniquity.

The story inside

The jealousy law begins with a problem of knowledge: the alleged adultery is hidden, without witnesses or discovery. It expressly allows that the husband’s suspicion may be false. The priest’s oath therefore has two conditions, one for a woman who has not been defiled and another for a guilty woman. The offering, oath, written curses and drinking directions belong to the prescribed procedure. The final contrast repeats the two conditions: harm for the guilty, no harm and children for the undefiled. This is a conditional law, not a report that a named woman underwent it. Challoner separately explains its purposes; that explanation must not be turned into an invented courtroom scene.

Lessons worth keeping

1
The camp rule states its reason: God dwells with the people. Removal applies to men and women with the named conditions, rather than to an unspecified group chosen by a leader.
2
Confession is followed by repayment. The principal and added fifth go to the person wronged; the law also names what happens when no one can receive them and keeps the ram offering separate.
3
Jealousy and guilt are distinguished. The law includes false suspicion and an outcome for an undefiled wife, so a summary must preserve both conditions rather than assume the accusation is true.

Test your recall

Why must the jealousy law distinguish a wife who has been defiled from one against whom her husband’s suspicion is false?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 14512–14529
Numbers Chapter 5 The unclean are removed out of the camp: confession of sins, and satisfaction: firstfruits and oblations belonging to the priests: trial of jealousy. 5:1. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 5:2. Command the children of Israel, that they cast out of the camp every leper, and whosoever hath an issue of seed, or is defiled by the dead: 5:3. Whether it be man or woman, cast ye them out of the camp, lest they defile it when I shall dwell with you, 5:4. And the children of Israel did so, and they cast them forth without the camp, as the Lord had spoken to Moses.
Lines 14530–14539
5:5. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 5:6. Say to the children of Israel: When a man or woman shall have committed any of all the sins that men are wont to commit, and by negligence shall have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and offended, 5:7. They shall confess their sin, and restore the principal itself, and the fifth part over and above, to him against whom they have sinned.
Lines 14541–14542
Shall confess.... This confession and satisfaction, ordained in the Old Law, was a figure of the sacrament of penance.
Lines 14544–14552
5:8. But if there be no one to receive it, they shall give it to the Lord, and it shall be the priest’s, besides the ram that is offered for expiation, to be an atoning sacrifice. 5:9. All the firstfruits also, which the children of Israel offer, belong to the priest: 5:10. And whatsoever is offered into the sanctuary by every one, and is delivered into the hands of the priest, it shall be his.
Lines 14554–14564
5:11. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 5:12. Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: The man whose wife shall have gone astray, and contemning her husband, 5:13. Shall have slept with another man, and her husband cannot discover it, but the adultery is secret, and cannot be proved by witnesses, because she was not found in the adultery: 5:14. If the spirit of jealousy stir up the husband against his wife, who either is defiled, or is charged with false suspicion,
Lines 14566–14569
The spirit of jealousy, etc.... This ordinance was designed to clear the innocent, and to prevent jealous husbands from doing mischief to their wives: as likewise to give all a horror of adultery, by punishing it in so remarkable a manner.
Lines 14571–14584
5:15. He shall bring her to the priest, and shall offer an oblation for her, the tenth part of a measure of barley meal: he shall not pour oil thereon, nor put frankincense upon it: because it is a sacrifice of jealousy, and an oblation searching out adultery. 5:16. The priest therefore shall offer it, and set it before the Lord. 5:17. And he shall take holy water in an earthen vessel, and he shall cast a little earth of the pavement of the tabernacle into it. 5:18. And when the woman shall stand before the Lord, he shall uncover her head, and shall put on her hands the sacrifice of remembrance, and the oblation of jealousy: and he himself shall hold the most bitter waters, whereon he hath heaped curses with execration.
Lines 14586–14603
5:19. And he shall adjure her, and shall say: If another man hath not slept with thee, and if thou be not defiled by forsaking thy husband’s bed, these most bitter waters, on which I have heaped curses, shall not hurt thee. 5:20. But if thou hast gone aside from thy husband, and art defiled, and hast lain with another man: 5:21. These curses shall light upon thee: The Lord make thee a curse, and an example for all among his people: may he make thy thigh to rot, and may thy belly swell and burst asunder. 5:22. Let the cursed waters enter into thy belly, and may thy womb swell and thy thigh rot. And the woman shall answer, Amen, amen. 5:23. And the priest shall write these curses in a book, and shall wash them out with the most bitter waters, upon which he hath heaped the curses,
Lines 14605–14614
5:24. And he shall give them her to drink. And when she hath drunk them up, 5:25. The priest shall take from her hand the sacrifice of jealousy, and shall elevate it before the Lord, and shall put it upon the altar: yet so as first, 5:26. To take a handful of the sacrifice of that which is offered, and burn it upon the altar: and so give the most bitter waters to the woman to drink.
Lines 14616–14633
5:27. And when she hath drunk them, if she be defiled, and having despised her husband be guilty of adultery, the malediction shall go through her, and her belly swelling, her thigh shall rot: and the woman shall be a curse, and an example to all the people. 5:28. But if she be not defiled, she shall not be hurt, and shall bear children. 5:29. This is the law of jealousy. If a woman hath gone aside from her husband, and be defiled, 5:30. And the husband stirred up by the spirit of jealousy bring her before the Lord, and the priest do to her according to all things that are here written: 5:31. The husband shall be blameless, and she shall bear her iniquity.