Discovery BoxNumbers 5:15 
Context5:15 then 1 the man must bring his wife to the priest, and he must bring the offering required for her, one tenth of an ephah of barley meal; he must not pour olive oil on it or put frankincense on it, because it is a grain offering of suspicion, 2 a grain offering for remembering, 3 for bringing 4 iniquity to remembrance.
Numbers 9:13
Context9:13 But 5 the man who is ceremonially clean, and was not on a journey, and fails 6 to keep the Passover, that person must be cut off from his people. 7 Because he did not bring the Lord’s offering at its appointed time, that man must bear his sin. 8
Numbers 15:25
Context15:25 And the priest is to make atonement 9 for the whole community of the Israelites, and they will be forgiven, 10 because it was unintentional and they have brought their offering, an offering made by fire to the Lord, and their purification offering before the Lord, for their unintentional offense.
Numbers 16:38
Context16:38 As for the censers of these men who sinned at the cost of their lives, 11 they must be made 12 into hammered sheets for covering the altar, because they presented them before the Lord and sanctified them. They will become a sign to the Israelites.”
Numbers 19:13
Context19:13 Anyone who touches the corpse of any dead person and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. And that person must be cut off from Israel, 13 because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him. He will be unclean; his uncleanness remains on him.
Numbers 19:20
Context19:20 But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person must be cut off from among the community, because he has polluted the sanctuary of the Lord; the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, so he is unclean.
Numbers 25:18
Context25:18 because they bring trouble to you by their treachery with which they have deceived 14 you in the matter of Peor, and in the matter of Cozbi, the daughter of a prince of Midian, 15 their sister, who was killed on the day of the plague that happened as a result of Peor.”
1 tn All the conditions have been laid down now for the instruction to begin – if all this happened, then this is the procedure to follow.
2 tn The Hebrew word is “jealousy,” which also would be an acceptable translation here. But since the connotation is that suspicion has been raised about the other person, “suspicion” seems to be a better rendering in this context.
3 tn The word “remembering” is זִכָּרוֹן (zikkaron); the meaning of the word here is not so much “memorial,” which would not communicate much, but the idea of bearing witness before God concerning the charges. The truth would come to light through this ritual, and so the attestation would stand. This memorial would bring the truth to light. It was a somber occasion, and so no sweet smelling additives were placed on the altar.
4 tn The final verbal form, מַזְכֶּרֶת (mazkeret), explains what the memorial was all about – it was causing iniquity to be remembered.
5 tn The disjunctive vav (ו) signals a contrastive clause here: “but the man” on the other hand….
6 tn The verb חָדַל (khadal) means “to cease; to leave off; to fail.” The implication here is that it is a person who simply neglects to do it. It does not indicate that he forgot, but more likely that he made the decision to leave it undone.
7 sn The pronouncement of such a person’s penalty is that his life will be cut off from his people. There are at least three possible interpretations for this: physical death at the hand of the community (G. B. Gray, Numbers [ICC], 84-85), physical and/or spiritual death at the hand of God (J. Milgrom, “A Prolegomenon to Lev 17:11,” JBL 90 [1971]: 154-55), or excommunication or separation from the community (R. A. Cole, Exodus [TOTC], 109). The direct intervention of God seem to be the most likely in view of the lack of directions for the community to follow. Excommunication from the camp in the wilderness would have been tantamount to a death sentence by the community, and so there really are just two views.
8 tn The word for “sin” here should be interpreted to mean the consequences of his sin (so a metonymy of effect). Whoever willingly violates the Law will have to pay the consequences.
9 tn The verb is the Piel perfect with vav (ו) consecutive (וְכִפֶּר, vÿkhipper) to continue the instruction of the passage: “the priest shall make atonement,” meaning the priest is to make atonement for the sin (thus the present translation). This verb means “to expiate,” “to atone for,” “to pacify.” It describes the ritual events by which someone who was separated from the holy
10 tn Or “they will be forgiven.”
11 tn The expression is “in/by/against their life.” That they sinned against their life means that they brought ruin to themselves.
12 tn The form is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive. But there is no expressed subject for “and they shall make them,” and so it may be treated as a passive (“they shall [must] be made”).
13 sn It is in passages like this that the view that being “cut off” meant the death penalty is the hardest to support. Would the Law prescribe death for someone who touches a corpse and fails to follow the ritual? Besides, the statement in this section that his uncleanness remains with him suggests that he still lives on.
14 tn This is the same word as that translated “treachery.”
15 sn Cozbi’s father, Zur, was one of five Midianite kings who eventually succumbed to Israel (Num 31:8). When the text gives the name and family of a woman, it is asserting that she is important, at least for social reasons, among her people.
