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Numbers Chapter 36

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¹ And the chief fathers of the families of the children of Gilead, the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh, of the families of the sons of Joseph, came near, and spake before Moses, and before the princes, the chief fathers of the children of Israel:

² And they said, The LORD commanded my lord to give the land for an inheritance by lot to the children of Israel: and my lord was commanded by the LORD to give the inheritance of Zelophehad our brother unto his daughters.

³ And if they be married to any of the sons of the other tribes of the children of Israel, then shall their inheritance be taken from the inheritance of our fathers, and shall be put to the inheritance of the tribe whereunto they are received: so shall it be taken from the lot of our inheritance.

⁴ And when the jubile of the children of Israel shall be, then shall their inheritance be put unto the inheritance of the tribe whereunto they are received: so shall their inheritance be taken away from the inheritance of the tribe of our fathers.

⁵ And Moses commanded the children of Israel according to the word of the LORD, saying, The tribe of the sons of Joseph hath said well.

⁶ This is the thing which the LORD doth command concerning the daughters of Zelophehad, saying, Let them marry to whom they think best; only to the family of the tribe of their father shall they marry.

⁷ So shall not the inheritance of the children of Israel remove from tribe to tribe: for every one of the children of Israel shall keep himself to the inheritance of the tribe of his fathers.

⁸ And every daughter, that possesseth an inheritance in any tribe of the children of Israel, shall be wife unto one of the family of the tribe of her father, that the children of Israel may enjoy every man the inheritance of his fathers.

⁹ Neither shall the inheritance remove from one tribe to another tribe; but every one of the tribes of the children of Israel shall keep himself to his own inheritance.

¹⁰ Even as the LORD commanded Moses, so did the daughters of Zelophehad:

¹¹ For Mahlah, Tirzah, and Hoglah, and Milcah, and Noah, the daughters of Zelophehad, were married unto their father's brothers' sons:

¹² And they were married into the families of the sons of Manasseh the son of Joseph, and their inheritance remained in the tribe of the family of their father.

¹³ These are the commandments and the judgments, which the LORD commanded by the hand of Moses unto the children of Israel in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho.

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GiGi's Numbers Chapter 36 comment on 9/04/2023, 6:39pm...

This the last chapter in Numbers speaks again of the daughters of Zelphehad. The leaders of their tribe came to Moses to see if the Lord deemed it best for these daughters to marry within their tribe so that the inheritance will not pass to another tribe through marriage. When they marry, their husband will be the inheritor of their inheritance. The concern was by such intermarriage with other tribes the tribal land allotment of some tribes could be much increased or decreased depending on how much cross tribal marriage there was. Also, it seems that within one tribes alottment, the inheritance of a woman without brothers would go to her husband and thus resulting in another tribe inheriting this land within the wife's tribe. This intermarrying would certainly blur the lines of the tribal allotment.

This came up as a suggestion from the tribe of Manasseh rather than God telling Moses to speak about this possible situation. But when Moses spoke this out as new commandment, it says in verse 5 that it was the command of the Lord. If so, then God wanted the tribes to remain genetically separate from one another. There would be specific tribal physical characteristics passed on within tribes distinguishing one tribal ancestry.

I can understand the concerns of the tribe of Manasseh (specifically the family of Gideon) of how intermarriage would alter the allotments of land that were decided by lots (by the change that God chose). I am not sure how long this commandment was followed after the tribes settled but perhaps the story of Ruth is an example of this with Boaz being a kinsmen redeemer from the tribe of Naomi and thus able to redeem the inheritance of Naomi's sons through Ruth's marriage to Boaz.

I believe that this commandment concerning marriage was important for the time of the settling of the land of Canaan, but I don't think it is necessarily a ban on intermarriage of people from different cultures or races. It does shadow the recommendation of Paul.

David's Numbers Chapter 36 comment on 3/24/2022, 2:32am...

First cousins then were not the same as today. It does not say they HAD to marry their brothers sons but that they did marry them. Moses only said that God had told him to keep their marriages in the tribe.

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