Numbers 31 from Scroll 4Q27 Numbers^b

2 “Avenge the children of Israel on the Midianites. Afterward you shall be gathered to your people.”

3 Moses spoke to the people children of Israel, saying, “Arm men from among you for war, that they may go against Midian, to execute Yahweh’s vengeance on Midian. 4 Of every tribe one thousand, throughout all the tribes of Israel, you shall send to the war.” 5 So there were delivered, out of the thousands of Israel, a thousand of every tribe, twelve thousand armed for war. 6 Moses sent them, one thousand of every tribe, to the war with Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, to the war, with the vessels of the sanctuary and the trumpets for the alarm in his hand.

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21 Eleazar the priest said to the men of war who went to the battle, “This is the statute of the law which Yahweh has commanded Moses: 22 however the gold, and the silver, the bronze, the iron, the tin, and the lead, 23 everything that may withstand the fire, you shall make to go through the fire, and it shall be clean; nevertheless it shall be purified with the water for impurity. All that doesn’t withstand the fire you shall make to go through the water for impurity. 24 You shall wash your clothes on the seventh day, and you shall be clean. Afterward you shall come into the camp.”

25 Yahweh spoke to Moses[1], saying,

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30 Of the children of Israel’s half, you shall take one drawn out of every fifty, of the persons, of the cattle, of the donkeys, and of the flocks, of the donkeys, of all the livestock, and give them to the Levites, who perform the duty of Yahweh’s tabernacle.”

31 Moses and Eleazar the priest did as Yahweh commanded Moses.

32 Now the plunder, over and above the booty which the men of war took, was six hundred seventy-five thousand sheep, 33 seventy-two thousand head of cattle,

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35 and thirty-two thousand persons in all, of the women who had not known man by lying with him. 36 The half, which was the portion of those who went out to war, was in number three hundred thirty-seven thousand five hundred sheep;

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38 The cattle were thirty-six[2] thousand, of which Yahweh’s tribute was seventy-two.

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43 (now the congregation’s half was three hundred thirty-seven thousand five hundred sheep, 44 thirty-six thousand head of cattle,

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46 and sixteen thousand persons), 47 even of the children of Israel’s half, Moses took one drawn out of every fifty, both of man and of animal, and gave them to the Levites, who performed the duty of Yahweh’s tabernacle, as Yahweh commanded Moses.

48 The officers who were over the thousands of the army, the captains of thousands, and the captains of hundreds, came near to Moses[3], the ones who came from the service of the battle. 49 They said to Moses, “Your servants have taken the sum of the men of war who are under our command, and there lacks not one man of us. 50 We have brought Yahweh’s offering, what every man found: gold ornaments, armlets, bracelets, signet rings, and earrings, and necklaces, to make atonement for our souls before Yahweh.”

51 Moses and Eleazar the priest took their gold, even all worked jewels. 52 All the gold of the wave offering that they offered up to Yahweh, of the captains of thousands, and of the captains of hundreds, was sixteen thousand and seven hundred fifty shekels. 53 The men of war had taken booty, every man for himself. 54 Moses and Eleazar the priest took the gold of the captains of thousands and of hundreds, and brought it into the Tent of Meeting for a memorial for the children of Israel before Yahweh.