#37 — Parshat Pinchas
Numbers 25:10- 30:1
Overview
Phineas killed a leader of the tribe of Simeon who was blatantly sinning, together with a daughter of a Midianite leader. Phineas turned away G-d’s wrath by being “jealous with G-d’s jealousy.” Therefore he is given a covenant of perpetual priesthood. And Israel is commanded to become hostile toward the Midianites who shrewdly tempted them into sin (Numbers 25:10-16).
A new census of the tribes and clans of Israel is taken before the land can be divided proportionally. The Levites are counted separately and receive no inheritance. Israel’s population has not grown in the 40 years in the desert. Because of unbelief, everyone over 20 years who had left Egypt died in the wilderness (except Joshua and Caleb; Numbers 26).
The daughters of Zelophehad (who had no sons), ask for an inheritance. Hence it is established that daughters can inherit in the absence of sons (Numbers 27:1-11).
The L-RD tells Moses he will die. Moses asks G-d for a successor. At G-d’s direction Joshua is appointed as Israel’s new leader (Numbers 27:12-23).
Instructions are given for daily offerings, for Shabbat, and all the other holy days (Numbers 28-29).
The Zeal of Phineas and the Messiah
The commendation of Phineas
Our parsha starts with the L-RD’s commendation of Phineas for taking decisive action to stop the blatant idolatry and sexual immorality which had provoked the L-RD’s righteous anger. With one spear thrust, Phineas pierced through Zimri, a leader from the tribe of Simeon, and Cozbi, a Midianite woman, killing them in their blatant act of transgression.
And the L-RD said to Moses, “Phineas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back My wrath from the people of Israel, in that he was jealous with My jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the people of Israel in My jealousy. Therefore say, ‘Behold I give him My covenant of peace, and it shall be to him and to his descendants after him the covenant of a perpetual priesthood, because he was jealous for his G-d and made atonement for the people of Israel.’”
Here and in other places, we see God’s heart is not only to forgive sins, but to completely destroy what’s disrupting the relationship between us and God. When we look more at the messianic redemption, we also see this clearly.
Not condoning but atoning, with the zeal of Phineas
In the book of Daniel the angel Gabriel states that in the messianic redemption G-d will “finish the transgression, put an end to sin, atone for iniquity, and bring in everlasting righteousness” (Daniel 9:24).
In the book of Zechariah we read there will come a day when the L-RD “will cut off the name of the idols from the land” (Zechariah 13:2). This is the day when Jerusalem will recognize her previously-rejected Messiah and the people will be completely cleansed from sin (Zechariah 12:10-13:1).
These two examples show that the atonement which G-d gives through the Messiah is a package deal with “rooting out sin.”
At In Search of Shalom we often emphasize how the death of the Messiah atones for our sins and how we can be forgiven that way. But “atoning for sins” should not be misunderstood as being “condoning of sins.” The same divine jealousy against idolatry which made Phineas take decisive action is also burning in the Messiah and He wants to impart the same zeal against sin to us.
So Messiah’s atoning clearly isn’t condoning. Even more than Phineas, He is driven by the consuming zeal of G-d’s jealousy and wages a relentless war against sin. As the prophet Malachi says, “he is like a refiner’s fire” (Malachi 3:2).
[NOTE: As one example, He will actually “purify the sons of Levi” (Malachi 3:3), who in Malachi’s days had completely lost the zeal of Phineas.]
Messiah the slayer of the wicked (in us)
When the Messiah one day will establish His worldwide peace, He will do that by judging the world in complete righteousness and fairness. “He will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked” (Isaiah 11:4).
“The wicked” in the end includes everyone who kept resisting His messianic atonement. But in all whose sins are atoned for by the Messiah, He is also “slaying the wicked,” but in a way which is good news for the sinners that are redeemed by Him.
This good news is through the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. The good news teaches two vital truths to all who believe in Him. First, our sins are forgiven on the basis of the Messiah’s death. Immediately following is a further step: “Consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to G-d in Messiah Jesus” (Romans 6:11).
What does it mean that we died with Messiah?
Jesus is so much our representative that we should think of ourselves as having died with Him. When He died that cursed death on the cross, Messiah Jesus took the punishment for our sins in our place.
Not only that, He is so much our representative that we should consider our old lives as having come to a complete end in the judgment of the cross. We should consider our living for our sinful selves over, finished. And just as He rose from the dead we are now called to live a new life with Him.
Messiah’s death on the cross for us is the most piercing deathblow imaginable. At least as radical as the spear thrust which nailed Zimri and Cozbi to the ground.
Continuing in the spirit of Phineas
Messiah’s death for us is the spear-thrust to our old lives. But our new-born lives also make possible continual action in the spirit of Phineas. We are not in a position to execute G-d’s judgment in the same way Phineas was; we have to leave that in the hands of the Messiah, whom G-d appointed as judge. But we are called to do something else in the spirit of Phineas.
Since Adam and Eve’s rebellion against G-d, the earth is in the grip of sin. The Good News of Jesus the Messiah says however that since we “died with Messiah,” we have to “put to death” within ourselves the sins which typically ensnare us on this earth.
Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of G-d is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.
But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator (Colossians 3:5-10).
By His Spirit, Messiah Jesus wants to enable us to do this with the same zeal as Phineas.
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