Sin at Baal-peor
Exodus & Wilderness · Draft · BSB
Content revision: 6b0946a2d3999582 · No editorial review date recorded
Date: c. 1406 BC · Year 40
While Israel camps at Shittim, the men are drawn into sexual immorality with Moabite women and into the worship of the Baal of Peor. A plague strikes the camp; Phinehas acts to stop it, but 24,000 die.
Numbers 31:16 says this happened on Balaam’s advice.
Primary Scripture
25:1 While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with the daughters of Moab,
25:2 who also invited them to the sacrifices for their gods. And the people ate and bowed down to these gods.
25:3 So Israel joined in worshiping Baal of Peor, and the anger of the LORD burned against them.
25:4 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of the people and execute them in broad daylight before the LORD, so that His fierce anger may turn away from Israel.”
25:5 So Moses told the judges of Israel, “Each of you must kill all of his men who have joined in worshiping Baal of Peor.”
25:6 Just then an Israelite man brought to his family a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and the whole congregation of Israel while they were weeping at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.
25:7 On seeing this, Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, got up from the assembly, took a spear in his hand,
25:8 followed the Israelite into the tent, and drove the spear through both of them—through the Israelite and on through the belly of the woman. So the plague against the Israelites was halted,
25:9 but those who died in the plague numbered 24,000.
25:10 Then the LORD said to Moses,
25:11 “Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned My wrath away from the Israelites; for he was zealous for My sake among them, so that I did not consume the Israelites in My zeal.
25:12 Declare, therefore, that I am granting him My covenant of peace.
25:13 It will be a covenant of permanent priesthood for him and his descendants, because he was zealous for his God and made atonement for the Israelites.”
25:14 The name of the Israelite who was slain with the Midianite woman was Zimri son of Salu, the leader of a Simeonite family.
25:15 And the name of the slain Midianite woman was Cozbi, the daughter of Zur, a tribal chief of a Midianite family.
25:16 And the LORD said to Moses,
25:17 “Attack the Midianites and strike them dead.
25:18 For they assailed you deceitfully when they seduced you in the matter of Peor and their sister Cozbi, the daughter of the Midianite leader, the woman who was killed on the day the plague came because of Peor.”
Related Scripture
Deuteronomy 4:3–4 · recollection
Moses: you saw what the LORD did at Baal-peor.
Paul warns the Corinthians from this event.
Location evidence
Event map marker: Proposed site; [longitude, latitude] = [35.67368, 31.84018]. This is a teaching marker, not an exact event venue.
Shittim: Proposed site. Coordinates [longitude, latitude]: [35.67368, 31.84018]. Classification source: editorial.
Peor: Proposed site. Coordinates [longitude, latitude]: [35.738498, 31.777021]. Classification source: editorial.
For the class
Why is this failure on the edge of the land so serious?
Interpretation and reuse
Narrative order is a reading arrangement, not a proven chronology. Dates retain their stated uncertainty. An identified locality does not establish the exact venue or prove an event. Region extents and routes are illustrative, not surveyed boundaries or ancient roads. Draft material has not completed editorial review.
Record source: editorial (content/authored/exodus-wilderness.json)
Place coordinates from OpenBible.info Bible Geocoding Data, CC BY 4.0.
Teaching stops, summaries and regional extents are original editorial content of this atlas.
Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain. https://berean.bible/licensing.htm