KILL ALL THE BOYS AND KILL EVERY WOMAN WHO HAS SLEPT WITH A MAN


1 The LORD said to Moses,
2 "Take vengeance on the Midianites for the Israelites. After that, you will be gathered to your people."

5 So twelve thousand men armed for battle, a thousand from each tribe, were supplied from the clans of Israel.

7 They fought against Midian, as the LORD commanded Moses, and killed every man.

9 The Israelites captured the Midianite women and children and took all the Midianite herds, flocks and goods as plunder.

10 They burned all the towns where the Midianites had settled, as well as all their camps.

11 They took all the plunder and spoils, including the people and animals,

13 Moses, Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp.

14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army--the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds--who returned from the battle.

15 "Have you allowed all the women to live?" he asked them.

16 "They were the ones who followed Balaam's advice and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the LORD in what happened at Peor, so that a plague struck the LORD's people.

17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man,

18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."
(Numbers 31)


Not much commentary needed here. Biblegod ordered Moses to "take vengeance" on the Midianites. Moses took vengeance with 12,000 + soldiers. The Israelites killed all the men, burned the towns and camps and took all the women and children as prisoners
The soldiers herded the captive women and children back to Moses. General Moses was obviously upset. He ordered all the boys to be killed in addition to any woman who had slept with a man. Apparently that would have included the woman's husband, now deceased.

But General Moses spared the virgin women and female children. They got to live. What happened to them and what purpose they served for the Israelites will have to be left to your imagination. Before it was all over most of them probably wish they had been killed too!!

Wanton wholesale, barbaric slaughter and cold blooded murder of helpless captives - the boys and non virgin women massacred. And we hear Christians tell us today of God's love for us?

And we're far from being through!