Tag Archives: Numbers 36

“Yeah, but…”

September 18, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3DIRUPkGM4nK1I3TpLfaSC?si=cmXuNMP5TKS4iWCFp9YBWw

They said, “When the Lord commanded my lord to give the land as an inheritance to the Israelites by lot, he ordered you to give the inheritance of our brother Zelophehad to his daughters. Now suppose they marry men from other Israelite tribes; then their inheritance will be taken from our ancestral inheritance and added to that of the tribe they marry into. And so part of the inheritance allotted to us will be taken away.”
Numbers 36:2-3 (NIV)

When I present customer service training I’ve learned that every customer service skill is likely going to be challenged. A hand will go up in the air. When I call on my class member I typically year, “Yeah, but Tom…”

Now I simply call them, “Yeah, buts.” They are the typical excuses or exceptions to the general customer rule that cause people not to want to follow the rule.

The book of Numbers ends with a “Yeah, but….”

Just a few chapters ago God instructed Moses to allow Zelophahad’s daughters to inherit their father’s allotment of the Promised Land. It was a radical and revolutionary moment in history when women were suddenly given a level of equality no one could have expected.

In today’s final chapter, the men of the tribe approach Moses and say, “Yeah, but Mo, what if Zelo’s daughters marry into another tribe? By law their land would then get absorbed into the ownership of their husband’s family and now our tribe’s land becomes part of another tribe’s allotment. Doesn’t seem fair.”

Moses went before God and God provided a compromise. God did not want land being exchanged between tribes. Every tribe was to get their equitable and divinely appointed allotment of land to divide between the families of that tribe, and the land must stay with the tribe. So, Zelo’s daughters were required to marry a man from a family within their tribe if they wanted to retain ownership.

In the quiet this morning, my heart is split in two directions of thought and emotion.

I love that God has radically broken normal human protocol to divinely advance the female cause. The “Yeah, but…” that is raised is a legitimate legal question. Jewish rabbinical thought through history views God’s response as a balance of the individual rights of the daughters and the community rights of their tribe. The marriage requirement for the daughters was not seen as punishment but as a balance of justice for the daughters and order in the integrity of the tribe and its allotment. God’s divine decree is dynamic as it engages human concerns and balances the competing “good” of individuals and groups.

At the same time, as a student of history, I’m well aware that today’s chapter reflects a well-worn pattern in which men fight female rights and equality. Today’s chapter was just the first “Yeah, but…” to God’s divine decree of female land ownership. Through history, patriarchal male lawyers continued to chip away at it with their legal judgments. They increased the primacy of male heirs. They created marriage and dowry systems that channeled legal ownership to the control of male family members and circumvented the Zelophahad’s Daughter’s rule. They narrowed the circumstances in which the rule was applied and created legal loopholes by which the rule could be effectively bypassed.

The further I get in my journey the more appreciation I have for the women in my life. I love the radical move God made in naming and giving rights to Zelophahad’s daughters. I love that Jesus repeatedly broke patriarchal cultural convention to have relationship with women, even unacceptable women. Mary Magdalene, the Samaritan woman at the well, the woman who’d been bleeding for 12 years, and the woman caught in adultery to name a few. I love that Jesus made way for women to have a seat at the table and that in Christ there is no male and female.

In the long arc of the Great Story I see the Kingdom of God perpetually pushing against the curse of sin and the patriarchal nature of humanity that flows from that curse. Over my journey, my desire had continued to grow to do all I can to push into the equality of God’s Kingdom and impede the flow of sin’s curse and the inequality that it has shackled humanity with since the Garden.

Taking a little vacation through next week. Monday September 29th: 1 Timothy

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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Chapter-a-Day

Building Silos

December 11, 2017 Tom Vander Well 2 Comments

This is what the Lord commands for Zelophehad’s daughters: They may marry anyone they please as long as they marry within their father’s tribal clan.
Numbers 36:6 (NIV)

Almost every morning Wendy and I meet in our dining room for our requisite cups of coffee and tea. We read the newspaper together and start each day catching up on current events and solving the worlds problems. Over weeks and months and years we begin to see patterns that you can count on. For example, no matter what piece of legislation is presented by Congress here in America, all parties will get out their crystal balls and predict either blissful utopia or utter apocalypse depending on which side of the aisle they butter their womb-to-the-tomb pension and benefits package. The same clichés will be used like worn-out rags for the public while behind closed doors congressional staffers will be hammering out appeals and deals.

Along life’s journey I’ve observed that there are always unintended consequences to virtually any law. Laws may benefit the majority but will typically have unintended negative effect for others. Laws always get amended, altered and changed by additional legislation or by interpretations and clarifications from the judicial branch. It’s just the way the system works.

In today’s chapter we finish our journey through the ancient book of Numbers with a rather odd, anti-climactic story. A few chapters ago the unmarried daughters of a guy named Zelophehad approached Moses and argued that their father’s inheritance should pass to them, even though they were women. Women in near east cultures of that day could not own property and, in fact, were typically considered the property of their fathers or husbands. In a law that was incredibly progressive for the time, Moses agreed with the orphaned daughters and set up a new law granting unmarried daughters of a dead father the father’s inheritance. The inheritance would then pass to their husband if/when they eventually married.

Today we have an appeal to the original law. The ruling men in the tribe begin to ask themselves “What ifs.” It would not surprise me if multiple men from various tribes were lining up in an ancient version of The Bachelorette. Marrying Zelophehad’s daughters and getting your hands on Zelophehad’s inheritance would be a lucrative deal. “Mazel tov!”

The problem was that tribal inheritance in the promised land was to be set in stone and absolute. Land was not to pass back and forth from one tribe to another. The case of Zelophehad’s daughters created a problem. Their father’s land would go to their future husband. If they married outside the clan then their tribes land would be owned by another tribe. Moses quickly amends the original law stating that Zelophehad’s daughters must marry inside their own tribal clan.

Of course, when you follow the news long enough and acquaint yourself with human history you begin to see patterns. Today’s amendment will have its own unintended effect. When human tribes isolate and insulate themselves socially it creates “us versus them” mentalities. Eventually the tribes would turn against one another in a protracted civil war.

This morning I’m thinking about tribes and clans. In the business world we often speak of “Silos” in which departments and divisions of corporations operate within themselves and largely function in exclusion to the corporation as a whole. In the world of institutional Christianity we see this same paradigm in silos we call denominations. Across the U.S. I see silos in politics and in my own community I see silos culturally among groups with different ideas and interests. Silos we build with the best of intentions to shore up the identity and cohesion of certain groups become exclusionary protectorates that eventually contribute negatively to the whole.

The further I get in my life journey the more inclined I am to stop building silos and to start tearing them down.

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Numbers 36

August 18, 2011 Tom Vander Well 1 Comment

“No inheritance-land may be passed from tribe to tribe; each tribe of the People of Israel must hold tight to its own land.” Numbers 36:9 (MSG)

Land is a funny thing. We like to think we own it, and in doing so we attach all sorts of value to it and allow it to have a strange sense of power over us. The land I own here at home was first owned by the founder of the town, H.P. Scholte. All of the Dutch settlers gave Scholte their life savings and he pooled the money to buy all of the land around here, then parceled it out once the U.S. Government gave him the deeds. The problem was that it took a while for the Government to process the paperwork (some things never change, I guess). The delay created all sorts of conflict and scandal in the fledgling community. People became obsessed with claiming and owning their land. I can still see some of those obsessive attitudes in the descendents who inherited it.

The land that I “own” in Missouri was first developed in a time of blatant racism. The paperwork to my land includes handwritten instructions by the racist landowners that the land may never be owned by anyone other than a pure blooded caucasian. How very sad.

I’ve been reading through The Lord of the Rings again. I lost count how many times I’ve read the epic tale. In The Two Towers, two Hobbits are sunning themselves on the peak of a tall hill and they run into an ancient Ent – a giant tree-like creature who shepherds the trees. He asks the Hobbits what they call the thing they are standing on:

“Hill?” suggested Pippin. “Shelf? Step?” suggested Merry.

Treebeard repeated the words thoughtfully. “Hill. Yes, that was it. But it is a hasty word for a thing that has stood here ever since this part of the world was shaped.”

Indeed. Today I am reminded that I may own land, but if I’m not careful it can end up owning me. The truth of the matter is that in the end we all die and, as God’s Message reminds us, return to the ground from which we were made. I may hold claim to a piece of land for a short time, but the land will ultimately claim me.