DAY 83: FEB 23

NUM 30-31

Vows Made by Women

30 Then Moses said to the heads of the tribes of the Israelites: This is what the Lord has commanded. ² When a man makes a vow to the Lord, or swears an oath to bind himself by a pledge, he shall not break his word; he shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth.

³ When a woman makes a vow to the Lord, or binds herself by a pledge, while within her father’s house, in her youth,⁴ and her father hears of her vow or her pledge by which she has bound herself, and says nothing to her; then all her vows shall stand, and any pledge by which she has bound herself shall stand. ⁵ But if her father expresses disapproval to her at the time that he hears of it, no vow of hers, and no pledge by which she has bound herself, shall stand; and the Lord will forgive her, because her father had expressed to her his disapproval.

⁶ If she marries, while obligated by her vows or any thoughtless utterance of her lips by which she has bound herself,⁷ and her husband hears of it and says nothing to her at the time that he hears, then her vows shall stand, and her pledges by which she has bound herself shall stand. ⁸ But if, at the time that her husband hears of it, he expresses disapproval to her, then he shall nullify the vow by which she was obligated, or the thoughtless utterance of her lips, by which she bound herself; and the Lord will forgive her. ⁹ (But every vow of a widow or of a divorced woman, by which she has bound herself, shall be binding upon her.) ¹⁰ And if she made a vow in her husband’s house, or bound herself by a pledge with an oath, ¹¹ and her husband heard it and said nothing to her, and did not express disapproval to her, then all her vows shall stand, and any pledge by which she bound herself shall stand. ¹² But if her husband nullifies them at the time that he hears them, then whatever proceeds out of her lips concerning her vows, or concerning her pledge of herself, shall not stand. Her husband has nullified them, and the Lord will forgive her. ¹³ Any vow or any binding oath to deny herself,^[a] her husband may allow to stand, or her husband may nullify. ¹⁴ But if her husband says nothing to her from day to day,^[b] then he validates all her vows, or all her pledges, by which she is obligated; he has validated them, because he said nothing to her at the time that he heard of them. ¹⁵ But if he nullifies them some time after he has heard of them, then he shall bear her guilt.

¹⁶ These are the statutes that the Lord commanded Moses concerning a husband and his wife, and a father and his daughter while she is still young and in her father’s house.

War against Midian

31 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ² “Avenge the Israelites on the Midianites; afterward you shall be gathered to your people.” ³ So Moses said to the people, “Arm some of your number for the war, so that they may go against Midian, to execute the Lord’s vengeance on Midian. ⁴ You shall send a thousand from each of the tribes of Israel to the war.” ⁵ So out of the thousands of Israel, a thousand from each tribe were conscripted, twelve thousand armed for battle. ⁶ Moses sent them to the war, a thousand from each tribe, along with Phinehas son of Eleazar the priest,^[c] with the vessels of the sanctuary and the trumpets for sounding the alarm in his hand. ⁷ They did battle against Midian, as the Lord had commanded Moses, and killed every male. ⁸ They killed the kings of Midian: Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian, in addition to others who were slain by them; and they also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword. ⁹ The Israelites took the women of Midian and their little ones captive; and they took all their cattle, their flocks, and all their goods as booty. ¹⁰ All their towns where they had settled, and all their encampments, they burned, ¹¹ but they took all the spoil and all the booty, both people and animals. ¹² Then they brought the captives and the booty and the spoil to Moses, to Eleazar the priest, and to the congregation of the Israelites, at the camp on the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho.

Return from the War

¹³ Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the congregation went to meet them outside the camp. ¹⁴ Moses became angry with the officers of the army, the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds, who had come from service in the war. ¹⁵ Moses said to them, “Have you allowed all the women to live? ¹⁶ These women here, on Balaam’s advice, made the Israelites act treacherously against the Lord in the affair of Peor, so that the plague came among the congregation of the Lord. ¹⁷ Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man by sleeping with him. ¹⁸ But all the young girls who have not known a man by sleeping with him, keep alive for yourselves. ¹⁹ Camp outside the camp seven days; whoever of you has killed any person or touched a corpse, purify yourselves and your captives on the third and on the seventh day. ²⁰ You shall purify every garment, every article of skin, everything made of goats’ hair, and every article of wood.”

²¹ Eleazar the priest said to the troops who had gone to battle: “This is the statute of the law that the Lord has commanded Moses: ²² gold, silver, bronze, iron, tin, and lead— ²³ everything that can withstand fire, shall be passed through fire, and it shall be clean. Nevertheless it shall also be purified with the water for purification; and whatever cannot withstand fire, shall be passed through the water. ²⁴ You must wash your clothes on the seventh day, and you shall be clean; afterward you may come into the camp.”

Disposition of Captives and Booty

²⁵ The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ²⁶ “You and Eleazar the priest and the heads of the ancestral houses of the congregation make an inventory of the booty captured, both human and animal. ²⁷ Divide the booty into two parts, between the warriors who went out to battle and all the congregation. ²⁸ From the share of the warriors who went out to battle, set aside as tribute for the Lord, one item out of every five hundred, whether persons, oxen, donkeys, sheep, or goats. ²⁹ Take it from their half and give it to Eleazar the priest as an offering to the Lord. ³⁰ But from the Israelites’ half you shall take one out of every fifty, whether persons, oxen, donkeys, sheep, or goats—all the animals—and give them to the Levites who have charge of the tabernacle of the Lord.”

³¹ Then Moses and Eleazar the priest did as the Lord had commanded Moses:

³² The booty remaining from the spoil that the troops had taken totaled six hundred seventy-five thousand sheep,³³ seventy-two thousand oxen, ³⁴ sixty-one thousand donkeys, ³⁵ and thirty-two thousand persons in all, women who had not known a man by sleeping with him.

³⁶ The half-share, the portion of those who had gone out to war, was in number three hundred thirty-seven thousand five hundred sheep and goats, ³⁷ and the Lord’s tribute of sheep and goats was six hundred seventy-five. ³⁸ The oxen were thirty-six thousand, of which the Lord’s tribute was seventy-two. ³⁹ The donkeys were thirty thousand five hundred, of which the Lord’s tribute was sixty-one. ⁴⁰ The persons were sixteen thousand, of which the Lord’s tribute was thirty-two persons. ⁴¹ Moses gave the tribute, the offering for the Lord, to Eleazar the priest, as the Lord had commanded Moses.

⁴² As for the Israelites’ half, which Moses separated from that of the troops, ⁴³ the congregation’s half was three hundred thirty-seven thousand five hundred sheep and goats, ⁴⁴ thirty-six thousand oxen, ⁴⁵ thirty thousand five hundred donkeys, ⁴⁶ and sixteen thousand persons. ⁴⁷ From the Israelites’ half Moses took one of every fifty, both of persons and of animals, and gave them to the Levites who had charge of the tabernacle of the Lord; as the Lord had commanded Moses.

⁴⁸ Then the officers who were over the thousands of the army, the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds, approached Moses, ⁴⁹ and said to Moses, “Your servants have counted the warriors who are under our command, and not one of us is missing. ⁵⁰ And we have brought the Lord’s offering, what each of us found, articles of gold, armlets and bracelets, signet rings, earrings, and pendants, to make atonement for ourselves before the Lord.”⁵¹ Moses and Eleazar the priest received the gold from them, all in the form of crafted articles. ⁵² And all the gold of the offering that they offered to the Lord, from the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds, was sixteen thousand seven hundred fifty shekels. ⁵³ (The troops had all taken plunder for themselves.) ⁵⁴ So Moses and Eleazar the priest received the gold from the commanders of thousands and of hundreds, and brought it into the tent of meeting as a memorial for the Israelites before the Lord.

PS 84

The Joy of Worship in the Temple

To the leader: according to The Gittith. Of the Korahites. A Psalm.

¹ How lovely is your dwelling place,
    O Lord of hosts!
² My soul longs, indeed it faints
    for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh sing for joy
    to the living God.

³ Even the sparrow finds a home,
    and the swallow a nest for herself,
    where she may lay her young,
at your altars, O Lord of hosts,
    my King and my God.
⁴ Happy are those who live in your house,
    ever singing your praise.Selah

⁵ Happy are those whose strength is in you,
    in whose heart are the highways to Zion.^[a]
6 As they go through the valley of Baca
    they make it a place of springs;
    the early rain also covers it with pools.
⁷ They go from strength to strength;
    the God of gods will be seen in Zion.

⁸ O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer;
    give ear, O God of Jacob!Selah
⁹ Behold our shield, O God;
    look on the face of your anointed.

¹⁰ For a day in your courts is better
    than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
    than live in the tents of wickedness.
¹¹ For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
    he bestows favor and honor.
No good thing does the Lord withhold
    from those who walk uprightly.
¹² O Lord of hosts,
    happy is everyone who trusts in you.

ACTS 17:16-34

Paul in Athens

¹⁶ While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was deeply distressed to see that the city was full of idols. ¹⁷ So he argued in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and also in the marketplace^[a] every day with those who happened to be there. ¹⁸ Also some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers debated with him. Some said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign divinities.” (This was because he was telling the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.) ¹⁹ So they took him and brought him to the Areopagus and asked him, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? ²⁰ It sounds rather strange to us, so we would like to know what it means.” ²¹ Now all the Athenians and the foreigners living there would spend their time in nothing but telling or hearing something new.

²² Then Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, “Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way.²³ For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, ‘To an unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. ²⁴ The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, ²⁵ nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. ²⁶ From one ancestor^[b] he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, ²⁷ so that they would search for God^[c]and perhaps grope for him and find him—though indeed he is not far from each one of us. ²⁸ For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said,

‘For we too are his offspring.’

²⁹ Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold, or silver, or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals. ³⁰ While God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent, ³¹ because he has fixed a day on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

³² When they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some scoffed; but others said, “We will hear you again about this.”³³ At that point Paul left them. ³⁴ But some of them joined him and became believers, including Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.

CAT 612-617

The agony at Gethsemani

612 The cup of the New Covenant, which Jesus anticipated when he offered himself at the Last Supper, is afterwards accepted by him from his Father's hands in his agony in the garden at Gethsemani,⁴³⁴ making himself "obedient unto death". Jesus prays: "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. . ."⁴³⁵ Thus he expresses the horror that death represented for his human nature. Like ours, his human nature is destined for eternal life; but unlike ours, it is perfectly exempt from sin, the cause of death.⁴³⁶ Above all, his human nature has been assumed by the divine person of the "Author of life", the "Living One".⁴³⁷ By accepting in his human will that the Father's will be done, he accepts his death as redemptive, for "he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree."⁴³⁸

Christ's death is the unique and definitive sacrifice

613 Christ's death is both the Paschal sacrifice that accomplishes the definitive redemption of men, through "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world",⁴³⁹ and the sacrifice of the New Covenant, which restores man to communion with God by reconciling him to God through the "blood of the covenant, which was poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins".⁴⁴⁰

614 This sacrifice of Christ is unique; it completes and surpasses all other sacrifices.⁴⁴¹ First, it is a gift from God the Father himself, for the Father handed his Son over to sinners in order to reconcile us with himself. At the same time it is the offering of the Son of God made man, who in freedom and love offered his life to his Father through the Holy Spirit in reparation for our disobedience.⁴⁴²

Jesus substitutes his obedience for our disobedience

615 "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man's obedience many will be made righteous."⁴⁴³ By his obedience unto death, Jesus accomplished the substitution of the suffering Servant, who "makes himself an offering for sin", when "he bore the sin of many", and who "shall make many to be accounted righteous", for "he shall bear their iniquities".⁴⁴⁴ Jesus atoned for our faults and made satisfaction for our sins to the Father.⁴⁴⁵

Jesus consummates his sacrifice on the cross

616 It is love "to the end"⁴⁴⁶ that confers on Christ's sacrifice its value as redemption and reparation, as atonement and satisfaction. He knew and loved us all when he offered his life.⁴⁴⁷ Now "the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died."⁴⁴⁸ No man, not even the holiest, was ever able to take on himself the sins of all men and offer himself as a sacrifice for all. the existence in Christ of the divine person of the Son, who at once surpasses and embraces all human persons, and constitutes himself as the Head of all mankind, makes possible his redemptive sacrifice for all.

617 The Council of Trent emphasizes the unique character of Christ's sacrifice as "the source of eternal salvation"⁴⁴⁹ and teaches that "his most holy Passion on the wood of the cross merited justification for us."⁴⁵⁰ and the Church venerates his cross as she sings: "Hail, O Cross, our only hope."⁴⁵¹