Numbers 27:1-11--The Daughters of Zelophehad

Numbers 27:1-11
English Standard Version

The Daughters of Zelophehad
27 Then drew near the daughters of Zelophehad the son of Hepher, son of Gilead, son of Machir, son of Manasseh, from the clans of Manasseh the son of Joseph. The names of his daughters were: Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah. 2 And they stood before Moses and before Eleazar the priest and before the chiefs and all the congregation, at the entrance of the tent of meeting, saying, 3 “Our father died in the wilderness. He was not among the company of those who gathered themselves together against the LORD in the company of Korah, but died for his own sin. And he had no sons. 4 Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan because he had no son? Give to us a possession among our father's brothers.”

​5 Moses brought their case before the LORD. 6 And the LORD said to Moses, 7 “The daughters of Zelophehad are right. You shall give them possession of an inheritance among their father's brothers and transfer the inheritance of their father to them. 8 And you shall speak to the people of Israel, saying, ‘If a man dies and has no son, then you shall transfer his inheritance to his daughter. 9 And if he has no daughter, then you shall give his inheritance to his brothers. 10 And if he has no brothers, then you shall give his inheritance to his father's brothers. 11 And if his father has no brothers, then you shall give his inheritance to the nearest kinsman of his clan, and he shall possess it. And it shall be for the people of Israel a statute and rule, as the LORD commanded Moses.’”

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After the new census and the command from the LORD that this census would be used for the apportionment of land to each tribe, clan, and family, a question arose from some women, the five daughters of Zelophehad, about if they would be eligible to receive their family's inheritance of land given that they no longer had any male heirs to inherit, for their father had died in the wilderness without having any sons.  They said, "Our father died in the wilderness. He was not among the company of those who gathered themselves together against the LORD in the company of Korah, but died for his own sin. And he had no sons. 4 Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan because he had no son? Give to us a possession among our father's brothers.”

Specifically, their father died in Korah's rebellion.  It was not clear at that time that any of the family members of those engaged in the rebellion survived, but here we see God's grace in that it now appears that only those actively involved in the rebellion were killed.  It was only those that were rebellious that were meant to be cut off from their inheritance, but that did not describe these women.

Moses intercedes for them and the LORD agrees that a woman should not be kept from inheriting her part of the family estate simply because there is no male relative.  Only if the man was without children was the inheritance of the family land to go to the man's closest male relative and the LORD lays out exactly what the process would be here the idea of the "kinsman redeemer" is established here that the closest male relative that has the right to do so has the obligation to redeem the family land and make it his own.  We'll see this particular issue come up in the story of Ruth later where Naomi's husband and all of her sons would die and only her daughter-in-law Ruth remained with her (she was part of the "family estate," but could not inherit herself since she was not technically a daughter by birth from the family).  Boaz wishes to be the kinsman redeemer for Naomi and Ruth but says, "there is a closer kinsman," and he had to give that relative the opportunity to refuse the right of inheritance first (that kinsman would have to accept both Naomi and Ruth as part of his family as part of the inheritance, and they were unwilling to do so since Ruth was a Moabite woman--we'll see the commands related to Moabites here shortly, and that will stem back to what happened at Peor with the sexual immorality there just a couple chapters ago).

God will also use this principle in the New Testament to describe Jesus as our Kinsman Redeemer. He as the only "close" male relative that could secure the family inheritance on our behalf because none of us had the right to inherit on our own--we were all in slavery to sin.  Jesus bought all of us and redeemed us so that we are rightful co-heirs with Jesus through adoption now (something explained mostly in the book of Romans).

The last point I'll make here is this is one of my favorite passages to point to when people accuse God and the Bible for being "anit-woman."  Quite the opposite.  God gave these women the same right as their brothers (if they had any) to inherit, but gave the responsibility of the taking care of the land and the family primarily to the male relatives.  They were not forced to marry someone else and become part of their family to be eligible to receive an inheritance, but they knew the risk that they faced if they died without having any children themselves, but even so, God made provision for the land to be an eternal inheritance for the family, the clan, and the tribe in that order.  Even if all the members of the family died, the closest relative of the clan would inherit the land.  If all the members of a particular clan died, then the closest relative of the tribe would inherit and God would make Himself responsible for preserving His people as we've seen through the Second Census that we just looked at last time.

Neither God nor His Word teach that women are inferior, but we see that sin has corrupted everyone and everything and from the beginning put enmity between men and women and ruined the perfect relationship that God had created.  The Bible is descriptive in the fact that even God's people did not perfectly live out God's plan and one of their major failings was how they treated women and outsiders like Samaritans and Gentiles.  We don't see Jesus doing this, and we are to welcome women and children and people of all kinds into the Church as long as they are willing to submit to the authority of the Word of God and to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  God will not force anyone to be adopted by Him who doesn't want to be.