

3.52 Summary of Numbers Racial Teachings
a. The fact that Moses married a Cushite woman shows that God did not put a generational curse on all the descendants of Ham.
b. The whole 19th Century white Protestant ideology of superior/inferior races, so far as it was drawn from the Old Testament, is disavowed by the conduct of Moses himself.
c. Likewise all racist rules against inter-marriage have no justification in the Pentateuch.
d. Balaam declared the supremacy of Israel because of God's presence among them. They were set apart from all other nations.
e. In the distant future, a ruler will come forth from Israel and crush the surrounding nations. There is no hint of inclusion.
f. Israel's unique burden and privilege was to bear the Presence of God before the nations.
g. Any inteference in the covenant relationship between God and a chosen individual or nation reaped severe judgment upon the perpetrator: Aaron and Miriam vs Moses, and Midian vs Israel.
h. We note at this point three patterns of relationships with outsiders:
1. extermination of nearby nations hostile to God (Midianites, Canaanites)
2. enslavement (POWs from unspecified foreign nations)
3. guests (freeborn law-abiding immigrants)
-- a few were given full rights of "citizenship" (Jethro, Hobab, Zipporah)
-- the devout were circumcised and allowed to share in Passover
-- other foreigners who adapted to Israelite laws were given legal rights
i. The Israelite religious system was not imposed on non-Israelites outside of Canaan.