The
Case of the Punishment of the Sabbath-breaker (Num 15:32-36)
The second passage that concerns
the determination of punishment for a violation of an existing law is the case
of the Sabbath-breaker in Num 15:32-36. While in the wilderness, the Israelites
find a man gathering wood on the Sabbath, and they bring him to Moses (vv.
32-33). The Israelites had been repeatedly commanded to keep the Sabbath by
abstaining from work (Exod 20:8-11; 31:13-16; 35:2; Lev 19:3, 30; 23:3; 26:2;
cf. Deut 5:12-15). The penalty for breaking the Sabbath was death (Exod
31:14-15; 35:2). Did the man’s actions constitute a breaking of the Sabbath and
hence warrant the death penalty? Two passages suggest so. The Israelites
previously had been prohibited from gathering (לקט) and from cooking manna on
the Sabbath (Exod 16:23-29), a prohibition that would seem to extent to the
similar act of gathering (קשׁשׁ) wood. Furthermore, kindling a fire on the
Sabbath was explicitly forbidden (Exod 35:3), and gathering wood, though not in
direct violation of this command, was suspicious as an act of preparation to
kindle a fire.
Nevertheless, Moses is ensure of
how to proceed with punishment, so he puts the man “in custody” (במשׁמר; v. 34).
The LORD’s guidance is clear: the man is
to be put to death, and his execution was to take place by stoning (v. 35). In
the LORD’s eyes, the man had broken the Sabbath. Even though there was no
explicit prohibition against gathering wood, the intent of the law had been
violated, and the man was held responsible. The immediately preceding context
suggests that this man is being cited as an example of someone who commits a
sin “with a high hand” (ביד רמה, i.e., deliberately and defiantly) and is “cut
off” (vv. 30-31).
The correspondence between the
case of the Sabbath-breaker and the case of the blasphemer is unmistakable. In
both cases, someone is caught in a sin and brought to Moses. Moses then does
not know how to proceed with punishment and awaits guidance from the LORD.
Next, the LORD gives the guidance sought by Moses. Especially noteworthy is the
verbal correspondence between Lev 24:12 and Num 15:34:
|
Lev 24:12 |
Num 15:34 |
|
וַיַּנִּיחֻ֖הוּ בַּמִּשְׁמָ֑ר לִפְרֹ֥שׁ לָהֶ֖ם עַל־פִּ֥י יְהוָֽה |
וַיַּנִּ֥יחוּ אֹת֖וֹ בַּמִּשְׁמָ֑ר כִּ֚י לֹ֣א פֹרַ֔שׁ מַה־יֵּעָשֶׂ֖ה
לֽוֹ |
|
And they placed him in custody until it was clear to them what
was in accordance with the mouth of the LORD. |
And they placed him in custody, for it was not clear what should
be done to him. |
These are the only two verses in
the Pentateuch (and in the entire OT) that contain the terms פּרשׁ (“to be
clear”), משׁמר (“custody”), and נוח (Hiphil, “to place”), which leaves no doubt
that these two passages ought to be viewed together.
One difference between the case of
the Sabbath-breaker and the case of the blasphemer (and the other two
aforementioned cases) is that the case of the Sabbath-breaker does not result
in a legal precedent (see Lev 24:15-16; Num 9:10-13; 27:8-11; 36:8-9). It is
only this man who is dealt with here (Num 15:35), and there are no additional
laws given to declare the guilt of those who might gather wood on the Sabbath
in the future. Perhaps such laws would have been inappropriate or unhelpful
because they could have led to an unnecessarily pedantic approach to keeping
the Sabbath. After all, if gathering wood on the Sabbath is forbidden
henceforth, what else is forbidden? The questions are seemingly endless (The
Talmud attempts to answer some of these questions at extreme length in its
tractate on the Sabbath [Shabbat]). Instead, the lack of a precedent
here suggests that the point is that the intent of the Sabbath law was not to
be violated. The emphasis on the intent of the Sabbath highlights the
importance of wisdom in understanding this intent over against a detailed
listing of additional Sabbath laws. To be sure, additional laws are given in
Num 15:37-41, but they are of a more general nature. Israel is instructed to
make tassels on their garments to help them “remember [וזכרתם] all the
commandments of the LORD” (v. 39), one of which was, of course, the Sabbath.
Indeed, the Sabbath-breaker had failed to “remember [זכוֹר] the Sabbath day”
(Exod 20:8). (Kevin Chen, “Wisdom is Worth a Thousand Laws: Legal Insufficiency
and Exception as Intentional Compositional Strategy in the Pentateuch,” in Text
and Canon: Essays in Honor of John H. Sailhamer, ed. Robert L. Cole and
Paul J. Kissling [Eugene, Oreg.: Pickwick Publications, 2017], 50-52)