14/12/2023
𝗪𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗜𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗠𝗘𝗔𝗡𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗢𝗙 𝗕𝗜𝗧𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗪𝗔𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗜𝗡 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗕𝗜𝗕𝗟𝗘?
The first mention of bitter water in the Bible is 𝗘𝗫𝗢𝗗𝗨𝗦 𝟭𝟱:𝟮𝟯. As the Israelites traveled in the wilderness, they came to a spring of water. But when they tried to drink it, they found that the water was bitter. The word translated “bitter” is marah in Hebrew, and that became the name of the place. The water may have had a salty, metallic taste and was undrinkable in the way that ocean water is undrinkable. There still exist springs in that region with bitter-tasting water. God miraculously transformed the water of Marah from bitter to sweet (𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗲 𝟮𝟱).
A puzzling use of the term bitter water is found in 𝗡𝗨𝗠𝗕𝗘𝗥𝗦 𝟱:𝟭𝟭–𝟯𝟭. As part of the Israelite Law, bitter water was used to determine whether or not a wife had been unfaithful to her husband. This is a different type of bitter water than we saw in Exodus. The bitter water of Marah appears to have had a natural cause, such as sediment or pollution from an unknown source. But the bitter water in Numbers 5 is pure water taken from the tabernacle laver and mixed with dust from the floor (𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗲 𝟭𝟳).
The priest was to write down the accusations against the woman, as well as the accompanying curses on a scroll, swish the scroll in the water, and make the accused woman drink the bitter water. If she was innocent, nothing would happen, and she was free to go.
If, however, the woman had committed adultery, after she drank the bitter water, “her womb shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away, and the woman shall become a curse among her people” (𝗡𝗨𝗠𝗕𝗘𝗥𝗦 𝟱:𝟮𝟳, 𝗘𝗦𝗩). There was clearly nothing in the water that would cause it to taste bitter or cause such extreme physical conditions. The power was in the curse that the Lord’s priest pronounced upon the guilty. It was the Lord’s judgment on an unfaithful wife that caused the adverse reaction.
God often used natural items to bring about sup
