The funniest line so far is 12:3, where Moses declares himself the most humble man on Earth. The rest of the reading made up for the boredom of the first ten chapters of Numbers, in spite of a dozens verses of lists.

The Lord heard the people complaining, so he torched some of the outer buildings.

Later, they were complaining that all they’ve had to eat has been manna, and they’d like a little meat, please. That really pissed off the Lord, so he’s going to give you meat “until it come out at your nostrils.” Moses asks how He is going to do it, to which he replies: just you watch Me.

As it turns out, the Lord didn’t do this. Instead, he sent a flock of quails one night, and they made everyone so sick that they needed to dig mass graves for the victims of the Lord.

Next chapter, Aaron and Miriam complain about Moses’ schvartze wife, and this pisses off the Lord something fierce, so He gives the two of them a dressing down, and then afflicts Miriam with Leprosy.

Chapter 13 was about the spying expedition to Canaan. They spies found it was great country, but it was also densely populated, and didn’t see how they could drive out the current occupants. We’ll see tomorrow whether their exaggerations about the Canaanites’ size will be a problem.

Tomorrow: Numbers 14-15