Two chapters on rules about the priests — what they should do, and how they should be fed. Every time I read more details about the sacrifices, it seems that the priests keep more and more, and the Lord gets to smell the aroma less and less.

There is some cleanliness instructions about dead bodies. Anyone who touches one, or is near one, is unclean for a week. What does the mortician do?

In chapter 20, a number of things happen. Miriam dies, and gets a half a sentence about her death. She’s Moses and Aaron’s sister, and she gets no obituary.

Later, the Israelites have run out of water, and are understandably complaining to Moses. When Moses brings up the water situation with Him, He gets all bend out of shape and gives them water, but then tells Moses that he’ll never see the promised land. So now we know that absolutely no one over the age of 20 will see it, and that includes Moses.

Later, they ask to go through Edom to get to the promised land, but the King is no dummy, and won’t let the people go through his territory. That’s no shock to me, given how many people Moses claims to have.

Finally, we end with another death: Aaron. Unlike his sister, he gets eight verses and thirty days of mourning.

Tomorrow: Numbers 21-22