The Ritual of the Wayward Wife and God’s Demands of Society

This week’s Torah reading of Naso contains what might be the Pentateuch’s most discomfiting passage for moderns: the ordeal of the woman suspected of adultery. As Numbers 5:11–31 explains, if “the spirit of jealousy come upon” a husband, he can take his wife to the Temple, where the priest performs an elaborate ritual. If innocent, the ritual results in her pregnancy; if not, in a terrible illness. While similarities between biblical passages and other ancient Middle Eastern texts are often enlightening, it is often the differences that tell more.