Numbers — Chapter 30

aThis verse is labeled as 29.40 in some editions, and chapter 30 starts with the next verse. So Moses spoke to the Israelites just as GOD had commanded Moses.

Moses spoke to the heads of the Israelite tribes, saying: This is what GOD has commanded:

If anyonebanyone In practice, only a (usually male) householder can make vows that are not subject to review. A daughter (vv. 4–9) and a wife (vv. 11–16) exemplify a household’s dependent members, including its subordinate males (cf. 2 Sam. 15.7–9). makes a vow to GOD or takes an oath imposing an obligationcan obligation Or “a prohibition.” on themselves, they shall not break their pledge; they must carry out all that has crossed their lips.dcrossed their lips Lit. “come out of his mouth.”

If a woman makes a vow to GOD or assumes an obligation while still in her father’s household by reason of her youth,

and her father learns of her vow or her self-imposed obligation and offers no objection, all her vows shall stand and every self-imposed obligation shall stand.

But if her father restrains her on the day he finds out, none of her vows or self-imposed obligations shall stand; and GOD will forgive her, since her father restrained her.

If she should become someone’s [wife] while her vow or the commitmentecommitment Lit. “utterance of her lips.” to which she bound herself is still in force,

and her husband learns of it and offers no objection on the day he finds out, her vows shall stand and her self-imposed obligations shall stand.

But if her husband restrains her on the day that he learns of it, he thereby annuls her vow that was in force or the commitmentfcommitment See note at v. 7. to which she bound herself; and GOD will forgive her.—

The vow of a widow or of a divorced woman, however, whatever she has imposed on herself, shall be binding upon her.—

So, too, if, while in her husband’s household, she makes a vow or imposes an obligation on herself by oath,

and her husband learns of it, yet offers no objection—thus failing to restrain her—all her vows shall stand and all her self-imposed obligations shall stand.

But if her husband does annul them on the day he finds out, then nothing that has crossed her lips shall stand, whether vows or self-imposed obligations. Her husband has annulled them, and GOD will forgive her.

Every vow and every sworn obligation of self-denial may be upheld by her husband or annulled by her husband.

If her husband offers no objection from that day to the next, he has upheld all the vows or obligations she has assumed: he has upheld them by offering no objection on the day he found out.

But if he annuls them after [the day] he finds out, he shall bear her guilt.

Those are the laws that GOD enjoined upon Moses between a husband and his wife, and as between a father and his daughter while in her father’s household by reason of her youth.