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Numbers 6 - Nazirites and the Priestly Blessing

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This narration is from a previous version of the study and may include a combined recording of multiple chapters.

The person who has abstained from wine is eventually allowed to drink it again. Numbers 6 carries that small but important sentence into its account of consecration. A good created thing can be set aside for a time without being condemned as evil. The chapter then ends beyond the person’s vow, with God’s own blessing. Holiness reaches its goal under His face, not in admiration of our discipline.

After Numbers 5’s laws concerning the holy camp, this chapter provides for a voluntary vow by a man or woman and then gives Aaron and his sons the words of blessing. Numbers 7 will describe the tribal gifts for the altar. The vow and blessing belong together here: the life offered to God remains a life dependent on His keeping and mercy.

The whole person set apart for the Lord (Numbers 6:1-8; Greek/Brenton 6:1-8)

A note on numbering and wording. The study follows NKJV numbering and retains Brenton’s labels. Numbers 6 has corresponding verse boundaries in the two editions. NKJV names ‘the vow of a Nazirite’; Brenton describes a vow ‘to separate oneself with purity to the Lord’ and later calls the person ‘the votary’. ‘Nazirite’ is used here for that familiar biblical category.

Numbers 6 (Brenton).

1: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2: Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them, Whatsoever man or woman shall specially vow a vow to separate oneself with purity to the Lord, 3: he shall purely abstain from wine and strong drink; and he shall drink no vinegar of wine or vinegar of strong drink; and whatever is made of the grape he shall not drink; neither shall he eat fresh grapes or raisins, 4: all the days of his vow: he shall eat no one of all the things that come from the vine, wine from the grape-stones to the husk, 5: all the days of his separation:—a razor shall not come upon his head, until the days be fulfilled which he vowed to the Lord: he shall be holy, cherishing the long hair of the head, 6: all the days of his vow to the Lord: he shall not come nigh to any dead body, 7: to his father or his mother, or to his brother or his sister; he shall not defile himself for them, when they have died, because the vow of God is upon him on his head. 8: All the days of his vow he shall be holy to the Lord.

The vow can be taken by a man or a woman. Abstinence reaches beyond wine to everything from the vine, the hair is left uncut for the vowed period, and contact with a corpse is forbidden even when close relatives die. These are definite bodily practices. Verse 8 gives their purpose: the person shall be holy to the Lord. The body participates in the offering of the life.

Verse 7 says that ‘the vow of God is upon him on his head’. The hair marks consecration, not magical strength possessed independently of God. Samson’s history in Judges 13 and 16 shows how bodily signs can remain while obedience is squandered. Amos 2:11-12 makes another danger plain: those who make Nazirites drink wine resist the consecration God has raised up among His people. The vow is not a license for one person to pressure another into identical discipline.

The wider scriptural thread must preserve differences. Brenton’s 1 Samuel 1:11 includes Hannah’s promise that her son will drink no wine or strong drink. Luke 1:15 gives that abstinence to St. John the Baptist and joins it to being filled with the Holy Spirit. The Greek witnesses use the same nouns for wine and strong drink, but this shared wording alone does not establish that Luke describes every requirement of a Nazirite vow.1 Matthew 2:23’s ‘Nazarene’ must not be equated with ‘Nazirite’.

The restriction concerning the dead also gives a revealing Gospel contrast. Christ touches the bier at Nain and raises the widow’s son (Luke 7:14-15); He takes the dead girl’s hand and raises her (Mark 5:41-42). The consecrated person here avoids death’s defilement. Christ, the Holy One, overcomes death by giving life. He fulfills holiness through a power greater than the boundary that marked it.

A disrupted vow begins again (Numbers 6:9-12; Greek/Brenton 6:9-12)

A note on numbering and wording. Numbers 6:9-12 has corresponding verse boundaries in NKJV and Brenton. The death in 6:9 occurs suddenly beside the person; the rite addresses defilement even when that event was not chosen.

Numbers 6 (Brenton).

9: And if any one should die suddenly by him, immediately the head of his vow shall be defiled; and he shall shave his head in whatever day he shall be purified: on the seventh day he shall be shaved. 10: And on the eighth day he shall bring two turtle-doves, or two young pigeons, to the priest, to the doors of the tabernacle of witness. 11: And the priest shall offer one for a sin-offering; and the other for a whole-burnt-offering; and the priest shall make atonement for him in the things wherein he sinned respecting the dead body, and he shall sanctify his head in that day, 12: in which he was consecrated to the Lord, all the days of his vow; and he shall bring a lamb of a year old for a trespass-offering; and the former days shall not be reckoned, because the head of his vow was polluted.

Death can interrupt the vow without the votary having sought it. The response is a definite rite of purification: shaving on the seventh day, the birds on the eighth, atonement by the priest, and the renewed consecration of the head. The former days are not counted. The cost is real, and the text does not simply declare the interruption insignificant.

Nor should the sacrificial language make the bereaved or shocked person morally guilty of causing the death. The law regulates restored ritual fitness for this vow. Its distinction between the event and the person’s intention keeps us from turning every disruption into a judgment on the heart. Orthodox repentance also needs discernment. A sick person who cannot keep the expected food rule is not thereby a rebel; a person who deliberately abandons obedience should not hide behind the language of circumstance.

The provision gives the disrupted person a road back rather than a permanent identity of failure. Christian reflection can receive that hope without claiming that a broken prayer rule requires this ancient sacrifice. Bring what happened before Christ, seek the guidance needed, and begin the actual obedience now possible. Despair adds a second captivity to an interruption that grace can heal.

Completion at the altar, and wine received again (Numbers 6:13-21; Greek/Brenton 6:13-21)

A note on numbering and wording. Numbers 6:13-21 has corresponding verse boundaries in NKJV and Brenton. Brenton’s ‘votary’ means the person who has made the vow. The reading includes the return to drinking wine in 6:20.

Numbers 6 (Brenton).

13: And this is the law of him that has vowed: in whatever day he shall have fulfilled the days of his vow, he shall himself bring his gift to the doors of the tabernacle of witness. 14: And he shall bring his gift to the Lord; one he-lamb of a year old without blemish for a whole-burnt-offering, and one ewe-lamb of a year old without blemish for a sin-offering, and one ram without blemish for a peace-offering; 15: and a basket of unleavened bread of fine flour, even loaves kneaded with oil, and unleavened cakes anointed with oil, and their meat-offering, and their drink-offering. 16: And the priest shall bring them before the Lord, and shall offer his sin-offering, and his whole-burnt-offering. 17: And he shall offer the ram as a sacrifice of peace-offering to the Lord with the basket of unleavened bread; and the priest shall offer its meat-offering and its drink-offering. 18: And he that has vowed shall shave the head of his consecration by the doors of the tabernacle of witness, and shall put the hairs on the fire which is under the sacrifice of peace-offering. 19: And the priest shall take the sodden shoulder of the ram, and one unleavened loaf from the basket, and one unleavened cake, and shall put them on the hands of the votary after he has shaved off his holy hair. 20: And the priest shall present them as an offering before the Lord; it shall be the holy portion for the priest beside the breast of the heave-offering, and beside the shoulder of the wave-offering: and afterwards the votary shall drink wine. 21: This is the law of the votary who shall have vowed to the Lord his gift to the Lord, concerning his vow, besides what he may be able to afford according to the value of his vow, which he may have vowed according to the law of separation.

At the completion of the vow, the person brings the appointed offerings to the sanctuary. Burnt, sin, and peace offerings stand together with bread and the priest’s share. The consecrated hair is shaved and placed in the fire under the peace offering. What marked the person’s visible separation is now handed back at the altar. The vow’s end belongs to worship, not to self-congratulation.

Then the text says, ‘afterwards the votary shall drink wine’. The discipline has reached its appointed end. This line protects a Christian reading of asceticism, the training of desire through chosen restraint. Abstinence can free a good thing from our bondage to it, so that it is received with thanksgiving instead of being grasped compulsively. It does not make the created thing wicked. Equally, the permission to drink is no command for a person whose health or recovery requires continued abstinence.

Acts 18:18 records St. Paul’s cutting his hair because he had a vow, and Acts 21:23-26 places him with men completing vows and purification. The passages show vows within his life without telling us to reconstruct every detail from Numbers 6. For the Church, such practices remain accountable to Christ, pastoral guidance, and love. A promise made rashly to escape shame is not purified merely by making it severe.

Gems from the Fathers 💎

St. John Cassian’s Institutes, V.5-7, offers a thematic witness to bodily restraint rather than a commentary on the Nazirite. He distinguishes bodily capacity from the common aim of a disciplined heart: ‘And so on the manner of fasting a uniform rule cannot easily be observed, because everybody has not the same strength; nor is it like the rest of the virtues, acquired by steadfastness of mind alone.’2 He specifically considers sickness and age. This helps us receive a concrete fast without comparing another person’s need to our own capacity. The Lord desires a purified heart, not an exhibition of endurance.

The Lord’s Name, shining face, and peace (Numbers 6:22-27; Greek/Brenton 6:22-27)

A note on numbering and wording. Numbers 6:22-27 has corresponding verse boundaries in NKJV and Brenton. At 6:25 Brenton says ‘have mercy upon thee’; NKJV says ‘be gracious to you’. Both renderings belong to the blessing’s gift, not to a merit earned by the vow.

Numbers 6 (Brenton).

22: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 23: Speak to Aaron and to his sons, saying, Thus ye shall bless the children of Israel, saying to them, 24: The Lord bless thee and keep thee; 25: the Lord make his face to shine upon thee, and have mercy upon thee; 26: the Lord lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. 27: And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel, and I the Lord will bless them.

The priests receive words to speak over Israel, but the Lord reserves the act of blessing to Himself: ‘I the Lord will bless them’. Their ministry is neither a private power nor a favorable wish with no divine giver. They place His Name upon His people, and the blessing declares whose care surrounds them.

The three sentences ask for keeping, the shining face with mercy, and the lifted countenance with peace. Peace is more than a passing calm. It is life received under God’s favor and protection. The chapter’s final attention turns from the signs on a votary’s head to the face of the Lord. Devotion needs that turn. Otherwise a person can spend the entire fast watching himself.

The Christian reading is illuminated by 2 Corinthians 4:6: the knowledge of God’s glory shines in the face of Jesus Christ. In Baptism we receive the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19), and Revelation 22:4 brings the promise to fulfillment in seeing God’s face with His Name upon His servants. This is a canonical, Trinitarian reflection, not a claim that the three lines alone establish the doctrine of the Trinity. The blessing draws its fullness from the God revealed in Christ.

The Church’s Voice in Worship ⛪

No verse-addressed reading of Numbers 6 is identified in the Coptic lectionary sources used for this study. Its blessing has a close scriptural echo in Psalm 67 (LXX 66), prayed in the Agpeya at the First Hour, Sixth Hour, and Veil Prayer.3 The psalm carries the desire for mercy, blessing, and God’s shining face into the Church’s daily prayer. It teaches the heart to ask for God’s gift repeatedly instead of measuring the day only by its own success.

Spiritual Fruit 🍇

Choose a truthful restraint. Bring one habit before God that repeatedly masters your attention. With appropriate guidance, take a definite, proportionate step: less compulsive drinking, a limit on entertainment, or a steadier time of prayer. Let the body help the heart become free.

Begin again after disruption. If illness, grief, or failure has interrupted your rule, tell the truth about the cause and seek the next faithful practice. Do not demand that an unchosen circumstance become a confession of wrongdoing. Do not let a chosen sin disappear under the same excuse.

Keep the fast from becoming a mirror. St. Cassian’s attention to different bodily capacities gives a concrete safeguard. Pray for someone whose practice differs from yours, and refuse to turn observation into judgment. A discipline offered to God should make you more capable of mercy.

Receive the blessing as a gift. At the day’s end, turn your attention from what you accomplished to the Lord’s mercy and keeping. Let Psalm 67 (LXX 66) give that prayer its words. The face of Christ is more enduring than today’s favorable or unfavorable verdict on yourself.

Lord Jesus Christ, light of the Father’s glory, gather our desires toward You. Receive our small obedience, restore what has been interrupted, and give us the peace that comes from Your face.

Footnotes

  1. Numbers 6:3 in the CCAT/CATSS Rahlfs-based witness 🔗, compared with Swete’s Greek witness 🔗, and Luke 1:15, Greek text analysis 🔗: the shared nouns are ‘οἶνος’ and ‘σίκερα’, wine and strong drink. Shared vocabulary is distinguished from identical syntax or proof of a complete Nazirite vow. ↩

  2. St. John Cassian, Institutes, V.5, NPNF Second Series, vol. 11, translated by C. S. Gibson, text 🔗. ↩

  3. Agpeya, First Hour, Sixth Hour, and Veil Prayer, Psalm 67 (LXX 66), service book 🔗. ↩

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