Commentaria in Numeros
WITH THE DAUGHTERS OF MOAB—and with the daughters of Madian, as is plain from verses 6 and 17; for on account of this fraud and hurt all the Madianites were slain by the Hebrews, as will be plain from chapter 31.
ISRAEL WAS INITIATED TO BEELPHEGOR—Israel devoted, joined and consecrated himself to the sacred rites of Beelphegor. So the Hebrew, Chaldee and Septuagint. Vatablus translates, Israel was yoked to Beelphegor himself. For the idolater enters as it were into a marriage and union with the idol, especially with Priapus; for he was worshipped by harlot-like union.
BEELPHEGOR.—Phegor and Phogor and Beelphegor are the same; for Baal, or Beel, Bel and Belus (for all these are the same) was a general name of gods, which was determined to some certain one by adding another name, as Beelzebub was the god Zebub, that is, of flies, because, being invoked by the citizens, he had freed the city of Accaron from flies; Beelsephon the god of the north; Baalberith was Baal, that is, the god of the covenant; Baalpharasim was the god Pharasim. So Beelphegor was Baal, or the god, Phegor.
Secondly, Beelphegor or Phegor was he whom the Gentiles, the word being somewhat altered (for Phegor in Hebrew is said Peor, whence Priapus), called Priapus; so teaches St. Jerome, book VIII on Isaias, chapter 25, toward the end of the book: “Beelphegor,” he says, “is interpreted Priapus”; and Isidore, book VIII, chapter On the Gods of the Gentiles: “Beelphegor,” he says, “the Latins call Priapus, and worship him as the god of gardens; for he himself was from Lampsacus, a city of the Hellespont, from which he was driven out, and the Greeks, because of the size of his virile member, transferred him into the number of their gods, and consecrated him in the name of gardens: whence he is also said to preside over gardens on account of their fruitfulness.” The same teach Andreas Masius and Arias Montanus on Josue 13:20, and others commonly. Thirdly, Priapus was called Beelphegor, that is, god of desire, that is, of concupiscence, and therefore was depicted openly, says Arias Montanus on Osee 9. Or he was called Beelphegor from the mount Phogor on which he was worshipped; or rather Beelphegor in Hebrew is, as if to say, the god of opening or of nakedness; for the root pa’ar signifies to open and to make bare. For Priapus, as the president of obscenity, displayed his naked members, as did his priests in his rites. Nay some think that from this obscene god Phegor or Phogor the mount Phogor was named, because he was worshipped on it. Hence St. Jerome, book II, Commentary on Osee 9: “Beelphegor,” he says, “is interpreted, having in the mouth the foreskin, that is, at the top the skin, to show the shame of the virile member.” The same in the Hebrew Names: “Beelphegor,” he says, “is the same as having a skinny mouth,” as though Beelphegor were Baal, that is, having, Fourthly, Beelphegor was the image of a naked man; who had the skin of a dead one in his mouth, by which was signified that there is a remedy for mortality, and that fleeing nature cannot be held, unless through the mouth food and drink supply matter to lust and generation, by which fleeing nature may be held and propagated in offspring, says Christopher a Castro on Jeremias 48:7. St. Jerome, however, cited a little before, says this skin was the foreskin of the virile member, and Ribera on chapter 9 of Osee: “Beelphegor,” he says, “is interpreted having in the mouth, that is, at the top of the privy parts, the uncovered glans.” Or properly Beelphegor is the same as having a mouth of skin, that is, having the glans standing out from the skin, and this seems truer; for Beelphegor was the president and inciter of obscenity. So also John Fernandus and others relate that Beelphegor sat with his privy parts uncovered, to stir up the lust of those approaching, which were so great as to approach the size of the privy parts of an ass. Whence an ass was also sacrificed to Priapus. Fifthly, the worship of Beelphegor consisted in idleness, feastings, revellings, leisure and freedom from all discipline, honesty and chastity. Hence the priests had women, namely harlots, Osee 4:14, of whom the chief was Maacha, the mother of Asa king of Juda, whom Asa removed, and overthrew Priapus, 3 Kings 15:13. Herodotus in Euterpe, and others, recount the most shameful rites of worshipping Priapus.
Sixthly, à Castro and Adrichomius in the Description of the Holy Land, p. 129, and others think Beelphegor to be Chamos: for both were gods of the Moabites, and Chamos is said in Hebrew from kamas, that is, as it were feeling and handling: for he was most obscene; or from kamas, that is, to lie hid, to conceal, so that Chamos was Bacchus, god of the komos, whom they worshipped by night with banquets and unbridled lusts, and hence revellings are called komoi and komoidia, that is, wanton songs and dances. Whence Athenaeus, book I, chapter 27: “In great honour,” he says, “is Priapus held at Lampsacus, who from his epithet is also the same as Dionysus (that is, Bacchus), so called, as triumph and dithyramb.”
The same, therefore, are Beelphegor, Priapus, Chamos, Bacchus, Dionysus; this god, then, the Bacchanals worship, and those who give themselves to lusts. This example, therefore, of the revelling Israelites, and their punishment, which is recounted in verses 4 and 9, may fitly be set before Christians at the carnival. For these were the first revellers: for they gathered together in the fortieth year from the departure out of Egypt, which was the 120th of the life of Moses, 2455 of the world, as I said in chapter 20, at the beginning.
4. TAKE ALL THE PRINCES OF THE PEOPLE, AND HANG THEM UP AGAINST THE SUN.—Vatablus and others refer “them” to the princes, as if they all, as guilty of the crime, or consenting, or not hindering, were here commanded to be hanged. For this sense seems plain and open. Others, however, and more truly, refer “them” not to the princes but to the fornicators and idolaters of whom he spoke in verse 3, as if to say: Take, or, as in Hebrew, receive, that is, call together and assemble the princes, that they, as judges, may command to be hanged against the sun those who are guilty of the fornication and idolatry of Beelphegor. Whence the Chaldee clearly translates: take all the princes of the people, and slay him who shall be guilty. Moses therefore ordered the princes to be assembled here, not as guilty ones to be hanged, but as judges, who should inquire who were partakers of the crime, to hang them, whoever they were, nay even if they were princes. That it is so is plain, first: for it is not likely that all the princes here apostatized from God and were hanged; nay the contrary is established by the fact that afterward Zambri, prince of the tribe of Simeon, fornicating with a Madianite woman, was not hanged but was run through with a dagger by Phinees, verse 14. Secondly, because these princes were judges of the people, to whom Moses says in verse 5: “Let every man kill his neighbours that have been initiated to Beelphegor.” So Abulensis, Eugubinus and the Hebrews.
HANG THEM UP AGAINST THE SUN.—Note: These fornicators and idolaters are commanded to be hanged against the sun, that the faces of those who were not ashamed to commit so great a crime may be exposed to ignominy; and that tropologically this figure may proclaim, says Cyril, book XIV On Adoration, that no one can escape the hand or the eye of the supreme Judge, who like the sun beholds all things, even the secret things that are done in chambers and beds, and that He will bring forth into public in the day of judgment those who sin and fornicate in secret, to the sight of all flesh, as Isaias says, last chapter, last verse, and will exact from them most grievous penalties.
THAT MY FURY MAY BE TURNED AWAY—which otherwise would have raged against the whole people, either consenting or neglecting to punish these filths, as it has often raged at other times. Let Christian princes and judges learn here that God avenges adulteries, fornications and other sins, especially public ones, on the whole people who tolerate them in their assembly or commonwealth, and accordingly, if they wish to be guardians of the people, they ought to punish the guilty, and satisfy God offended and justice: so they will turn away the wrath and vengeance of God both from themselves and from the whole people.