Numbers 15, 16

God hasn't reinforced the need for the Israelites to make Him food in a while, so He launches into the details once again. As usual, it's all blemish-free animals and cakes made of oil. He specifically reminds them to make offerings when they take possession of Canaan, which I'm sure will be any day now.

The action quickly takes a left turn: the Israelites discover a man collecting sticks on the Sabbath. They drag the poor fella to Moses, who confers with the Almighty. God considers the matter for half a second and decides Stick Man must be stoned to death. And that's what everyone does. They stone a guy to death for collecting sticks on the Sabbath. Remember that the next time you pray to God to make your team win on Superbowl Sunday.

The stoning is why when God tells everyone to make fringes on their garments they end up looking like Dee Snyder from 1986. No sense in making God angry.

After Sticky is killed, Korah, Dathan, Abiram, and On gather two hundred and fifty princes and go against all common sense and confront Moses. They feel that Moses is hoarding too much of the cool holy stuff and leaving everyone else with nothing to do all day but stone guys who just want to heat a little water up for tea. Moses tells these clueless bastards that God will decide the next morning who is the holiest among them and, therefore, has the honor of approaching Him in the tabernacle. But make no mistake, Moses is not happy. He demands to know why these men--all from the Levite family, who you may recall God singled out to cart around the tabernacle items--aren't happy with their special status.

You'd think that the Levites, recalling the fate of previous men and women who complained against Moses and Aaron, would just head home. But where's the drama in that? Two guys, Dathan and Abiram, are ready to fight for the honor of carrying even more shit through the desert for an entity no one has ever seen. "Is it a small thing that thou hast brought us up out of a land that floweth with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, except thou make thyself altogether a prince over us?" they ask. "Moreover thou hast not brought us into a land that floweth with milk and honey, or given us inheritance of fields and vineyards: wilt thou put out the eyes of these men?"

You have to admit that they kind of have a point. But the Lord doesn't appreciate a sound argument and decides the next morning to consume all the Levites in fire. Moses begs God not to punish everyone for the actions of a few men, so God does the only rational thing: He opens up the ground beneath the dwellings of everyone related to Korah, Dathan, Abiram, and On, and they are all swallowed by the earth. Then He consumes in fire the original two hundred and fifty men who came to Moses to complain.

Still unable to grasp the punishment meted out to dissenters, the Israelites chastise Moses for allowing God to murder all of those people, many of whom had nothing at all to do with the original complainants. God, as anyone should be able to guess, is royally fucking pissed. "Are you people paying any attention at all?" He asks. "Get you up from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment."

All of a sudden everyone is apologetic, falling on the their faces and praying for God to spare them. Moses, who really should let the whiners get what's coming to  them, at least so he'd have fewer mouths to feed, intercedes once more on behalf of his people, but not before fourteen thousand die. 

Today's lesson: let Moses control the remote.