Thus far, it would seem, Israel and Midian had mixed together on friendly terms. Both were desert tribes, both were connected together by old traditions and intercourse, and claimed descent from a common ancestor. But it was now a question of rival deities and forms of faith. The very existence of the Law that had been promulgated from Sinai and Kadesh was at stake; and if Israel and its religion were not to be absorbed into the world of heathenism around them, it was time for the tribe of Levi—the keepers of the sanctuary—to awake. Moses and Phinehas saw the danger, and swift punishment descended on the backsliders within Israel itself. How formidable, however, the danger had been may be gathered from the statement that ‘all the heads of the people’ were put to death. The turn of Midian came next. The Midianite tribes were overthrown, and their five shêkhs slain, one of whom, Rekem, gave his name to the city which is better known as Petra. ‘Balaam also, the son of Beor, they slew with the sword.’ The Midianite villages and forts were burned to the ground, and the captives and spoil were brought to the Israelitish camp. Here they were divided among the people, Yahveh and His priests receiving their share. Out of a total of 16,000 captives, thirty-two slaves were given to the Lord. Henceforth it became the rule that the spoil taken in war should be divided into two equal parts, one-half for the fighting men, the rest for the people as a whole; and that while the fighting men had to deliver up only one share in five hundred to the Levites, the priestly tribute levied on the rest of the ‘congregation’ was as much as one in fifty. The regulation was reinforced by David after his defeat of the Amalekites when his companions clamoured for the whole of the spoil (1 Sam. xxx. 24, 25), at all events in so far as the equal division of it was concerned between the combatants and those who remained at home. The Midianites were driven from Moab and its frontiers. Their overthrow meant the triumph of the priestly tribe in Israel. The war had been waged not against Midian only, but against the allies and kinsmen of Midian in Israel itself. The old relationship between Israel and Midian had been severed on the confines of the Promised Land; the supremacy of Yahveh in Israel had been once more asserted, and Israel had become more than ever His peculiar people. Before they entered Canaan, it was needful that the last links that bound them to the wild tribes of the desert should be cut in two.