And Moses said unto them, Have ye saved all the women alive?
Moses spoke these words to confront the officers returning from the war with Midian, demanding why they had saved the women, and the children, alive instead of carrying out God's command. The Midianite women had enticed Israel into sin at Peor, seducing them into idolatry and sexual immorality and wrongdoing. They did this through Balaam's counsel, and their seduction brought a plague on the congregation of Israel.
Because they led Israel into sin, the women were regarded as the most guilty and dangerous of Israel's enemies, and their idolatrous presence among the Israelites remained a continuing danger. Moses' question introduces his command that the captured women be put to death as punishment for their role in leading Israel into sin. That order of punishment also required the destruction of the male children. Sparing those who had led others into sin was a failure to carry out God's command, not an act of godly compassion. The war against Midian to which the verse belongs was God's judgment carried out by the Israelites as his instruments, an act of divine justice and mercy to uphold God's authority and glory, not to satisfy malice or revenge.
Moses spoke these words to confront the officers returning from the war with Midian, demanding why they had saved the women, and the children, alive instead of carrying out God's command. The Midianite women had enticed Israel into sin at Peor, seducing them into idolatry and sexual immorality and wrongdoing. They did this through Balaam's counsel, and their seduction brought a plague on the congregation of Israel.
Because they led Israel into sin, the women were regarded as the most guilty and dangerous of Israel's enemies, and their idolatrous presence among the Israelites remained a continuing danger. Moses' question introduces his command that the captured women be put to death as punishment for their role in leading Israel into sin. That order of punishment also required the destruction of the male children. Sparing those who had led others into sin was a failure to carry out God's command, not an act of godly compassion. The war against Midian to which the verse belongs was God's judgment carried out by the Israelites as his instruments, an act of divine justice and mercy to uphold God's authority and glory, not to satisfy malice or revenge.