How God loves boldness in faith! Zelophehad means “united” and his daughters certainly were.
The daughters of Zelophehad! You know—Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah. They’re right there in Numbers 26:33. You didn’t notice? That’s understandable, except they’re daughters in a long list of sons. In chapter 27, they’re brought front and center. Coming for an audience with Moses and Eleazar, they plead their case: “Our father died in the wilderness…and he had no sons. Why should the name of our father be removed from among his family because he had no son? Give us a possession among our father’s brothers” (vv 3-4). This is remarkable for several reasons. First, many of the men were shaking in their sandals just thinking about fighting those big bullies in Canaan. Not these women! They wanted all that God had for them, and were ready to claim it by faith. Second, you remember Moses’ caseload was so heavy in the wilderness that, at Jethro’s insistence, he appointed judges “to be rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens” to “judge the people at all times” (Ex 18:21-22). Yet of all the cases heard, only two are recorded and both have to do with the daughters of Zelophehad. Here was the problem. Israeli society was patrilineal; inheritance came from father to son. But the father of these five sisters died in the desert, and they had no brothers to run the family farm. Would they therefore get nothing? Moses took the case before the Supreme Court (Num 27:5). The Lord set down the precedent: “The daughters of Zelophehad speak what is right; you shall surely give them a possession of inheritance among their father’s brothers, and cause the inheritance of their father to pass to them” (v 7). Three cheers for Zelophehad’s daughters, and all who possess their possession, too!