Vex the Midianites, etc. - See this order fulfilled, Numbers 31:1-20. Twelve thousand Israelites attacked the Midianites, destroyed all their cities, slew their five kings, every male, and every grown up woman, and took all their spoils.

Vex the Midianites, and smite them. Go to war with them, and smite them with the sword; not the Moabites, but the Midianites, though they were both confederates against Israel; but God had given a charge not to contend in battle with Moab, Deuteronomy 2:9, they were spared for the sake of Lot, from whom they sprang; and, as Jarchi says, for the sake of Ruth, who was to come from them; and so in the Talmud (l); though they did not entirely escape the divine resentment, as appears from Deuteronomy 23:3 but the Midianites were the first that advised to send for Balaam, and with them he stayed and was entertained, after he had been dismissed by Balak; and it seems as if it was to them he gave the wicked counsel, to draw Israel into fornication, and so into idolatry, and thereby bring the curse of God upon them; which advice they communicated to the Moabites, and both were concerned in putting it into execution; see Numbers 22:4.

(l) T. Bab. Bava Kama, fol. 38. 2.

Vex the Midianites, and smite them:

25:17 The Midianites - And why not the Moabites. It is probable the Midianites were most guilty, as in persuading Balak to send for Balaam, Nu 22:4,7. So in the reception of Balaam after Balak had dismissed him, Nu 31:8, and in farther consultation with him, and in contriving the means for the executing of this wicked plot.

17. Vex the Midianites, and smite them-They seem to have been the most guilty parties. (Compare Nu 22:4; 31:8).

25:16-18 We read not that any Midianites died of the plague; God punished them with the sword of an enemy, not with the rod of a father. We must set ourselves against whatever is an occasion of sin to us, Mt 5:29,30. Whatever draws us to sin, should be a vexation to us, as a thorn in the flesh. And none will be more surely and severely punished than those who, after Satan's example, and with his subtlety, tempt others to sin.