This biblical passage suggests that there was a way to determine if a woman was unfaithful to her husband. It also suggests that a man has a right to question his wife's fidelity but it does not suggest that a woman has the right to question the fidelity of her husband.

"Then the Lord said to Moses, "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'If a man's wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him by sleeping with another man, and this is hidden from her husband and her impurity is undetected (since there is no witness against her and she has not been caught in the act) and if feeling of jealousy come over her husband and he suspects his wife and she is impure - or if he is jealous and suspects her even though she is not impure - then he is to take his wife to the priest. He must also take an offering of a tenth of an ephah of barley flour on her behalf. He must not pour oil on it or put incense on it, because it is a grain offering for jealousy, a reminder offering to draw attention to guilt.

"'The priest shall bring her and have her stand before the Lord. Then he shall take some holy water in a clay jar and put some dust from the tabernacle floor into the water. After the priest has had the woman stand before the Lord, he shall loosen her hair and place in her hands the reminder offering, the grain offering for jealousy, while he himself holds the bitter water that brings a curse. Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, "If no other man has slept with you and you have not gone astray and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse not harm you. But if you have gone astray while married to your husband and you have defiled yourself by sleeping with a man other than your husband" - here the priest is to put the woman under this curse of the oath - "may the Lord cause your people to curse and denounce you when he causes your thigh to waste away and your abdomen to swell. May this water tht brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen wells and your thight wastes away".
(Numbers 5: 11- ??)

So, What's Baffling?

It is baffling that the Bible tells us that God, Himself, prescribed this weird ceremony to Moses. This ritual sounds eerie enough to have been taken from a book of "Vodoo", not a book of the Bible. Consider the ingredients involved and the procedures to be followed: holy water in a clay jar mixed with dust from the tabernacle floor - loosening a woman's hair then placing in her hands a grain offering and then burning it. And, to top things off, the woman must drink bitter water containing washed-out curses than were written on a scroll. The curses, of course, can cause the victim's thigh to waste away and cause their abdomen to swell!!

It is also baffling that a woman would have to undergo such a humilating procedure based simply on the SUSPICIONS of a jealous husband, even if the suspicions might eventually prove to be unfounded.

What's even more baffling is the fact that this whole procedure is entirely sexist. In this passage God has given the man a way to test a woman's fidelity, but has not given the woman any similar recourse vis-a-vis the man.

Observation: If a woman lived in those days she had to be very careful not to get her husband jealous!