במדבר, פרק כ״ה, פסוק ב׳

The spiritual downfall of the Israelites did not begin with a sudden desire to worship foreign gods. Instead, it was a gradual descent that started with physical lust and social mingling. The Midianite women took the lead in this active seduction, as the women of Moab were generally more modest [מלבי״ם]. These women took the initiative, seeking out the men in their tents or drawing them out in large crowds [אור החיים]. They boldly presented themselves naked before the men, initiating a state of physical impurity that set the stage for further sin [תורה תמימה].

This social enticement soon escalated into an invitation to partake in pagan feasts. Eating the meat of foreign sacrifices served as the gateway to much graver offenses [מלבי״ם]. Because the worship of the local idol, Baal Peor, typically involved bodily waste rather than animal sacrifices, the feasts were initially dedicated to the Moabite god Chemosh. Once the Israelites participated in this, the path to worshipping Peor was very short [העמק דבר]. Another perspective suggests that the meat feasts were indeed held in honor of Peor; the goal was to encourage excessive eating so the men would produce the bodily waste required for the idol's bizarre ritual [אור החיים].

The final and most severe stage occurred when the Israelites and the local women bowed down together in worship [רבנו בחיי, אבן עזרא]. The primary approach among commentators is that the Israelites had no actual interest in idolatry. They were entirely driven by physical desire and were dragged into pagan worship against their original intentions [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. When an Israelite man approached a woman, she would pull a small idol from her clothing and refuse to be with him unless he bowed to it first [רש״י, שפתי חכמים, מזרחי]. The men bowed specifically to the personal gods of these women, rather than the national gods of Moab, because their actions were completely dependent on their lust for a specific individual [גור אריה, שפתי חכמים].

In this culture, sexual immorality was framed as an act of religious devotion [רש״ר הירש]. Consequently, what began as a careless pursuit of physical pleasure ultimately caused the Israelites to sink deeply into sin, leading to complete submission and total attachment to foreign idols [העמק דבר, משכיל לדוד].