Recap
8 coverings chapters 22 to 24
A.
Overview
Chapter
22 The Reasonableness of the Law of Moses
22.1
The Complaints that are made
22.2
How the Law of Moses came into Being
22.3
The Purposes behind the Law
22.4
Looking at the Ten Commandments
22.5
Looking at the Social Laws of Exodus
22.6
Looking at the Laws of Leviticus
22.7
Leviticus Chapter 19 Misc. Laws
22.8
Some Conclusions
Chapter
23 An Old Testament Hotch-Potch
23.1
Introduction
23.2
Lot
23.3
The Levite
23.4
Abraham
23.5
Jephthah
23.6
Idols
23.7
Midian
23.8
Baal
23.9
Joshua and Ethnic Cleansing
23.10
The Death Penalty
23.11
To Conclude
Chapter
24 Lessons to be Learnt
24.1
Introduction
24.2
Don't Speak from Ignorance
24.3
Don't be Ashamed at Weighing the Evidence
24.4
Check Teaching before Events
24.5
Don't be Afraid to Look Back at History Carefully
24.6
Understand the Law of Choice
24.7
Don't be Afraid to look God's Anger, Wrath & Judgment in the
Face
24.8
Think about the Garden of Eden as History
24.9
Understand the Capability of Unrestrained Humanity
24.10
Learn to Step back and see the Big Picture
24.11
Learn to Respect People & Let Them take Responsibility
24.12
Don't be Afraid to Read the Law
24.13
Don't be Afraid to Challenge the Critics
24.14
And so
.
Appendix
1 to Chapter 22: The Social' Laws of Exodus 21-23
Appendix
2 to Chapter 22: The Miscellaneous Laws of Leviticus 19
B.
Detail
Chapter
22 The Reasonableness of the Law of Moses
Given
the opportunity, the world takes delight in ridiculing the Law of
Moses by picking out obscure commands and mocking them as either ridiculous
or irrelevant to modern society.
The
Law was conveyed at a specific time-space point of history at a specific
geographical location that all Israel
knew about.
Moses
wrote down the laws which God conveyed to him, and this became referred
to as the Book of the Covenant.
The
primary reasons for the Law are:
1.
To distinguish Israel
from all other nations
2.
To establish a moral and social code for the community to live by.
3.
To restore sinners to God
4.
To establish a Priesthood and place for Worship
We
observed key sections of the Law as follows:
The Ten Commandments Exodus, chapter 20
The
Covenant Laws Exodus, chapters 21 to 24
The
Sacrificial Laws Leviticus, chapters 1 to 7
Misc.
Laws examined Leviticus 19 (there are lots more about the priesthood
and worship.)
A
little thought reveals that they are the design of a loving, good
and wise God who seeks for the wellbeing of His people.
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Chapter
23 An Old Testament Hotch-Potch
Here
we pick up specific complaints by Richard Dawkins and use them to:
•
provide specific answers to specific
queries, AND
•
observe the nature of bad arguing
that is so often employed AND
•
provide some suggested guidelines
for dealing with such issues.
The
specific subject covered are Lot,
The Levite, Abraham,
Jephthah, Idols, Midian,
Baal, Joshua and Ethnic Cleansing, the
Death Penalty.
From
this we observe the following lessons to be learned:
•
Learn to distinguish between cultural
practices and God-directed practices, and between human-inspired activity
and God-inspired activity. Don't blame God for cultural, human-inspired
activities.
•
Learn to
•
recognise the primitive state of the
nation of Israel
in the early books of the Bible,
•
recognise the desire of the nation
to hold to God's laws and to be a nation that stood out for goodness
in an otherwise bad world,
•
distinguish between God-directed activity
and the activity of men trying on their own to be righteous and
sometimes falling short of perfection!
•
not blame God for the failings of
human beings.
•
Not get their morals from all
of Scripture. The standard rule of interpretation is don't make rules
out of observed behaviour.
•
Understand that silly people do silly
things, even in the process, sometimes, of seeking to do right things.
•
Understand that because of free will
we cannot expect God to step in and forcibly stop people doing silly
things even though He may speak clearly to them.
•
We need to study the life and behaviour
of nations that worshipped idols to understand the pure superstition
and horror and fear that so often goes with idolatry.
•
We need to come to an intelligent understanding
of how crucial it was that Israel
did not get seduced and overrun
by an enemy nation and be led into foreign pagan worship.
•
Don't pretend that these pagan idol-worshipping
religions are healthy and good and that many of their adherents aren't
full of fearful superstition, and don't be selective in your reading
of the Bible.
•
We need to seriously think about the
reality of life in Canaan
before Israel
arrived, and also about the possibilities open to the occupants before
we make judgmental comments about what happened.
•
We need to learn to see the death penalty
as part of an overall scheme of ethics which works as a fair deterrent
when society holds to those ethics generally.
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Chapter
24 Lessons to be Learnt
The
following lessons, we believe, come out of the book:
•
Don't Speak from Ignorance
•
Don't be Ashamed at Weighing the Evidence
•
Check Teaching before Events
•
Don't be Afraid to Look Back at History
Carefully
•
Understand the Law of Choice
•
Don't be Afraid to look God's Anger,
Wrath & Judgment in the Face
•
Think about the Garden of Eden as
History
•
Understand the Capability of Unrestrained
Humanity
•
Learn to Step back and see the Big
Picture
•
Learn to Respect People & Let
Them take Responsibility
•
Don't be Afraid to Read the Law
•
Don't be Afraid to Challenge the Critics
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C.
And so
The
Law, strange events and people and lots of lessons!
The
Law is not so strange as some people would make out. People and the
events surrounding them are not so strange when you carefully read
what was happening and understand the culture. The lessons abound
if we have a heart to learn.
Perhaps
the most important things to pick up on are the lessons which emerge:
- from Dawkins' careless and apparently
ignorant critique of the Old Testament, and
- from the whole book.
The
range and scope of these lessons suggests what clerics of old maintained,
that casual, careless people shouldn't be left alone with the Bible,
for a little knowledge is a dangerous thing!
However
we wouldn't want to suggest that the Bible be kept from anyone. To
the contrary we would encourage anyone and everyone to read the Bible
in a modern version, and to study it. Don't be casual with it and
don't be careless in what you say about it.
There
are those who read it from end to end, but they are serious readers!
I suggest you take the easier parts first and only then delve into
the heavier sections. The Gospels and Acts are easy and most important
reading in the New Testament, to be read first.
In
the Old Testament, the historical narratives are the easiest to handle
first time out. Try Genesis and Exodus 1 to 20, and then perhaps 1
Samuel. Thereafter go where you will. For those who are determined
to study it systematically, I recommend the daily Bible studies found
on the front pages of this site. There is enough there to keep you
going for a long time. Happy informed reading!
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