Tag: Exodus

Deuteronomy Chapter 31

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Moses is now 120 years old and can’t get around much anymore. I wonder if a mobility scooter would help? He tells Israel not to be afraid because God is going to precede them into the promised land and destroy the nations that are there. We get another reminder that he did the same in earlier chapters to other kings. Also, he reminds Israel that he will not be crossing with them because way back when he hit a rock with his staff and that was an affront to God. Talk about holding grudges. Then he announces, again, that Joshua will be leading them across the Jordan.

So, after announcing that there will be bloodshed and violence and a new guy at the helm, it only makes sense to talk about the law again. Every seven years, at the festival of booths, all of the people will be brought together and the law will be read in its entirety. This is so that the people will hear it and fear God. I really hope that they have the law written down in an easy-to-read place instead of having to go through these past four books where the laws are just carelessly strewn about.

God calls Moses and Joshua, the new guy, to the tent of meeting to tell them that after Moses dies, which will be soon, that the Israelites will start turning to other gods and they will notice that God isn’t there defending them. So, like any 1980’s afterschool special, Moses is told to write a song and teach it to the people so that they won’t forget.

24When Moses had finished writing down in a book the words of this law to the very end, 25Moses commanded the Levites who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD…”

Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 492). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

OK, good news: there is a book of laws. Bad news: it’s with the Ark of the Covenant which likely doesn’t exist, or it’s in a secret government warehouse. Anyway, he tells the Levites that they’re stubborn and rebellious and that he is going to teach him the new song he just wrote. I read ahead, it’s no Lennon and McCartney collab, it’s more like something Jim Steiman would write. Just picture it sung by Meatloaf.

Deuteronomy Chapter 10

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1AT THAT time the LORD said to me, “Carve out two tablets of stone like the former ones, and come up to me on the mountain, and make an ark of wood. 2I will write on the tablets the words that were on the former tablets, which you smashed, and you shall put them in the ark.”

Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 444). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

I try not to start off with a quote out of the gate, but this one makes me chuckle because it’s another callback. If you recall back in Exodus 34 where this is taken from, when Moses went back up the mountain and God wrote on those tablets. The commandments in Exodus 34 included observing feasts, first born males, and the prohibition of boiling a baby goat in its mother’s milk. You know, just like the originals.

It turns out, according to by Twitter/X source, Joel Baden, Exodus 34 was the intertwining of two separate stories. The author of Deut. 10 only used one source.  I highly recommend following him. I have learned a lot from his analysis that I may go back and edit my previous posts to reflect new information.

The next section talks about fear and the love of God as the essence of the law. Their God is the Lord of lords and the God of gods because of course he is.

19You shall also love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 445). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

Remember that the Israelites are about to go into another people’s land and utterly destroy them. I suppose they only have to love the stranger that believes in and worships the same God as themselves. And don’t even get me started on “Circumcise the foreskin of your heart.”

Deuteronomy Chapters 5 & 6

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Moses is still talking to the Israelites and he tells them that God made a covenant at Mount Horeb, not with their ancestors, but with them, the Israelites gathered at that moment. He then recites the Ten Commandments, but not the Exodus 34 version. This is the Exodus 20 version which is the version people are most familiar with.

The section that follows says that the Israelites could not bear to hear the voice of God for themselves, so they asked that Moses relay everything that God says to him. God sends the people back to their tents, and he will give Moses all of the commandments, statutes, and ordinances.

Going back to the Ten Commandments. It is curious that the author of this section used the first set of ten, like he didn’t like the second set. I mean, seriously, would there be such a push to hang them in courtrooms and classrooms if it was list that included Jewish feasts and a prohibition against boiling a baby goat in its mother’s milk?

4Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. 5You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. 6Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. 7Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. 8Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, 9and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 436). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

I’m not sure if this greatest commandment is just verse 5, or if it’s the whole paragraph. The authors of the Bible don’t really seem to do lists. They could really learn from Buzzfeed.

They are then cautioned to obey all of the commands and fear, serve, and swear to the Lord because, as we learn again, he is jealous. They are warned against following any other gods of the people around them because they will be destroyed from the face of the earth. They should also not test the God, because he doesn’t like to be tested.

This chapter is God simply covering his butt. Don’t test God, just obey him. In concert with the previous chapter, just do what Moses tells you to do because God only speaks to him and he’ll tell them everything that God wants. And God wants them to follow every jot and tittle of the law or be killed. That’s a nice place to end these chapters.

Exodus Chapters 33 through 40

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Chapter 33

God tells Moses to pack up and leave Sinai and head into the land of Canaan. God would send an angel ahead to drive out all of the people already living there since he promised this land to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. However, he tells Moses that he will not go with them because the Israelites are a “stiff-necked” people. That is, I learned, stubborn. The people were really upset to hear such harsh language about themselves, so they didn’t get all dressed up with their ornaments.

Moses had set his tent up outside of the camp and God would visit him there in a whirlwind and they would talk face to face as friends. The people would bow to the whirlwind when it appeared. Anyway, Moses expresses disappointment that God will not go with them to the land of Canaan and tries to talk him into it. Lo and behold, God can once again be bargained with and he agrees to go with them. However, nobody could see God’s face and live. That’s it, that’s the bargain.

Chapter 34

I’m calling this the last chapter of any substance and it is quite interesting as we will soon find out. I’m calling this an egregious retconning of the commandments. God tells Moses to cut two stone tablets and God shall write upon them what was written on the first set. However (I use that word a lot in this book), as we will see, the commandments are nothing like the previous set. First though, God has to make his presence known, I guess.

6The LORD passed before him, and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, 7keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

Bibles, Harper . NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha (p. 197). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

Is it wrong of me to laugh at that, “slow to anger” line? Who flooded the globe again?

Moses is told not to make a covenant with any of the inhabitants of Canaan and to destroy their altars and pillars and cut down their sacred poles. That’s because they are not to worship any other gods because God is Jealous.

Do not make cast idols. Keep the festival of unleavened bread. All firstborn males of livestock, animals, and people belong to God and shall be redeemed. No one shall appear before God without an offering. Remember the sabbath. Observe the festival of weeks. Three times per year, all males will appear before God. Apparently God really hates yeast because the blood of sacrifice will not touch leavening. The best of the first fruits of the harvest will be given to God. And most importantly, no boiling a baby goat in its mother’s milk.

So once Moses wrote this all down, he came down…wait a second…I though they left Sinai, but he was back up there again. Anyway, he came down and apparently his face was shining. So he put a veil over his face unless he was speaking with God.

Chapters 35 through 40

The last six chapters are simply carrying out the instructions given in Chapters 25 through 31. It’s the building of the altar, the tabernacle, the making of the priestly vestments, the assigning of the priests, and the building of the Ark Of The Covenant. I skimmed through it to see if there was anything of interest, nope, not to me there isn’t.

I’m sure in Jewish traditions this is all very interesting and has some historical context and stuff, but for the purposes of this reading, I’m not going to bother. I’m actually more interested in the narrative stories and some of the more well-known laws.

A Lot On My Mind

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My mind has been active this week thanks to my Twitter feed, the Bible, and just life in general. Allow me the chance to dump all of this on you right now. Thanks.

The week started off with Dr. Frank Turek tweeting,

Eternity is a concept that is impossible to quantify. As I wrote a while back regarding heaven and hell, eternal reward or punishment for doing finite good or for finite sins is disproportionate at best and immoral at worst. Also, if there is an eternity of bliss or torture after this life, then this life in comparison become but a blink of the eye which renders any meaning here useless to consider. No, this is our one only life. Spend it making the lives of others better by doing good things. Moving along now…

I read through seven chapters of Exodus to come up with Monday’s post, which was comparably short for seven chapters. That’s because in the eleven total chapters from where God first starts giving Moses the laws, the first four commandments and the final seven chapters are all about the care, feeding, and proper worship of the all-powerful God. There is also a large section about the proper treatment of slaves which, if God is all-knowing and all-good, he would not have allowed for the ownership of slaves in the first place. There is one small section that contains laws that make good sense explaining how not to be a jerk, but that’s about it. I could keep going on this thread, but I’m moving on.

I saw a lot of so-called pro-life Christians tweeting about the injunction on the Texas abortion law which got me thinking about gun culture in this country (the US, in case you didn’t know). I tweeted,

How is this perfectly okay? Sure, kids have fire drills and tornado drills, but the latter is an act of nature, the former could be an act of nature or due to human error. An active shooter drill is preparing for the actions of a person who woke up that morning and decided to take up arms and end the lives of children. Think about that.

Announcements:

I only put out one post this week because of all the stuff on my mind. I don’t like forcing myself to write about something in particular when there is so much other stuff going on in my head.

Not that I’ve mentioned it here at all, but I’ve come to a decision on the rest of the Pentateuch. Since it’s mostly laws, I am going to read it through, but I will only be touching on the items of interest that people tend to cite and ignore.

Also, while I have been on a regular posting schedule (Bible posts Monday and Thursday, and the Saturday Sermon), I am going to drop the schedule for the Bible posts. I will still post somewhat regularly, but I need to read other things, too.