Journey de Steve

A&Ds - Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua

2012-03-08T13:20:00.004-08:00

Numbers 22:22-35 - Balaam did not want to go to Balak, which God had told him to do. He flees on a donkey. An angel appears to the donkey, the donkey moves to avoid it, Balaam beats the donkey, the donkey starts speaking, and then Balaam sees the angel.

Deuteronomy 32:8 - the boundaries of the nations of earth are under the care of angels (note, some translations say "sons of God" or "sons of Israel").

Deuteronomy 32:17 - the gods of the Canaanites are referred to as demons ("you offered sacrifices to demons, those useless gods", CEV)

Joshua 5:13-15 - Joshua encounters an angel with a sword the day before he attacks Jericho. He bows down and worships it. The angel calls himself "Commander of the Lord's Army". (v. 14, CEV). The angel directs Joshua to remove his shoes because he is on holy ground.

Joshua 11

2012-03-08T12:44:00.003-08:00

Northern armies form a large alliance and form a huge army. God tells Joshua to not be afraid and that when the army is destroyed, Joshua must cripple their horses and burn their chariots. Joshua defeats the army and does this before going on another city-after-city rampage.

No other kings made peace with Joshua, just the Gibeonites.

The chapter concludes by saying that the entire land had been conquered and the land finally had rest from war.

The remaining chapters of Joshua speak of how the land was divided among the Israelites and catalogs the cities that were destroyed and are yet to be destroyed.

Joshua 10

2012-03-08T12:44:00.001-08:00

The surrender of the Gibeonites does not sit well with the locals. The kings of 5 Amorite cities (including Hebron and Jerusalem) gather together and attack Gibeon, who calls for aid from Joshua.

Joshua moves his army to support his new allies, but must take on 5 armies at once. God says to Joshua to not be afraid. He moves through the night and attacks in the morning, I read this to mean that he attacks around dawn before the Amorites have fully woken up.

The Amorites flee and God sends a hail storm that kills more Amorites than Joshua's army did. Joshua also prays that the son and moon be immobilized in the sky. It happens, which allows daylight to be extended.

Woah!

Meanwhile, the 5 kings hide out in a cave. When they are found, Joshua orders a large rock and sentries posted by the cave until the battle is over. After the battle, Joshua returns to the cave and has each king impaled on a pole and displayed until evening. Gross. Vlad Dracula did that a lot too, but he would leave the bodies displayed for longer. I assume that Joshua has them taken down by evening because of the Mosiac code provision that a person is cursed if they are hung from a tree after sunset.

Joshua then goes on a rampage, taking city after city until the entire region is conquered. Afterwards, he goes back to camp at Gilgal.

Joshua 9

2012-03-08T12:43:00.001-08:00

The remaining cities in the Promised Land tremble in fear at what happened at Jericho and Ai. One of whom, the Gibeonites hatch, a plan to save themselves.

They bring gifts to the Israelites and say that they are from a very far off land and do no mention they live in Gibeon, one of the cities slated to be destroyed. They request from Joshua a peace truce, which he gives them but without first consulting God.

A few days later, the Israelites discover the ruse, but they honor the arrangement in that the Israelites will not kill them, but they will forever be servants of the Israelites. They "are still there to this day", as of the writing of Joshua 9.

Compare and contrast what happened with Rahab - it is quite possible that God would have let the Gibeonites surrender without the ruse. Rahab's entire family was saved based on her actions. Could an entire city have been spared? I think it would have been likely, at least for the inhabitants, if not their property.

Also, the Gibeonites make a comment that they believe that God promised the land to Moses and that's why the Israelites are winning the battles and having miracles. In short, they recognize the supremacy of God over their local deities. So, why don't they say "we will no longer serve Baal, we want to serve your God, Joshua.". I don't know if they considered as a possibility.

Joshua 6-8

2012-03-07T19:36:00.001-08:00

Joshua 6

God orders Joshua to march his men around Jericho once a day for 6 days. They are not to say a single word while the priests carry the Ark and blow trumpets. On the 7th day, they march around it 7 times, then shout, and the wall collapses.

The story is famous - but huh?! Why does God want this? I don't know why, but this whole process would build fear in the people of Jericho and other local cities.

It also straddles the sabbath on one point. If they march for 7 days, then one of those days would have been the sabbath. We are not told which one it is, but it is possible that it is actually the final day in which the walls collapse. Regardless, (1) they are told to do this work on the sabbath, and (2) warfare might be an appropriate exception for the sabbath, since after all, it is not "ordinary work".

Back to the story, the whole city is burned and destroyed. All the gold and silver goes to God's treasury. Rahab and here family is sparred from destruction. Everything else must be burned.

Joshua 7

One of the Israelites kept a few items from Jericho for himself, Achan. Uh oh. God is angry.

The Israelites head off to the next town to conquer, Ai. The spies report that it is lightly defended on only a small portion of the army is needed to defeat Ai. This is actually interesting as it shows that the Israelites have confidence in God. The walls of Jericho falling down made a strong impression on everyone.

The Israelites attack and are soundly beaten. Joshua falls on the ground and laments. Remember, he was promised never to lose any battles, plus here the people show confidence in God, but God does not deliver.

God explains that the defeat was because the Israelites have sinned and took items from Jericho. Now, the destruction of Jericho is aimed at the Israelites.

We're not told exactly how it happens, but the tribe, clan, and family of Achan is singled out as the culprit. He confesses what happens and the Israelites find the items of Jericho in his tent. All this for a robe, silver, and gold.

They then stone Achan and his entire family and destroy all his possessions. woah. Is this an over-reaction? What about the children not being punished for their parents sins? Well, this whole Canaanite war was a major exception to that rule and the stuff in Jericho was supposed to be destroyed (and Rahab's family was an exception to that rule). Taking items from Jericho seemed to have brought the punishment of Jericho to the man and his family.

Joshua 8

The return to Ai. There is no miraculous wall falling down, but rather an impressive military strategy. Also, they are allowed to keep the plunder of this city.

Joshua secretly puts 5,000 men hiding behind the town. The Israelites attack, pretend to be beaten, and fall back. The men of Ai chase them, at which point Joshua signals to the hidden men to take the city, which they do. Ai is completely destroyed and becomes a pile of ruins.

Interesting, the word Ai means "ruins".

The chapter ends with Israel assembling on the two mountains and reading the blessings and curses, as Moses had told them to do.

Joshua 4-5

2012-03-07T19:35:00.001-08:00

Joshua 4

Joshua sets up a pile of 12 stones at the camp sight and where the priests held the Ark as they crossed the river. I wonder if these stones are still there. I imagine there would be a problem of people throughout the centuries setting up stone memorials like this, so finding the original ones could be impossible.

Crossing the Jordan river elevated Joshua in the eyes of the people and it confirmed God was with Joshua.

As soon as the priests come out of the riverbed, the water returned to normal.

Joshua 5

Crossing the river had a paralyzing effect on the Amorites and the Canaanites. This was expected from what we know about Rahab.

So, are going to take Jericho yet? Nope. Not even close. First, the soldiers must be circumcised. On one hand, this makes sense that God wants these people to be circumcised. Remember Moses' kids not being circumcised and how God was going to kill Moses for it? God cannot use the people if they are not circumcised.

But the timing from a military perspective is - huh? Now? Remember the story of Simeon and Dinah? Men cannot fight if they have recently been circumcised. In that regard, this is a completely foolish act. But it also forces them to rely on God to fight their battle.

But verse 8 says they rested in the camp until they were healed. Phew.

Meanwhile, the Israelites celebrate Passover, the first Passover in the Promised Land. Likewise, they eat of the crops of the land and manna shuts off, never to be seen again.

Finally, Joshua is by himself and sees a man standing with a sword. It turns out to be an angel, specifically the Commander of the Lord's Army. Is this Jesus? I think some Christian commentators say yes, I personally am not 100% convinced of that, but I am sympathetic to this idea. First, Joshua is commanded to remove his shows because he is in the presence of holiness. Contrast this with other angelic counters, and not all angels have this effect. Further, looking ahead to Revelations, I personally think the White Horse and Rider, which is a warrior, depict Jesus.

But regardless, this angelic being only has one command for Joshua - take off your sandals for the ground is holy.

This is the first angelic encounter since Numbers (the story of Baleem and the donkey).

So, what's the purpose of this? My sense is that it was to encourage Joshua because in the next chapter, they begin their assault on Jericho. It is also his first battle as leader without Moses being around. So, he's probably feeling apprehensive at this moment.

Joshua 1-3

2012-03-07T19:34:00.000-08:00

Joshua 1

God tells Joshua that he will succeed in taking Canaan, but only if he follows the entire law faithfully. In fact, It seems to suggest that Joshua will never lose any battles (I think he loses one).

Joshua tells the Israelites that they will cross the Jordan river in 3 days. The warriors from Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh must come as they promised as well. They even tell Joshua that they will put to death anyone who disobeys Joshua's order.

Joshua 2

Meanwhile, Joshua sent out 2 spies to scout out the land around Jericho. They "visit" a prostitute named Rahab at Jericho. The king of Jericho finds out about this and tells Rahab to give them up. However, she hides them on the roof of her home and lies to the king, saying that they moved on.

(ethical question - are lies during warfare, particularly spying or hiding people, OK? For after all, two of the 10 commandments (murder and no work on the sabbath) are about to be broken by Joshua himself)

Back to the story, Rahab tells the spies that people live in fear after hearing that they crossed the Red Sea on dry land and they have already conquered several local kingdoms. She makes the spies swear that she and her family will be protected. Later on, God honors this agreement, which shows that God actually changed His mind about killing everyone.

The men tell Rahab to keep a scarlet rope outside of the window and that when the invasion comes, her family must be in her home. They hide out in the hills while the men of Jericho search for them, but then make their way back to Joshua, who still is across the Jordan river.

Joshua 3

The Israelite camp has moved to next to the Jordan river and it is time to cross the river. The Levite priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant move first and the people are instructed to hold off about a 1/2 mile. It is harvest season and the banks of the Jordan river overflow with water, but as soon as it touches the feet of the priests carrying the Ark, the water shuts off upriver and the whole riverbed becomes dry. The people pass over on dry land. He water did not entirely turn off, but rather backed up upriver, like a miraculous dam.

This has analogies to Moses crossing the Red Sea. But a few differences, 1. No one died, 2. Aquaman's staff played a similar role to the Ark of the Covenant, which did not yet exist, 3. A miraculous dam did this, as opposed to wind.

Some of the Israelites crossing the Jordan may have remembered crossing the Rex Sea 40 years earlier. But hearing about the water backing up upriver also would have had a chilling effect on the inhabitants of Jericho because according to Rahab, crossing the Red Sea was one of the reasons they feared the Israelites.

Deuteronomy 31-34

2012-03-07T19:30:00.000-08:00

Moses knows his death is imminent. These chapters cover the last few hours of his life. He has a lot to say.

He tells the people to be courageous and singles out Joshua in front of the crowd as the next leader.

A new instruction - when they release the debts every 7 years, they have to read out to the people what's in the book that Moses wrote, ie., the Mosiac law stuff.

God assembles Moses and Joshua in front of the tabernacle where God appears as pilar of cloud. God tells Moses the people will fall away gives Moses a song which the people are to know. The song is actually quite harsh and full of bad things that will happen (Chapter 32).

In chapter 33, Moses blesses the 12 tribes of Israel in a similar fashion to when Jacob gave individual blessings to his 12 sons.

In chapter 34, Moses climbs to the peak of a local mountain and God shows him all the promised land. Afterwards, he dies and God buries him in the land of Moab, but no human knows where exactly Moses is buried. He was 120 years old, but was strong and had good eyesight.

Moses' successor Joshua is full of the spirit of wisdom.

Thus ends Deuteronomy.

Deuteronomy 29-30

2012-03-03T06:23:00.000-08:00

Once again, the blessings of the covenant and problems they would face if they should fall away.

Chapter 29 ends with an interesting statement - God has secrets that no one knows, but they are not accountable to what they don't know. They are only accountable to what has been revealed to them. Could this be the first implicit reference to Christ or the Trinity (aside from the "let us create" from Genesis)...I think so. Plus it is also means there is far more about God than we can possibly imagine.

Chapter 30 outlines that they will have a chance to return to God should they be exiled and banished. Looking forward into history, is this a reference to returning from the Babylonian captivity? Or the "Lost 10 Tribes" of Israel? It has elements of the former. It also has elements of Christianity going to the Gentiles, and in essence, reclaiming the "Lost 10".

What struck me while reading the promises of fortune is that Christianity helped preserve Western European culture during the Middle Ages. Within a relatively short span, Christianity was spread worldwide through the colonial empires of the Portuguese, Spanish, French, Dutch, Belgian, and English. Likewise, in Eastern Europe, Christianity spread through Eurasia and the Caucuses, and the Russians took it across northern Asia.

Now, Europeans fought brutal wars amongst themselves all that time and were harsh on the natives the encountered. But it seems that God used these messy Europeans to fulfill a lot of these promises in Deuteronomy.

Just something that occurred to me. I see parallels in Deuteronomy to what happened in history.

Deuteronomy 27-28

2012-03-02T17:07:00.000-08:00

Deuteronomy 27

After they cross the Jordan, they must set up on altar on Mount Ebal using uncut stones. Earlier back in Exodus they made a similar altar.

Afterwards, half of the tribes will assemble on Mount Ebal and pronounce curses for following away from God while the other half assembles on Mount Gerizim and pronounces blessings.

The curses are actually list of things to avoid with an emphasis on social justice and prohibitions against murder, sex with family members, although the list starts with a prohibition against idols.

We don't get a list of blessings that the people must say on Mount Gerizim.

Deuteronomy 28

The chapter outlines many of the similar blessings and curses we have seen before, but this emphasizes the consequence of falling away. If they obey God, they will defeat their enemies and have lushes crops. Whereas if they disobey God, their crops will fall short, disease will strike them, their enemies will ravage the land, their children sold into slavery, etc...and it gets worse, including a discussion of human cannibalism.

Yikes.

In a nutshell, their civilization will collapse.

Deuteronomy 24-26

2012-03-01T15:08:00.000-08:00

Deuteronomy 24

The social rules continue, but these are more familiar.

It begins with the ever so famous writ of divorce. A husband can divorce a displeasing wife by giving her a letter of divorce. If she remarries, then gets divorced or widowed, the prior ex-husband cannot remarry her. The whole letter of divorce is actually a lot like what our society does, although there are procedures for it, plus it is not gender-specific (I.e., women can divorce men).

Much of the rest of he chapter contains a lot of societal justice of the poor with an emphasis on appropriate security for loans. In all examples (millstones, cloaks), the security cannot be oppressive, affect the person's livelihood.

An important criminal justice rule emerges - people are only put to death for their own sins. Children are not to die for he sins of their parents and vice versa. So, how do we reconcile this with God cursing to the 3rd or 4th generation and that the children of the bad people will die in the conquest of Canaan? I'm not entirely sure, but for starters, this chapter is a social justice criminal code for people, whereas the other events are stuff that God explicitly deals with. Since they are supposed to spare children of conquered cities after the initial conquest (from the rules of war, a few chapters back) I think that God is spelling out here - the death of children will be a rare thing and only when explicitly directed by God. Since the conquest of Canaan was unique in so many ways, it will end up being very rare.

Deuteronomy 25

These are actually weird rules again.

Flogging is to be limited to 40 lashes.

Remember Judah and Tamar from Genesis? Here it spells out that if a husband dies without a son, his brother must marry the widow.

If two men are fighting and the wife of one intervenes by grabbing the testicles of the guy her husband is fighting, you must cut off her hand. This is totally strange on so many levels, but at least it fits the rule that if men have their testicles crushed, they are exploded from the Assembly of God (from a few chapters before).

They cannot forget that the Amelakites are bad people who attacked stragglers while they were in the desert.

Deuteronomy 26

This covers a special remembrance in the first fruit harvest.

It also the special tithe every 3rd year. This goes specifically to the poor and the Levites. So, is this tithe on top of the tithe they are already doing? Or is it one tithe with a different purpose depending on the year? I think it is the latter, actually. Tithes for years 1-2 they enjoy at harvest feasts in a big community pot luck, while every 3rd year, they give it to the Levites and the poor. If this were the case, it would make sense for people within the community to stagger which one they are doing, so the poor and Levites get something every year, as opposed to one huge windfall every 3 years.

Deuteronomy 22-23

2012-03-01T03:43:00.001-08:00

Deuteronomy 22

This contains lot of various rules that we scratch our heads at today. But in a middle-eastern society 3000 years ago, they probably made more sense.

A couple of the weirder ones:

Men cannot wear womens' clothing and vice versa. Now, before you change your costume plans for Halloween, look at all the crazy stuff around it.

You cannot plant other crops between vineyard rows.

If a man has sex with an engaged woman in a field, it is assumed to be rape and he is to be killed. But if it happens in town, then they are both stoned because here consent is assumed since she did not cry for help.

If she is not engaged, then he has to pay her father money and they must marry.

If a man accuses his new wife of not being a virgin, her parents have the right to show the bloody bedsheets before the town. If it is not true, the new husband must pay his father in law money. If it is true, she is stoned to death.

The are a few things that make sense to us, like building a railing on rooftops. Otherwise, this chapter is filled with things that make little sense to our modern Western society.

Chapter 23

The weirdness continues.

Illegitimacy of birth (for 10 generations) or having your testicles crushed would bar you from the assembly of God. Same with Moabites and Ammonites (for 3 generations).

Interestingly, they were not supposed to return runaway slaves to their masters. Did the antebellum US South know about this?

No interest on loans between fellow Israelites.

If you enter another's field of grain or vineyard, you can pick stuff off by hand, but cannot harvest with a sickle or collect in a basket.

Deuteronomy 18-21

2012-02-28T17:32:00.000-08:00

Deuteronomy 18

Priests can relocate voluntarily. They also get a portion of the animal sacrifices as meat, plus share in the first harvest.

God lists out the bad things the local nations do - sorcery, witchcraft, child sacrifice, and communicating with the dead. Don't do any of these.

False prophets must be put to death. False prophets say things in another god's name or make predictions that do not come true. They also are Baltimore Ravens fans.

Deuteronomy 19

Make 3 cities of refuge when they cross over. Make 3 more if they obey God and their territory increases. Here, we see a reference to the promises to the patriarchs plus the potential that God sees in the Israelites, that their geographic scope would enlarge.

Priests vet out accusations of one witness, for non capital offenses. False accusations by someone would warrant the same penalty of the crime that the person accuses of another.

Deuteronomy 20

The chapter covers the laws of war.

Army officers must send away people who are afraid, are engaged, or have not dedicated their homes.

Kill all the entire population of the cities of the idolatrous nations of the land. For other cities, they to spare the entire population if the city surrenders, or spare the women and children if they lay siege.

Trees are not your enemy, so don't destroy the food trees while laying siege.

Deuteronomy 21

Unsolved murders need to be cleansed by breaking a cow's neck.

You can marry women of captured cities. Yay. You can't sell them as slaves if they displease you. Boo.

If a man has two sons with different wives, the son of the first wife is considered the firstborn and gets the firstborn privileges. This was Abraham's situation, but the outcome was different.

Rebellious kids are stoned to death by the community, but first the parents must take them to the priest court. So, parents cannot act on their own.

People who are hung from trees must be buried that day.

Deuteronomy 15-17

2012-02-27T17:05:00.001-08:00

Deuteronomy 15

They had to cancel the debts to other Israelites every seventh year. Obviously, this would impact whether or not they lend money to people. God anticipates this and says that they must not withhold money to lend to poor people because of the upcoming debt forgiveness. The language in the text refers to it as "give" and "giving", which it would be as opposed to lending.

Similarly, they had to release their Israelite slaves after 7 years of work. Note, it did not say that they had to release their slaves every 7 year (I.e., on a community-wide level) but rather it is calculated after 7 years of work.

Finally, they must sacrifice their firstborn male herd animals, but they get to eat them at the yearly feast pilgrimages. Yay!!!

Deuteronomy 16

Passover and the week of unleavened bread have designated places of worship throughout the country. For the unleavened bread, they could not let leavened bread be found in their homes, nor eat it.

Pentacost requires a voluntary offering. They language says they must celebrate with the community, so my guess is the offering is for community feasting at this point. It sounds like a pot-luck dinner.

Festival of shelters is similar to the week of unleavened in that it lasts a week. But it at the end of the harvest seasons and there is no requirement for unleavened bread.

Deuteronomy 17

People worshipping foreign must be stoned to death the gates of town, but not on the testimony of one person. The witnesses must throw the first stones.

The priests get to judge the hard criminal or civil cases and their decisions stand.

Some guidelines for the king - even though there is no king yet. He must be an Israelite, but cannot use his authority to amass personal wealth. He also must read these instructions to himself every morning.

He cannot send people to Egypt to buy horses, because the Israelites are commanded never to go back to Egypt, not even to buy horses for a king they do not have yet.

Deuteronomy 14

2012-02-26T16:32:00.004-08:00

The first half coves the clean and unclean meats again. New things - animals that died of natural deaths can be sold to foreigners. It ends with the no cooking a goat in its mother's milk. I first thought this may have been a pagan practice, but its placement here suggests it's a dietary rule. Who knows. Maybe animals have dignity and this would violate that.

The second half covers using a harvest tithe to attend the various feasts. Every third year, the tithe goes to the Levites. So, are there 3 tithes? Or just one tithe with different uses, depending on the year? Based on this chapter alone, you would think it's the latter.

Also, we see a requirement to use the tithe to drink alcohol at the feast. (v. 26)

Deuteronomy 13

2012-02-26T16:32:00.001-08:00

This covers several situations to prevent being led astray. The response is the same for all.

False prophets - anyone who leads makes a prediction, which might come true, but then says hey lets worship another god. Response - stone him.

Family members who say lets worship another god. Response - stoning.

A village that starts worshiping another god. Response - destroy it and burn aol the belongings of the village in the square.

Deuteronomy 12

2012-02-26T16:31:00.000-08:00

ots of various prescriptions. A couple major themes:

1. People who are ceremonially unclean can eat meat. Phew.

2. The blood of meat must be poured on the ground.

3. Destroy the idols and Ashareh poles of the pagan practices in Canaan,

4. Do not worship God the same way the pagans worship their gods.

Point 4 is repeated throughout the chapter. I think verses like that gave rise to many Puritanical (I.e., anti-Catholic) traditions in the Christian history. Take Christmas for instance, which the Puritans did not observe. December 25th was the winter solstice at one point, which led rise to the German pagan rituals surrounding it. When Christianity became popular and evangelized the Germans, it adopted the celebration and Christianized it as Christmas in part to evangelize them.

So, does once pagan mean always pagan? Well, I think that goes too far, at least based on Deuteronomy 12. It you look at the examples within the chapter of what God is concerned about, they are the "detestable practices" of idols, Ashereh poles, and especially child sacrifice.

Going back to Christmas, it's interesting that December 25 is no longer the winter solstice, it is now December 21. But Christmas is not observed on the 21st, which actually shoes that the Christian tradition has gone a separate path from the original pagan rationale for a celebration that day,

Also, if once pagan means always pagan, then women should not wear earrings. Remember that random versus in Genesis as Jacob was heading back to Bethel?

Deuteronomy 11

2012-02-26T16:20:00.000-08:00

More blessings if they follow God and curses if they do not. Something new though - when they reacth two mountains in Canaan, they are to pronounce a blessing at Mount Geribim and a curse at Mount Ebal.

Deuteronomy 9-10

2012-02-25T13:40:00.003-08:00

The Israelites are about to enter the Land, perhaps even this very day they will cross into Jordan. Likewise, this could very well be the last day of Moses' life.

God explains why the Israelites get the Land at the expense of the current inhabitants. It is not because the Israelites are so great, but rather because the current inhabitants are wicked, in addition to the oath with Abrahams.

We also get a recount of the Golden Calf incident. God was about to destroy Aaron as well, but Moses' pleading to God saved Aaron's life. Afterwards, Moses had to chisel out two new tablets, on which God wrote.

Another interesting tidbit - God is the only name on which they can do vows. They are not to make vows or swear things under other names. I assume God has in mind things like "I swear to Baal that...". But I don't think God wants us to casually say things like "I swear to Jesus that..."

Deuteronomy 8

2012-02-25T13:40:00.001-08:00

God explains why they were in the desert all that time. It was not merely punishment, but rather as a test to see if the Israelites would obey. He let the people go hungry, but it does not sway God let them go thirsty. Rather God provided water from a rock. A lot of this was discipline, like parent disciplines a child. This is an interesting perspective, considering God was ready to wipe them out.

The Promised Land will have the things they lacked in the desert - lots of plants and food. God partly let them go hungry in the desert, so that when their wealth and status increases, they won't attribute it to themselves.

As strange as this chapter seems, I can actually relate to it. In the hopes that some of the things I've struggled with will one day be resolved. For me, it's sports injuries. If I can go an entire year without getting hurt, I will attribute it to God.

Deuteronomy 6-7

2012-02-25T13:39:00.001-08:00

God calls the people for whole-hearted commitment. It sort of restates the principals of the Covenant - follow my commands and I will bless you and give you land. A few things stand out to me:

all the rules and regulations are considered "commands".

They are told to destroy the inhabitants of the land, destroy their pagan poles and idols, and do not intermarry with them. As for destroying their idols, they cannot even take the gold and silver in them, but must through it into the fire. So, could they then take the silver and gold from the ashes after the wood has been burned and the metal has been melted? I would think so, but there is no explicit allowance.

Taking a detestable object into your home brings a curse.

Deuteronomy 5

2012-02-25T13:38:00.000-08:00

Moses recounts the time he was at Mount Sinai with the Israelites. It retells the original 10 Commandments being spoken audibly from the fire. It also says that it was these that were written on the stone tablets.

Interestingly, the Sabbath day is associated as a result of God leading them out of Egypt. Taken to it's logical conclusion, it is possible the Sabbath day commandment would be "Jewish" like the way the Passover is, I.e., a command for them, but not necessarily a "command" for the New Testament era.

Here, the Sabbath is supposed to be day refraining from "ordinary" work. But non-ordinary work is allowed. Again, I think God is putting in place the modern concept of the weekend.

Also, God pushes the families of people who reject God, while blessing those that follow God to a thousand generations. This might give some explanation why the total war in the Canaanifes occurred, notably, why children get killed.

Deuteronomy 3-4

2012-02-25T13:36:00.000-08:00

Chapter 3 recounts the war with Og, King of Bashan. As it turns out, he was the last survivor of the Rephaites, a race of giants. His bed was about 13 feet long, which gives some indication as to how tall he was.

It is a strange story. Who were these people? How is there a race of giants in the Bible? Who knows.

Deuteronomy 4 covers some of the basic principles of the law with a particular focus on idols and that there is only one "God". The is only one God that brought them out of Egypt, spoke to all of them from Mount Sinai, and wanted to establish them as a nation.

It also says the ever so famous, but actually quite controversial - don't add to or take away from the commands that I am giving you. Wait - what commands? These are all commands. Everything in the Mosaic law is a command. It presents a difficulty for us modern readers, which I think people take for granted. I don't know of anyone who still does the entire Mosaic code, so I would say that every Christian tradition has said that some laws are not applicable, but this is actually a warning against doing just that.

On the flip side, there are plenty of good reasons in the New Testament that many rules are no longer applicable. But at the very least, this is a warning that the people under the Mosaic law are not to add or take away rules.

Chapter 4 ends with cities of refugee begin established on the east side of the river. Basically, where they are currently camped. So, before they even enter the Promised Land, people have committed manslaughter or accidentally killed someone can go in peace right now.

Deuteronomy 1-2

2012-02-23T18:23:00.001-08:00

Israel is camped across the Jordan river, but Moses recounts all the details of their previous journey through the desert. Most of this is a repeat of what we saw before, but we find out a few new details.

Joshua was selected to lead the people into the promised land in part because he was Moses' assistant and Moses sinned.

The land they pass through had races of giants at one time. Several races of giants are mentioned.

It is after all the fighting men of the prior generation die before they start having successful battles. Also, it is not stated, but something I picked up - the people stop talking about how Egypt was better. So, God's plan about them wandering around the desert for 40 years worked in the sense that those that reminisce of Egypt die out, leaving their children who were too young, or were born in the desert.

They had to pay for their food and water as they passed through the land of the Edomites (descendants of Esau) and the Moabites (descendants of Lot).

Numbers 36

2012-02-23T18:22:00.004-08:00

Remember the women who were concerned about their inheritance? They're back. They stand to inherit land, but the tribal leaders are concerned because if the women marry someone outside their tribe, the tribal land size might change.

So, a new law. Women who stand to inherit land must marry within their own tribe. This will prevent the size of the tribal lands from changing. However, it won't stop the original lots of land by clan from changing.

Thus ends Numbers. Numbers was about numbers. Two censuses, plus numerous scourges that left thousands of Israelites dead.

From Numbers, we get a sense of the size of the Israelites. If there were 600,000 men aged 20 or more, then we might estimate their total size to be 1 or 2 million. If we take these numbers at face value, then I think we see several things:

1. Why the Egyptians feared them. They are a mass of people.

2. They really are the blessed children of God. They went from 60 people to 1-2 million in 400 or so years. This gives them an explosive population growth rate. At that trend, they'll take over the world.

Numbers 35

2012-02-23T18:22:00.003-08:00

48 towns will be Levite towns. 6 of the Levite towns will be cities of refuge. A city of refuge is where people who accidentally killed someone can be protected from revenge from a relative of the victim. He must stay there until the death of the high priest.

Afterwards, we get a recounting of the criminal justice system - murder gets you death. The chapter ended with some interesting things:

murder pollutes the land and only the execution of the murderer can reverse the pollution of the land caused by murder. This might seem outlandish, but I think it is talking about things on a spiritual level. Plus, back in the Cain and Able story, the blood of Abel cried out to God from the ground (Genesis 4:10).

There must be at least two witnesses in capital murder trials.

No one can be put to death on the testimony of one person.

Numbers 33-34

2012-02-23T18:22:00.001-08:00

Numbers 33 recounts the journey of the Israelites through the desert. We find out a few random details - Aaron died about 40 years after leaving Egypt. The Israelites also had left Egypt the next morning after the Passover, not in the middle of the night.

The recounting ends with them poised to go into the promised land. When they take the land, they have to drive out all the inhabitants or else they will become "like splinters" and God will do to the Israelites what God planned for the Canaanites. They are also supposed to divide up the land by lot.

Numbers 34 outlines the geographic boundaries of the land, plus names the people who are in charge of dividing up the land.

Numbers 32

2012-02-22T10:57:00.001-08:00

he tribes of Reuben and Gad have a ton of livestock and decide that the land east of the Jordan is better suited for it. They ask Moses if they can settle there. Moses gets mad and thinks this might be a ruse for getting out of fighting in the campaign for Canaan. The tribes say they will send their men to fight with the rest of the tribes, but their families and livestock will remain and be protected in the east. Moses is happy with this arrangement.

Half of the tribe of Manasseh decides to join them in the east. The land apparently is the same land that belonged to the Amorites, who the entire Israelites defeated earlier.

It seems that the conquest has begun and the 40 years have flown by. However, we still have an entire another book to read before Joshua's military campaign.

Numbers 31

2012-02-22T06:56:00.001-08:00

The story returns to the military campaign. The Israelites attack the Midianites for revenge for the idolatry and the plague that followed. This chapter answers a few questions from before. First, Balaam (the prophetic guy who was offered money to curse the Israelites, but then blessed ghem) was no man of God. He was responsible in some way for their worship of Baal and ends up getting killed in the war.

It is a campaign of total destruction. All the Midianite men die, but the soldiers bring back women and children. Moses is mad because these are the same women that led Israel to Baal worship. Moses orders them and the Midianite male children killed, but virgin girls are kept alive and distributed among the people. As it turns out, there are 32,000 virgin girls.

The plunder is divided up among the soldiers and civilians, and a portion goes to Eleazor and the Levites, including the virgin girls.

Numbers 28-30

2012-02-22T06:55:00.000-08:00

Numbers 28-29

These chapters cover the timing of various animal and grain sacrifices. Each day, a lamb is sacrificed in the AM and another in the evening.

On the sabbath, they do the daily sacrifices plus an additional two lambs.

The high holy days have precise numbers, plus multiple bulls and rams.

Interesting, if these are all sabbath days, that's s lot of work the priests are commanded to do.

Numbers 30

If unmarried women take vows, they can be annulled by their fathers or future husbands. He has one day upon learning of it to do so, otherwise the vow stands.

Numbers 27

2012-02-22T06:53:00.000-08:00

Part 1 discusses the inheritance laws. Basically, a man's property goes to his son. If he has sons, it goes to his daugthers. If he has no daughters, then it goes to his brothers, and so forth.

This is similar to what we have now, but we removed the gender distinction. Still though, if someone dies, his or property is inherited by the children, and if he has no children, then the nearest living relative.

This all happened because women lost their fathers, but their uncles were receiving their property.

Part 2 discusses the selection of Joshua as the successor of Moses. He is inaugurated in a public ceremony before high priest Eleazor and the entire community.

It is interesting that both of these are in the same chapter. Part 1 is property inheritance, part 2 is a spiritual leadership inheritance.

Numbers 26

2012-02-20T06:06:00.002-08:00

The Israelites stand across Jericho.

Oooo...will they attack and enter? Nope

There has been numerous die-offs since the first, so a second counting happens.

So, a second censes count of Israel is in order and there still are over 600,000 fighting men.

I was thinking about the plight of their lives. They are told they cannot enter the Promised Land. But they win battles, they experienced freedom from slavery, manna falls from the sky....the Israelites have several repeating complaints:

They will die in the desert

Manna is boring

Why did we leave Egypt?

The first is legitimate, I think. It sucks to know the limits of your life. But in the context of their lives, it is awesome. They were slaves, they became free, God performs a miracle every day in the sense of manna falls from the sky...why should they complain? But alas, they do. I think we would kid ourselves if we think we would not do the same. Some would, some would not. Seriously, ask yourself, if the next 40 years, every meal will be free and taken care, but it will only be honey-tasting cake....what would you say?

After a day - nice food

After a week - ok food

After a month - protein, please?

After a year - blah

After 10 years - I forgot the taste of anything else

if this is all about a relationship with God, relationships become monotonous. Monotony of free food, even today, draws out complaints and not gratitude. Trust me, we have firm meetings and the same sandwiches show up.

I don't think complaining itself is wrong. If life sucks, if you are in the wilderness, I think it is healthy to admit it. The problem, and what seems to offend God, is when you say, "I was better off without you, God.". Even if everyone, including yourself, knows that is not true, we might say it anyway.

Back to Numbers. The second census shows that the mass killings have not decimated the Israelite community. Likewise, in some ways, it is a starting over.

But nevertheless, the army is poised to strike Jericho. What happens next?

Side question - and I think is something that affects our perspective during the "die offs", were these people who died "saved". Personally, I think yes, but I recognize that Christians have a variety or viewpoints of salvation in the pre-Christ era.

Numbers 25

2012-02-20T06:06:00.001-08:00

Back in the Israelite camp, the Israelites start having sex with the local Midianite women, who lead them to the worship of Baal. God gets mad and tells Moses to arrest and kill the ringleaders of this.

While all this is happening, man takes a Midianite woman to his tent. Aaron's grandson sees this, takes a spear and kills them. This averts God's anger. It is then stated that there was a plague that was killing Israelites, 24,000 in particular. The plague is discussed in terms of stopping, but we don't know when or why it started. Given the context, it may have started at the same time that God directed Moses to kill the ring leaders.

So, is it fair that so many people die each time the Israelites do something bad? That's an interesting question. In some ways, the Israelite community is like the walking dead, in the sense they have to wander around for 40 years until the generation dies off. But they are winning battles and are not enslaved.

I also wonder if the reason why God gets so offended by "why did we ever leave Egypt" means that while enslaved, they worshipped the local Egyptian gods. Therefore, the complain would have the implicit message, why did we leave the Egyptian gods for this God? That's my theory. I think while enslaved they managed to keep some of their Jewish identity, but as for this detail, I don't remember.

Numbers 22-24

2012-02-20T06:05:00.002-08:00

The people migrate up to by Jericho and a local king (Balak) freaks out. Apparently, there is a prophet of God who is not affiliated with the Israelites (Balaam). Balak sends for him to pay money for a curse on the Israelites. God tells Balaam not to go. Balak sends for Balaam a second time, this time God says go but only say what I tell you.

Balaam instead heads off his donkey to run away. The donkey sees an angel in the road and tries to avoid it. Balaam beats his donkey. The donkey starts talking and asks why are you beating me? Instead of being stunned by a talking donkey, Balaam tries to explain himself. He then sees the angel who tells him to go to Balak.

Whoa.

Balak and Balaam overlook the Israelite camp. Balaam only says what God prompts him. Instead of cursing Israel, Balaam ends up giving 3 blessings for Israel and ends up cursing the local cities. He offers a few distant prophecies as well about the Assyrians and a scepter coming from Jacob. Before we think, "hey that's Jesus", I don think so, because the the scepter is predicted to be a military leader who defeats the local. If anything, I think that pertains to the kingdom and king line of Israel, for after, the Israelites don't even have permanent land yet.

Numbers 21

2012-02-20T06:05:00.001-08:00

Lots of anecdotes in this chapter. God gives them victories over the local enemies, but they cannot conquer their own hearts.

The Canaanites attack and take a few prisoners. The Israelites make a vow that if they win, they will completely destroy the Canaanite cities. This happens.

This shows a lot of maturity on their behalf, because it was against a similar Canaanite raid that pushed them back after they tried to go into Canaan after God told them they would have to wait 40 years.

Later on, they move on from Mount Hur (that's where Aaron died), the people complain, and even say the no-no complaint that gets them killed, "why did we leave Egypt?". God gets mad and sends hundreds of poisonous snakes, which start biting and killing people. The people admit their sin and beg Moses to take the snakes away. God directs Moses to build a bronze snake on a pole, whoever looks at it will be healed of their snake bite.

Later on, this bronze snake becomes an idol that they worship. But more interesting is why did God send poisonous snakes at all? I think God was letting them retaste what Egypt was like. Egypt is associated with cobras, plus the Egyptian sorcerers were able to turn their snakes into snakes when Moses went before Pharaoh.

Later on, the Israelites want to pass through the land of the Amorites. The king will not allow this and instead attacks them. The Israelites win. (victory #2). The Israelites even capture their towns and settle in them for a bit.

The israelites move toward Bashan, who's king freaks out and attacks them. They defeat this raid, even killing King Og. (victory #3)

Numbers 18-20

2012-02-20T06:04:00.001-08:00

Numbers 18

The priests are not going to get land, but they will get the tithes of all Israel, plus they get to eat the sacrificial offerings that are not burned.

Not a bad deal, unless you want land, or if the Israelites stop paying tithes.

Numbers 19 covers the process whereby people who are ceremonially unclean get clean again. A particular emphasis of the chapter is on people who have touched dead bodies. If they do not do the purification ritual, they are to be caught off from the community.

Numbers 20

Miriam dies and is buried at Kadesh.

The people complain about their conditions again. It begins with complaining with water, but the turns to "we should not have left Egypt" and "we should have died with our brothers", presumably referring to the times that God struck down rebellious people.

Moses considers this rebellion and with Aaron goes prostrate in the sanctuary. He really cannot handle people complaining. God says to go speak to a rock and it will bring forth water. In other words, "you're Aquaman, remember?"

Aquaman assembles the people, but instead of speaking to the rock, he strikes it with his staff. God is not happy with this and says that he will not enter the promised land. We find out later that this instance will lead to Aaron's hastened death.

God explains this rationale - God wanted to demonstrate His holiness to the people. Apparently, God thinks that speaking to the rock would have demonstrated something else that striking the staff did not do. Perhaps this would have quelled the rebellious nature of the people of the some way. Another possibility is that maybe the 70 elders who were blessed with God's power a few chapters back would have picked up on this and said, "I don't need Moses' staff, I can just speak to a rock if we need water."

Whatever it was, Aquaman's lack of confidence (perhaps tied to this temper when people complain) is his downfall.

The people Kadesh and try to cross through the land of the Edomites (descendants of Esau). Their king won't let them pass but will send an army if they try to. So they go around.

Later at Mount Hor, God says that is time for Aaron to die. Moses, Aaron, and Aaron's priestly heir Eleazor go up the mountain, but only two return. The people mourn Aaron's death for 30 days.

So, in a single chapter, Moses lost both his sister and brother. Plus, Moses is told he will die in the next 40 years, since he won't enter the promised land.

Numbers 14-17

2012-02-20T06:03:00.002-08:00

Things get ugly. In all this time, remember that every morning, the people wake up and there is fresh manna from heaven. Every morning, they wake up to this miracle which makes their lack of faith in God to help them take the promised land a little perplexing, IMO.

The actions of the 10 scouts incites the fear of the people and they speak of making a new leader who will return them to Egypt. We also find out that Joshua has sided with Caleb and urges the people go take the land.

The people are discussing stoning them when God plans to destroy them with a plague and start over with Moses. Moses talks God from not destroying them immediately, nor to give up. Rather, God plans to not let anyone older than 20 years or older enter the land. The rest will die in the desert. God told Moses to lead them back to the Red Sea. The 10 scouts who incited the revolt are killed by a plague, perhaps the same plague that God had in mind for the others.

Moses tells the Israelites about this. "Uh oh. We sinned, we're sorry. Let's go to the promised land.". After bring warned by Moses not to go, they are attacked by the Canaanites and Amelakites, who push them back to the desert.

Numbers 15 feels like it's straight out of Leviticus. It discusses sacrifices but is interposed between all these revolts.

There is an interesting anecdote about a man who is breaking the sabbath by collecting wood. The last we heard about the sabbath, God was telling them what TO do, not what NOT TO do. They were supposed to assemble in worship and do "non-ordinary work". Collecting firewood certainly is ordinary work for this man, and perhaps even prevented him assembling with the community for worship.

God tells the community to stone this man. He is taken outside of camp and killed.

On one hand, it is easy to see how later on the Pharisees came up with rules to protect the sabbath. On the other, I think God has a pattern of doing what we might all over-reacting when God sets up a new institution that has not fully been ingrained. For instance, the husband and wife embezzlers in the New Testament. Here, i don't think the sabbath culture had not been fully ingrained. Plus, the story is interposed among all other open revolts against Moses and God.

Numbers 16

The next revolt is Korah. He is a Levite who leads 250 people and challenges Moses as leader. They are frustrated that they have not been taken to the promised land and think Moses and Aaron act like superiors.

Uh oh, this is not going to end well.

In some ways, some of their complaints feel somewhat legitimate. "Moses, you promised to take us there, and now we're witting in the desert. What gives?". If that were it alone, then Moses would say, "we were about to do it, but you let the 10 bad scouts incite you.". But it goes a step further, based on Moses' response.

Moses lets God sort this out. He tells them to bring their offerings tomorrow and God will decide who should lead the Israelites. The next morning, the ground opens up and swallows Korah and his followers, even children. Fire then comes out and instantly kills the 250 leaders who went along with Korah.

The next morning, yet another revolt. The people claim that it was Moses that killed all those people. Do they think he's a great sorcerer or something?

God starts striking them down with a plague, but Aaron intervenes and cleanses them the incense from the altar. However, over 14,000 are killed, in addition to Korah and his followers.

Numbers 17

God comes up with a plan of demonstrating who is in charge without killing people. Twelve trial leaders put their staffs in a tent over night. The next morning, the staff of Aaron has bloomed, blossomed, and even sprouted almonds.

Moses shows this to the people, but their response is fear - "we will all die!"

All the revolts and problems seem to really begin with the report of the 10 scouts and their inciting revolt. Things are going relatively well up to then.

Numbers 13

2012-02-20T06:03:00.001-08:00

After 400 years and all this talk of the promised land, the Israelites are getting ready to go in, they send 12 scouts, for after all, none of them has seen this land during their lifetime.

They scout the land for 40 days and return. They bring back a cluster of grapes so big that two people had to carry it on a pole. I don't think this means the individual grapes were huge, but rather the cluster was.

To balance the report, they talk about the people and the cities - walls, fortifications, and giants, descendants of Anak. Plus, the Amalekites, who they previously fought and beat live there.

It was the scouts' job to report on all this, so up to now, the report was fair. What is not is what happens next. One scout, Caleb urges that they can take the land. The other scouts say that they cannot defeat the giants and even go through the Israelites saying the same. Interestingly, Joshua was one of the scouts, but the text is silent as to what exactly he is doing or saying. We would like to think he is with Caleb in this since he replaces Moses as leader, but the text is silent.

Numbers 12

2012-02-20T06:02:00.003-08:00

Miriam and Aaron start criticizing Moses' wife, but this turns in to them complaining that God "only" speaks through Moses. Aaron seems to have forgotten that he is lucky to be alive after the golden calf incident.

Since this comes after the 70 elders prophesying, I wonder if this means that Aaron was not selected in that group. He is head priest after all, but why is he jealous?

As for Miriam, we don't know much about her still. She is reported to be a prophetess back in Exodus, but apparently she wants more.

In the text, it is stated that Moses is the most humblest man on earth, which we can assume is the answer to why God uses Moses and not Miriam or Aaron.

God brings the 3 of them together and ends up striking Miriam with leprosy. She recovers, but has to spend a week outside of camp. After this, the camp moves on.

Numbers 11

2012-02-20T06:02:00.001-08:00

They're on their way to take the promised land when things take a dark turn. People start dying.

At the first sign of complaints, God sends fire around the camp and kills some people in the outskirts. The people beg to Moses who begs to God to stop the fire, which happens. We don't quite know what the initial complaints were, or even if the people who were killed by the fire complained of anything. Perhaps these people wanted to leave or for whatever reason were not fully integrated in the community.

Then the foreigners start complaining about the lack of meat. Soon, the Israelites complain about the lack of meat. Note, they have manna every morning, but this does not impress them. In all fairness, protein is important, so this is a legitimate issue. What is not legitimate is their reaction - "we were better off in Egypt."

This prompts Moses to complain to God. This might be Moses' weak spot actually. God's response is to anoint 70 elders to take on more of Moses' supernatural and administrative duties. Perhaps God had in mind that these 70 people could pray for meat as well. These men feel the presence of God and begin prophesying. It seems to be too much for Joshua who asks that it to be turned off.

After this, God answers their prayers about meat - quail. Hordes of quail come in, the people gorge themselves, and they start dying. I interpret this to mean that they did not follow the rules on bleeding out an animal before eating them.

Numbers 7-10

2012-02-20T06:01:00.001-08:00

Numbers 7 outlines s number of gifts and offerings brought by the israelites. Six wagons are given, which become used to transport the tabernacle. For 12 days, a tribe leader brings his offerings of animals and fine metal objects (incense bowls and silver platters)

We alas hear how God is no longer talking to Moses from Mount Sinai, but rather is speaking from Ark within the Tabernacle. Moses hears God's voice from the curtains. Since this is audible, I wonder if other people (Aaron? Other priests?) could hear God to talking to Moses as well.

Numbers 8 covers the Levite dedication ceremony. They had to shave their entire bodies and offer some sacrifices. Their time of service begins at age 25 and they retire at 50.

Numbers 9

It has been a year in the desert and is time to celebrate Passover again. We also now have uncleanness rules as well. God allows the people who are temporarily unclean do celebrate Passover one month later. All other things about the Passover remain the same (I.e., eating with unleavend bread). It is written, but I think this means they also had the days of unleavened bread feast one month later as well.

This is interesting. It looks like God is not so much about actual days for these celebrations, but rather emphasizes the fellowship of community among people and between God and man.

Numbers 10

They make a few silver trumpets which only the head priests blow. God gives them guidelines of when to blow the trumpets - over offerings, when the procession moves, on the first of each month, etc...

Finally, the Israelites get to move from Mount Sinai. Yay, let's go to take Canaan. Moses' brother in law wants to return to his ancestral homeland, but Moses asks him go stay and be a guide. This would be a normal request, but we find out a few verses down that the God's pillar is their guide, showing them where to go and stop. Does this mean that they had no human guide and the brother in the law returned? Maybe, maybe not.

Either way, the army is on the march. They're heading to the promised land.

Numbers 6

2012-02-12T12:44:00.001-08:00

Nazarite vows!!!!

Basically:

no alcohol,

no grapes or grape products not even raisins

no cutting your hair or beard

No going near dead bodies, even relatives

But these can be temporary as well, however long the person wants it to last. Nazarites can be male or female. So a Nazarite woman probably cannot shave her legs (not that they probably did anyway at that time)

If someone dies near them, they wait 7 days before shaving their head, and then they make an offering to God and reinstate the Nazarite vow.

Samson was a Nazarite and he killed lots of Philistines. So, I guess he had to shave his head each time it happened.

At the conclusion of their Nazarite vow time, their head is shaved and the hair is burned on the altar as a sacrifice.

Numbers 5

2012-02-12T12:43:00.000-08:00

The census is over and the rest of the book seems to be Leviticus part 2

People are unclean by skin diseases, sexual infections, or touching human cadavers are isolated from the camp. There is no mention of people unclean from touching dead unclean animals.

Restitution for wrongful acts to other people must be confessed, returned with a 20% addition on top. If no one is available to claim it, becomes of an offering to God.

The rest of Chapter 5 has something really interesting. If a husband suspects his wife has been unfaithful but has no proof, then they can go to the priests for holy judgment. In a ritual, she drinks holy water. If she is guilty of adultery, she will become sterile. If she is innocent, then the water will have no effect and she can still have kids.

It describes it as the womb shriveling up, which makes me that if she is guilty, it sounds like she will feel immediate pain.

Woooaahh!!! Imagine that conversation. "hey hon, I'm jealous of all that time you spend with Bob, I think you need to take that holy water.". "this is the tenth time you made me drink that water. I think the problem is your jealousy, not me."

Numbers 3-4

2012-02-12T12:41:00.000-08:00

The census continues. This time, the Levite males older than 1 month are counted as well the number of the firstborn sons of all of Israel.

Here, we see somewhat a parallel from the childbirth purity laws. Remember how women were unclean for the first 40 days if it was a boy, but 80 days if it's girl? (what if she has twins, a son and daughter a once!) It still is a weird rule, but at least it roughly parallels the male census count as only boys 1 month or older are counted.

God plans to "redeem" the firstborn Israelite boys that God reserved in lieu of killing them at Passover and switch the reservation to the Levites. The census count shows they are the same number, except off by 273. The difference will be made up financially.

The Levites are organized by clan from the original sons of Levi. They will have specific priestly duties based on their family clan.

The Kohathite men aged 35 or older (2750) responsible for moving the sacred objects of the tabernacle when the camp moved. This process is supervised by Aaron or his sons, lest the Kohathite priests die.

The Gershonite men aged 35 or older (2630) carry the Tabernacle curtains. The Merarite men 35 and older (3200) carry the frame poles. Both of these are supervised by one of Aaron's sons.

Numbers 2

2012-02-11T06:54:00.002-08:00

umbers 2 provides details of how they are to camp around the Tabernacle. Three tribes camp on each side of the Tabernacle, each under the banner of their respective family.

The census is taken by a leader of each tribe, who will become the military leader for that tribe.

The oddball in this is the tribe of Levi. They are not counted in the number of fighting men. Plus, they are the ones that can approach the Tabernacle to assemble/dissemble it. Any unauthorized person who approaches the tabernacle gets killed.

One of the themes of Leviticus was what will happen when the Israelites take over Canaan. Here in Numbers, we essentially see preparations for war to go and take that land. The Israelites need a military organization, which they are getting here. All tribes will have a role to play.

I think this is the key to the distinction between Numbers and II Samuel 24. A reasonably prudent commander of an army would know how many troops he has. For after all, he must arm and position them. So, counting them probably is not David's sin.

Here in Numbers, the decision to go to war had already been made. Of course, it was God's decision. For David, he had not made any decision to go to war at all. Rather, he just wanted to know how many men he had. For what purpose, we don't know. Also, David has a long history of relying on God to fight battles. These two facts, that he had not decided to go to war and that David had relied on God in war many times before that makes it very different.

Numbers 1

2012-02-11T06:54:00.001-08:00

Numbers recounts a census of the Israelites, which was taken a year after they left Egypt. Later in II Samuel 24, King David takes a census of his fighting men. God is very angry with it and sends the angel of death to kill the population for 3 days. The response is so grievous, it makes you wonder if God hates census taking. No, because the entire book of Numbers is one.

Numbers 1 provides a breakdown by tribe of all the fighting men in Israel. There are over 600,000 men.

Leviticus 27 and the end

2012-02-09T20:31:00.000-08:00

Leviticus 27 covers making vows to the Lord to dedicate homes, animals, money in lieu of people. I cant think of anything remotely equivalent today.

Thus completes book 3 of the Bible. We now have an overall picture of the civilization that God started. It looks strange to us, and I'm sure it must have looked strange to their bronze age neighbors.

Leviticus 26

2012-02-09T20:30:00.000-08:00

Lev. 26 is full of blessings and curses for following God's plan. Interestingly, the curses are 2.5 times as must text as the blessings. The blessings really forecast what happens in the reigns of David/Solomon while the curses foreshadow what will happen with the nation of Israel after that. The end of the text on curses ties it back to the land sabbath and in summary says that if the people are destroyed, the land will finally the Sabbath it needed. The curses end with God remembering the Covenant with Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham, in that order. After God remembers this, the people can return to the land after being in exile.

Looking ahead, perhaps the years of the Babylonian Captivity were calculated by God according to the amount of time the land needed its Sabbath rest.

Leviticus 25

2012-02-09T20:29:00.002-08:00

Lev. 25 covers a lot of God's plan for real estate.

Crop fields must take a year of Sabbath. At first, there seems to be no indication that the land Sabbath for the entire community must be the same year. However, when we see the calculations for the year of Jubilee, it seems to assume that every farmer will take the same year.

As for the year of Jubilee, every 50th year is the year and land ownership reverts back to the family of the original owners. This only applies to countryside property. So, the most anyone can rent the land is 49 years, and the price for the land use is calculated based on the years to Jubilee.

Land within walled cities can be bought for pertuity and the Jubilee year has no effect on that.

The year of Jubilee has another effect - freedom of all Israelite slaves/servants. This will be covered later.

The year of Jubilee is also another year that the land must remain fallow. So, if we have 7 cycles of land/use and Sabbath, then every 50 years the land will remain fallow for 2 consecutive years.

God anticipates the farmers' reaction to this and in the text says that land production in the year before land Sabbath will be so big that there will be 3 years' worth of crops. Woah.

As for slaves, we see a bit more. The Israelites are to treat fellow Israelite slaves more as servants. They cannot abuse them and it is temporary. At the year of Jubilee, they are free can and return to their family lands.

As for non-Israelites slaves, Israelites are free to own non-Israelite slaves and are not required to ever release them or treat them as humanely as they would Israelite slaves.

Why the distinction? Well, at the very least, it would create an incentive for the non-Israelite slave to become an Israelite, at least culturally and religiously. As for a modern application to this, in the Christian era after the Gospel went to the Gentiles, the ethnic distinction is erased and we would all be considered Israelites or at least potential-Israelites. In my view, this would raise the bar to remove the harsher form of slavery to all.

Leviticus 24

2012-02-09T20:29:00.001-08:00

Aaron is to monitor the oil lamps all night long. At first glance, that would probably suck. But i think it was common in those days to have people monitor fires in the night because it is so hard to restart them without mathces.

Meanwhile, the priests get to eat the grain offering in the form of bread.

Finally, a blasphemer is stoned to death. It comes off as a harsh and even reminds me of modern day Sharia in Moslem countries for insulting Allah. Speaking of which, we finally get the "eye for an eye" doctrine at the end of Lev. 24. The last thing we saw closest to this was that losing an eye or tooth meant freedom for a slave. Taken together, I think God really hates us intentionally hurting each other. I don't believe this is intended to cover accidental harm, as we saw that earlier.

Leviticus 23

2012-02-09T20:28:00.000-08:00

Leviticus 20

2012-02-07T19:35:00.001-08:00

This seems to be a companion chapter to the prior chapter on unlawful sexual unions. It provides punishments to what we saw before.

Most of them are death penalties. Sex with someone who is on her period just makes you unclean. (phew!)

In modern times, a lot of these are looked down upon and we would consider gross or weird. However, we have largely taken away the criminal penalties, especially the death penalty. Sex with animals might land you in trouble.

Similarly, it covers child sacrifice to Molek. This warrants the death penalty.

Seeking out mediums does not get the death penalty, but rather disfellowship. The medium is supposed to be killed.

Marrying a woman and her mother warrants being thrown in the fire. We have not seen that before.

Marrying your sister warrants disfellowship.

Leviticus 19

2012-02-07T19:32:00.000-08:00

Leviticus 19 covers a wide variety of laws.

I have given up trying to find a pattern among the civil or criminal code. This society lived 3,000 years ago with rampant slavery and in a pre-Christ world. Likewise, I think the only explanation for some of these is to create a society that is culturally distinguished from the others.

Respect your parents, observe the Sabbath, and no idols. These are probably the highlights of the 10 commandments, highlights in the sense they are repeated the most.

Sacrifices can be eaten for a day or two, afterwards, it must be thrown into the fire. In a desert wilderness without refrigeration, this is probably a good idea.

During the harvest, do not reap to the edges or go through a second time, but leave them for the poor. This really is interesting and has modern analogies to our own system of Social Security. It is not a communistic system, as the property owner owns the majority of the harvest. Rather, it is more analogous to a socialistic institution of a bit of tax going directly to the poor. However, the poor have to put in the effort to find the leftovers.

Do not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block in front of the blind. I take this to mean, do not poke fun or torment those with disabilities, even if they are not aware of it (cursing the deaf). Putting a stumbling block in from the blind would be just plain cruel.

Sleeping with a slave is the fiancé of another is bad and requires a sin offering.

When finally see some forbidden plants. The last time was the garden of Eden. When they take Canaan, they must leave the fruit alone for 3 years, the 4th year harvest is an offering to God, but the 5th year and afterwards they can eat. I guess that the sin of the people of Canaan has an effect on the land, including the plants.

Do not cut the sides of your hair or beard. By the way, no tattoos.

Leviticus 18

2012-02-05T07:29:00.003-08:00

Leviticus 18 covers unlawful sexual relationships. This covers the gambit from humorous to just plain gross. Many of these are undoubtedly considered "incest" in our modern culture and are heavily frowned upon today. A couple I want to highlight:

No sex with your half-sister (v.11), daughter-in-law (v. 15), brother's wife (v. 16), wife's sister as a rival wife (v. 18). We saw all of these situations in Genesis with the Patriarchs. Abraham were Sarah were half-siblings, the Tamar and Judah incident involved a brother's wife and daughter in law. Finally, the rival sister wives reminds us of Leah and Rachel, wives of Jacob.

None of these were ideal situations and the relationships caused a lot of problems.

However, verse 9 forbids sex with your sister. Gross. But this would cause problems if one reads Adam and Eve to be the only humans on earth that were directly created by God. Then, all their future offspring would be forced to violate these rules. Likewise, they were commanded by God to be fruitful and multiply, so God is requiring them to break this rule.

A possible resolution could be found in the beginning of Lev. 18, where God explains these rules as being a separate practice from what they do in Canaan. Likewise, intermixed with all the rules on forbidden sex a requirement to not offer your children to the god Molek (v. 21). This would suggest these rules are to distinguish the Israelites from the worship of Molek.

That said, Lev. 18 concludes by saying that these practices defile the land and the land will vomit you out if you do them. This creates a quandary as the land did not vomit out the Patriarchs for doing this, while in contrast, Adam and Eve's offspring were implicitly instructed to break these rules.

I don't have an answer to this.

Leviticus 17

2012-02-05T07:29:00.001-08:00

God outlines that all the sacrifices must be consolidated from the open field to the altar area. Presumably, the Israelites were making sacrifices in the open field otherwise God would not have had to say this. I have a lot of sympathy for this perspective because maybe the Israelites wanted to stay away from that area after the high priest Aaron's sons were killed there.

The text goes on to say that all the blood animals must be drained before they can be eaten. The reasoning - life is in the blood. This I find interesting. As for modern corrolarries, it is common to drain the animal of blood and directly consuming blood is not common. We do have things like blood pudding, sausage made of blood, but blood consumption has become a counter-cultural "Goth" affiliation.

Regardless of clean and unclean meats in the New Testament, I am not aware of any New Testament revocation of the rule or its purpose. Specifically, I am unaware in the New Testament that animal blood does not still carry its life, and hence blood is now appropriate to eat.

The chapter ends with a stand-alone rule about being unclean for eating meat of animals killed in the wild. The consequence is being ceremonially unclean. The cure, which I think applies for all situations of eating unclean meats - wash your clothes and bathe, and waiting until evenng.

Leviticus 16

2012-02-05T07:28:00.000-08:00

Leviticus 16 covers a special ritual for the Day of Atonement

We need 4 animals - a bull, a ram, and two goats. The bull and the ram are for Aaron and his household. As for the two goats, lots are cast between them. The unlucky goat is scarified as an offering, but the lucky goat is now the "scapegoat". It gets spiritually blamed for all of Israel's sins, but then is led into the wild and released.

This ritual cleanses Aaron to allow him to go behind the Tabernacle curtain and be with God. Any other day, this would kill him.

Leviticus 15

2012-02-05T07:27:00.000-08:00

Leviticus 15 rounds out the rules for impurity and cleanliness.

If a man has an "unusual discharge", him and everything he touches is unclean while it is going on. Similarly, a woman who is having her monthly period is unclean and everything she touches is unclean.

In both situations, they must offer two birds, one as a sin offering, and one as a burnt offering in the cleansing ceremony. Since this is a regular occurrence for women, it's good that they only have to offer up two birds each time this happens and not, say a bull. That would get expensive.

Two situations that do not require offerings but they are unclean: male ejaculations and when two people have sex. They are just unclean until evening.

Since the gist of these rules is human health and hygiene, it is tempting to say that is the full limit and purpose. However, Lev. 15:31 cautions that Israelites are to avoid unclean things so they that do not die for defiling God's dwelling place. I interpret this to mean that bringing unsanitary conditions into God's tabernacle would result in death. This would suggest that unsanitary conditions has some sort of holiness downgrade that.

Leviticus 12-14

2012-02-04T13:08:00.001-08:00

Leviticus 12 - purification after child-birth

I cannot think of any modern corollaries to most of this.

If a son is born, he is to be circumcised on the 8th day (we have that). But then the mother is unclean for another 33 days, for a total period of 40 days.

If a daughter is born, the mother is unclean for a total time of 80 days.

Meanwhile, she cannot touch hallowed objects or go into the sanctuary. Afterwards, she must do a sin offering.

A sin offering? Having a child is not a sin, so I suppose it ties back to being excluded from the sanctuary during purification time. Why the 40/80 day distinction if it's a son or a daughter? I have no idea.

Leviticus 13-14 - skin diseases

The text of Lev. 13 provides a long list of situations where skin diseases may or may not be spreading. Importantly, it is the priest that determines if its is leprosy or not. If so, the leper must live alone and his clothes may or may not be burned.

A humorous anecdote in all of it is that bald men are considered clean (v. 40-41)

Lev. 14 gives us a precise ritual of reintroducing a person who has been healed of leprosy. There actually are two rituals, one involving two birds (kill one, let the other free) followed by a sin offering. Leprosy, like childbirth, is not a sin, but this sin offering is required to rejoin the population.

The last portion of Lev. 14 provides us with what to do when the leprosy has invaded the walls of a home. The home is to be shut up for 7 days. If that does not work, then it is to be destroyed. Interestingly, if the home is cleansed, an offering of two birds is required. One bird is killed while the other is released. This is similar to the ritual of rejoining the population for people. Why do the bird ritual? I have no idea. Perhaps there is some spiritual effect of leprosy. This would not be out of the ordinary in the Bible as we see a spiritual connection to diseases frequently in the ministry of Christ.

Leviticus 11

2012-02-04T12:10:00.001-08:00

Leviticus 11-14 covers the laws of "impurity" - clean and unclean meat, child birth, and skin diseases.

Are these applicable today? In what form? Are they merely "ceremonial" and not moral? Personally, I've never been 100% satisfied with the ceremonial v. moral line drawing of the Mosaic code that some modern Christian commentators do. It has an attractive simplicity to it, but in my view, it oversimplifies the Mosaic code because the Mosaic code itself blurs it all without such a distinction.

Let's start with Leviticus 11. Without editorializing, here are the meat rules:

Land animals fit for consumption must have: (1) cloven-hoof and (2) ruminate.

Water animals fit for consumption must have: (1) fins and (2) scales

For birds, we do not get a guiding principle, but rather a long list of things unfit for human consumption. However, a simple reading of the list emerges the pattern, the birds unfit include birds of prey and scavengers.

We get a list of other common animals that are unclean - weasel, mouse, tortoise, ferret, chameleon, lizard, snail, and mole.

If the rationale for these rules are hygiene and disease control, then the precise combinations for land and water animals seem arbitrary. Rumination would definitely affect an animal's disease, for after all, if it ruminates, then it must be a vegetarian. If we contrast this with the rules for bird meat, this would be consistent and we can discern a pattern - do not eat animals that scavenge or are predators.

However, the cloven-hoof or lack thereof seems to not have anything to do with what goes into the animal's body. No, it doesn't. However, I'm guessing at this as I don't know this for a fact, but the ruminating animals with cloven hoofs (i.e., cow) are foregut fermenters while those with a unified hoof are hind-gut fermenters (i.e., horses).

A bit of comparative anatomy, rumination is the process whereby the animal's GI track breaks down the cell walls of plants. This could occur in the 4-chamber stomach, such as in a cow (fore-gut fermentation), or in the large intestine of a horse (hind-cut fermentation).

Does this ultimately matter? I have no idea. I'm trying to figure why the cover-hoof matters other for the fact that it just so happens to fit the pattern of fore-gut rumination.

As for water animals, the scavenger/predator demarcation falls apart. One great example is tuna. Tuna are vicious predatory fish, but they have fins and scales. Likewise, vegetarian sea creatures don't always have fins. An example would be marine iguanas, although this would be included under lizards.

So, what's the pattern? What is this about? There is a general pattern of avoiding predators and scavengers, but it is not completely consistent. There are herbivores that would be excluded as unclean while some predators would be considered clean.

A great indication of the rationale for this might come from the consequence of touching their dead bodies, which is outlined in Lev. 11:31 - unclean until evening. This would indicate that it is about disease control and/ or physical cleanliness. It also fits into the pattern that emerges for purity of childbirth and leprosy.

On a side note, although the Israelites probably did not think like this (maybe they did), there is no consequence of eating unclean animals listed other than touching their bodies. Touching their bodies is a part of eating them. So, I suppose if you were an ancient Israelite and you really wanted to eat a pig, you could do it, but you would unclean until the evening.

If touching their dead bodies made you unclean, then the Israelites could not use these animals generally for hides and leather.

After all the discussion about disease control, we get an indication at the end of Leviticus 11 that is far more than about hygiene:

⁴⁴For I am the LORD your God. Ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy, for I am holy; neither shall ye defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

This would indicate that God views these rules as part of the general requirements for holiness. This would suggest there is a moral component to these rules.

So, let's ask - should these be applicable today?

On one hand, if these are about disease control, plus in the New Testament Peter sees the animals on the sheet and is instructed to "kill and eat". Well, despite Peter's vision, if we really care about being healthy and these rules are given by God, then maybe we should follow them.

On the other hand, I know people who still keep these rules. However, to my knowledge, they do not follow the corollary rules on clean and unclean meats, such as not using the hides of unclean meats (i.e, crocodile purses, eel-skin wallets etc...).

A follow-up question - what about plants?

In Leviticus 11, we do not get corollary rules on clean and unclean plants. There are no specific prohibitions against plant or plant products that we might consider "unclean" today - marijuana, coca, tobacco, or poppy. Tobacco and coca are New World plants, so the Israelites would not have had an opportunity to use them.

However, marijuana (hashish) and poppy have a long history of use in the Middle East. The closest thing we find in Leviticus 11 about potentially defiling plants is verse 44's prohibition about defiling oneself, although it uses unclean meats as the example.

Leviticus 11

2012-02-04T12:10:00.000-08:00