Which law is perfect?

[Guest]

I heard Steve say on a sermon that the Mosaic law (specifically Deut 24) is a perfect law. So if we dismiss De 24 then we are saying that God's law is not perfect. I am not sure that i agree with that.

One law came to mind that seems very imperfect - De 22.28-29. That is, a rapist must marry forever the woman he raped. At least that is how i understand it. I don't know of anyone who would enforce that law today.

So which part of God's law is perfect? The 10 commandments? The entire Mosaic law? Some other subset?

[Guest]

I heard Steve say on a sermon that the Mosaic law (specifically Deut 24) is a perfect law. So if we dismiss De 24 then we are saying that God's law is not perfect. I am not sure that i agree with that.

What do you mean when you say, "so if we dismiss De 24 then we are saying...?" Who can dismiss God's law? If God said that it has passed away are we dismissing it? If God has instituted a new covenant, does it follow that the old one was not perfect?

One law came to mind that seems very imperfect - De 22.28-29. That is, a rapist must marry forever the woman he raped. At least that is how i understand it. I don't know of anyone who would enforce that law today.

You are judging God's law by your modern sensibilities. You say that this law is "imperfect;" is that another way of saying it was unjust? If so, wouldn't it then follow that the law-giver was unjust? I don't think I would want to say that about God.

So which part of God's law is perfect? The 10 commandments? The entire Mosaic law? Some other subset?

All of it.

[Guest]

You are judging God's law by your modern sensibilities. You say that this law is "imperfect;" is that another way of saying it was unjust? If so, wouldn't it then follow that the law-giver was unjust? I don't think I would want to say that about God.

So which part of God's law is perfect? The 10 commandments? The entire Mosaic law? Some other subset?

All of it.

Thanks for your comments Michelle. Perhaps my thoughts would be better phrased another way. I think the 6th commandment (no murder) is a timeless law. It is always applicable under every era and in every culture. However I don't think the law regulating rape is in the same category.

So, for want of a better term, the 6th commandment is 'perfect' because it applies to all people at all times. The rape legislation is different because it does not seem to apply to all for all time. It may have been perfect for its time but it is no longer perfect because times have changed. In essence we are dismissing that law which I think is what Steve was suggesting we couldn't do because all of God's law is perfect.

I guess we could group it in with the ceremonial laws. But it doesn't really fit there.

[Guest]

Hi agrogers,

I guess we need Steve's definition of "perfect." Your definition seems to be "timeless."

Michelle

[Guest]

Actually, the example you gave, ag, seems to be a pretty good law! I wouldn't mind if it were applied to "all ages".

The one that troubles me is the one in which in which a woman is "tested" if a spirit of jealousy comes over her husband. It doesn't matter whether or not the wife has actually copulated with another man. All that matters is that a "spirit of jealousy" comes over her husband. In that case, a priest gives her polluted water to drink, and they go through a little ceremony. The priest says to her "Yahweh make you a curse and an oath among your people by Yahweh's making your thigh waste away and your abdomen swell; and this water that brings a curse shall go into your stomach, and make your abdomen swell and your thigh waste away." And the woman shall say, "Amen. Amen."

Then she is given the polluted water to drink, which is known to have the effects which the priest described. If it does, then she is guilty. If it doesn't, she is innocent.

Read the details of the test for youself in Numbers 5:11-31.

It reminds me of the test for witches in the middle ages. Tie her up and throw her in the lake. If she drowns, she is a witch. If she floats, she is not.

In my case, Michelle, I am not judging God by my modern sensibilities.
I am judging this treatment of women by the just standards of any age.
I don't believe Yahweh said these words to Moses in spite of what Numbers 5:11 affirms. I think this test came from Moses' own mind, and that he had mistakenly thought that God had told him this.

[Guest]

Paidion wrote:

If she drowns, she is a witch. If she floats, she is not.

actually, i think it was the other way around- which of course meant that the innocent died too. the floaters were executed.

Here is my authority:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_4 ... re=related

TK

[Guest]

Yep. You're right, TK! I now remember it correctly {not because of the YouTube video }

It appears that the wife of a jealous husband among the early Hebrews had a better chance at survival (although a slim one) with the Mosaic test than medieval witches did with the drowning test.

[Guest]

Paidion,

You wrote:

"Then she is given the polluted water to drink, which is known to have the effects which the priest described."

I think you are misunderstanding the ordeal of jealousy. You are assuming that drinking water with dust from the floor added to it will ordinarily cause a person's belly to swell and thigh to rot, and that it would be the exception if these results failed to occur. I do not think this is the case, and it could easily be tested. My children ingested a fair amount of dirt as they were growing up, and I do not remember these symptoms ever arising.

In fact, I believe the actions of the ordeal were symbolic in nature, and the symptoms, if they arose, were supernaturally brought on as a result of the curse of Yahweh, which was invoked upon her, if she was guilty. Thus there is no parallel to the witch trials, and there is nothing particularly unkind to the woman in the ordeal (except the momentary unpleasantness of drinking water with a bit of dust in it). If the woman was innocent, nothing would happen to her, she would be vindicated and she would not have to live with unwarranted suspicions from her husband. ON the other hand, if she was guilty, then her swelling belly and rotting thigh would be ranked among the least of her worries, since she would be stoned soon thereafter (Lev.20:10). The ordeal simply provided a way to invoke God's knowledge of secret sins, when they could not be discovered by human inquiry.

Agrogers,

As for the woman having to marry her rapist, this seems inhumane to the woman, from the standpoint of our modern value systems (the superiority of which is not a given). In those days, if a woman was not a virgin, she was spoiled for respectable marriage—she was damaged goods, and many respectable men would not want to have a woman who had been thus tried out by others. Thus, the woman damaged in this way, as a result of rape, was assured of a permanent marriage partner, who could not divorce her. She could maintain her purity in that she could have only one sex partner for life (desirable in terms of God's value system), and, under this law, the man who had lusted after her would now be required to love her as well.

In a society like ours, where the assumption is "be with the one you love," rather than "love the one you're with," for a woman to marry a man for purposes other than previously-acquired romantic love seems barbarian. However, it was quite common to marry for reasons other than love in ancient societies. The assumption was that love, if it was to be present at all, would have to be cultivated with one's partner.

Also, in light of Exodus 22:16-17, I personally think that the requirements imposed in Deut.22 could be voided by the girl's father. Thus, if the woman found her rapist repulsive, her father could deliver her from the necessity of marriage to him. Otherwise, this law would give a man, who otherwise had no chance of winning a beautiful woman's love, the ability to force her to marry him, simply by raping her. I think her father had the option of preventing his daughter's being further victimized by the imposition of such an unhappy marriage.

My impression is that the law of Deut.22 does not assume that the woman would find the man repulsive. Though he was the aggressor, and "seized" her (like Amnon did with Tamar—2 Sam.13), her resistance is perhaps assumed to be minimal, since it says "and they are found out"—meaning, "if their sin comes to light"—as if it was something they both were doing, not just him.

When Tamar found herself in this very situation, the occasion of her chagrin was not that she had had sex with a man she did not love, but with the fact that she would now not be marriageable. Thus she pled with Amnon (her rapist) to marry her (2 Sam.13:13). As products of modern western culture, we can hardly relate to the sentiments underlying this ancient custom—where people sometimes married (and stayed married) for honor, not for love. However, our modern marriages do not give evidence of being happier, or more permanent, despite our romantic notions of choosing a mate.

Everybody,

Now as to whether the Old Testament law is "perfect," I think I should have chosen a better word. According to Paul, "the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good" (Rom.7:12). That the law is perfectly just (which I think Paul affirms) does not mean that it is "perfect" in the sense of "complete, mature, and impossible to improve upon." The Old Covenant was not perfect in this latter, more absolute, sense, because the New Covenant was "better" and "more excellent" still (Heb.8:6-7).

[Guest]

I wonder why this "test" of a woman's faithfulness or unfaithfulness was not carried out in later Hebrew times or in early Christian times. Or was it just one of those many laws which were "done away with" with the coming of the new covenant?

I still think it was polluted water which caused the swelling, etc. It was more than "water with a bit of dust in it". It was the dust (or dirt) that was on the floor of the tabernacle over which many bare feet had walked. There was enough junk in it to give it a bitter taste and it was known to have caused the condition described. That's why it was called, "the water of bitterness that brings the curse."

However, even if that were not the case and it was a direct act of God to reveal the woman's faithfulness or unfaithfulness, could God not have revealed it more directly? He revealed a lot of other things through Moses. So why not this?

Besides, there was another obvious injustice in the early Hebrew society, of which this is but one example. Why was there not a similar test for husbands if a "fit of jealousy" came over a wife? The answer is obvious. It didn't matter how jealous a woman might be. In that society, a man could have as many wives as he wished (except someone else's wife) and the woman couldn't do a thing about it. Nor did God say a word against it. The "man after God's own heart" did not only murder in order to have Bathsheba, but he had at least eight wives in all. Besides Merab, Saul's daughter, and Bathsheba, each of his 6 sons had a different mother: Ahinoam, Abigail, Talmai, Haggith, Abital, and Eglah.
[2 Sam 3:2-5].

Not many men were virginal when they got married. Indeed, in most marriages the husband was already married to other women.

It seemed that "playing the harlot" was a terrible sin punishable by death. But there seemed to be no concern about the Israelite man who visited prostitutes. Indeed, Tamar, Judah's daughter-in-law, had twins from a sexual encounter with Judah, who thought she was a prostitute. When he found out that she had "played the harlot", he intended to have her burned. But he didn't carry it out when he found out that he was the father of the twins.

It seems that the laws and practices evident in the Old Testament upheld a different sexual standard for women than for men.

[Guest]

Paidion,

You say that the dust on the floor of the sanctuary was known to have caused bellies to swell and thighs to rot. Do you have any documentation for that? In ancient societies, standards of sanitation were much lower than in our modern world, and I am sure that children and others got as much dirt in their diet as we do today, if not far more. Yet, how would such a diet cause one's thigh to rot? Is there any evidence that this ever occurred? Besides, the dust from the sanctuary floor would be much less contaminated than elsewhere, since none but priests walked there, and only after washing their hands and their feet (Exodus 30:19-21). I think you're stretching on this one, Bro.

As for the "injustice" of other laws, I cannot agree. The laws you mentioned do exhibit inequality in the marital rights of men and women. However, inequality is not the same thing as injustice, unless the former involves the violation of someone's inherent rights (Matt.20:13-16). If a mother buys herself two scoops and her young child only one scoop at the ice cream shop, there is certainly inequality there, but no injustice.

That God had reasons for tolerating multiple partners for men, but not for women, seems obvious to anyone who reflects on the logistics of childbearing, economic security of wives, the disparity in the number of men (versus women) killed in battle, and other real-life realities. We may have an even better standard today, based upon the New Testament revelation, but to say that God's laws were unjust is to place oneself in conflict with Paul, and with God Himself, of whom it is declared that there is no injustice in Him.