More Regulations

(Deuteronomy 24:5 - 25:19)
“If a man is newly married, he must not be drafted into the army or be obligated to perform any public service.  He should be free to spend a year at home to be happy with the wife he has just wed.

“Do not accept a pair of millstones, not even an upper millstone, as security for a debt, for that would be taking away a person’s livelihood.

“If anyone abducts and enslaves a fellow Israelite or sells him, that person must be put to death.  In that way the evil among you will be purged.

“In the case of defiling skin diseases, take care to follow the instructions of the Levitical priests.  You must do exactly as I have commanded them, keeping in mind what I did to Miriam during the passage out of Egypt.

“When you make a loan of any sort to a neighbor, do not enter the man’s house to receive what he is offering you as security, but wait outside until he brings it to you.  If it is a cloak and he is a poor man, do not keep it overnight, but return it to him before sunset so that he can sleep in it.  He will be grateful and you will have done what is right in the eyes of Jehovah your god.

“Do not exploit a worker who is poor and needy, whether he be a fellow Israelite or an alien residing in one of your towns.  Pay him his wages at the end of the work day, for he is poor and is counting on it.  Otherwise he may complain about you to Jehovah your god and you will be guilty of a sin.

“Parents must not be executed for the crimes of their children, nor children for the crimes of their parents.  Each must be executed only for his own crimes.

“You must not subvert the justice due a resident alien or the orphan, or accept as security for a debt the garments of a widow.  Always remember that you were once slaves in Egypt and that Jehovah your god freed you from bondage; that is why I give you this command.

“When you harvest your fields and leave a sheath behind, don’t go back for it, but leave it for the foreigners that live among you, the orphans, and the widows, and Jehovah your god will bless you in all your endeavors.   When you pick the olives in your orchards, do not go over the vines a second time, but leave some olives for the foreigners, orphans, and widows.  And when you pick the grapes in your vineyard, do not strip the vines, but leave some grapes for the foreigners, orphans, and widows.  Remember that you were once slaves in Egypt; that is why I command you to do this.

“If two people have a dispute, they should take it to court, with the judge deciding who is in the right and who is in the wrong.  If the person in the wrong deserves a flogging, the judge should order him to lie down, and then he should be flogged in the judge’s presence with the number of lashes appropriate to the crime.  Never, however, should more than 40 lashes be imposed, for that would publicly degrade your fellow Israelite.

“Do to muzzle an ox [to prevent it from eating] while it is treading down the grain.

“If two brothers live together and one of them dies without having a son, the widow should not remarry outside of the family.  It is the duty of the surviving brother to marry her and have intercourse with her.  The first son they have should be named after the dead brother so that his name will not pass away in Israel.  However, if the brother will not marry his brother’s widow, she should go to the elders of the town and tell them, “My brother-in-law refuses to allow my husband’s name to be perpetuated in Israel and will not perform his duty as my husband’s brother.”  The elders should summon the brother-in-law and speak to him.  If he continues to refuse and tells them, “I do not want to marry her,” then the widow should approach him in the presence of the elders, remove one of his sandals, spit in his face, and declare, “This is what happens to a man who refuses to build up his brother’s house!”  And his house shall be called in Israel, “the house of the unsandaled man.”

“If two Israelite men get into a fight and the wife of one of them tries to rescue her husband by reaching out and grasping the testicles of the man who is beating her husband, you should cut off her hand, showing her no pity.

“You should not carry in your bag two different weights, one heavy, one light, or have two different measures in your house, one large, one small.  Accurate and honest weights you must have, so that you may prosper in the land Jehovah your god is giving you.  Jehovah your god detests anyone who does such things and anyone who does not conduct honest business dealings.

“Never forget what the Amalekites did to you when you came out of Egypt.  They attacked you when you were tired and fatigued and picked off those who lagged behind with no fear of God.  Therefore, when Jehovah your god gives you refuge from your enemies in the land he is giving you as an inheritance, you must exterminate the Amalekites and erase the memory of them from under the heavens.  Do not forget this!"

Notes
1. Exempting newly married men from military service seems a humane practice, not inconsistent with modern policy of sometimes giving married men or men with children draft deferments.  It provides as well an inducement to marry.  Societies have nearly always encouraged marriage, both to provide social stability and to perpetuate the race through children, who can be most successful reared within a stable marriage.

2. In Israelite society most individuals made flour for bread using their own hand mills to grind the grain they have harvested from their own fields.  To confiscate a millstone would be tantamount to depriving someone of food.

3. Enslaving an Israelite was a capital offense, but no mention is made of the morality of enslaving a foreigner.

4. The subject of skin diseases, some of which may or may not be accurately described as leprosy, is covered extensively in the Books of Moses.  Why something medical in nature should be under the purview of the priests is curious.  Medical doctors were probably unknown in Hebrew society at this time, even if in places like Egypt medical knowledge and practices were surprisingly advanced.   So it is likely that priests were sought out for health advice.  But the important aspect of skin afflictions seem to be their affect upon ritual purity, an obsession in Levitical law.

5. There are several provisions mandating kindly treatment of the the poor and downtrodden and making some allowances for the needy.  (These seem consistent with Christian charity.)  One puts a limit on the number of lashes an offender can be flogged.  Apparently 39 lashes is OK, but 40 will degrade the recipient.  A line, of course, must be drawn somewhere, but one wonders whether the age and physical condition of the person flogged, as well as the seriousness of the crime, should be a consideration in determining the proper number of lashes to be meted out.

6. The declaration that individuals should be punished only for their own crimes is very much at odds with previous statements supporting the concept of collective and ancestral guilt.

7. Not muzzling the oxen that tread the grain (apparently the standard means of threshing the grain, that is, separating the grain from the chaff) could be interpreted as exemplifying the principle of rewarding those who work, even animals.

8. The obligation of a man to marry his brother’s widow strikes one as a primitive, tribalistic custom that seems a contradiction to the prohibition in Leviticus against marrying a brother’s widow.  The exception here is if the deceased brother has no children.  This is called Levirate marriage and in not unique to Hebrew society.  Its purpose is generally to preserve marriage within the tribal unit.  The bizarre ceremony of the sandal is called halizah.  The widow must perform this ceremony before marrying anyone else, or be deemed an adulteress.  Orthodox Jews still perform this ancient ceremony when circumstances warrant.

9. The prohibition against a wife interfering in her husband’s fight by grabbing the testicles of his opponents is perhaps the most bizarre and ludicrous passage in the Bible.  Do wives generally throw themselves into the middle of fist fights or brawls their husbands engage in?  Are they usually present when such encounters occur?  And how on earth would a woman position herself during a fight so that she would be able to seize one of the combatant’s testicles?  Who is it that is in a position to cut off her hand -- a judge, when the matter comes to court?  And why are her actions, that of a loyal wife trying to defend her husband, so objectionable that they deserve no pity?  How could this provision have any practical value as a guide to behavior?  Perhaps it is meant symbolically.  Perhaps it means that a woman should not interfere with her husband’s quarrels with other men. 

10. There is another call for genocide against the detested Amalekites, the arch enemy of the Israelites and later a symbol for evil.  These were a nomadic people who lived in south Canaan, in the Negev.  They were supposedly the descendants of Amalek, a grandson of Esau, but were spoken of in Genesis as existing long before Amalek was even born.  The term is applied vaguely in the Bible, and it is impossible to pinpoint who exactly the Amalekites were and when and where they lived.