Joshua may have been commissioned but Moses is still in charge, and God has some housekeeping notices for him. He reminds him of the daily, weekly and monthly offerings, as well as the offerings for the annual festivals. Of course we've heard all of this before, but there are some subtle changes and additions. And anyway, the people have not proved themselves to be the most obedient. They need reminding. At times the Bible can feel really repetitive, and it can be tempting to skip passages in search of something new, but I don't believe God repeated Himself simply because He liked the sound of His own voice. He kept going back to things because He wanted to make sure that the people remembered them and understood them, and sometimes He would slip a new promise or commandment in among the repeats. When we get a sense of deja vu while reading the Bible, we need to ask ourselves why. What's so important that God needed to say it again? Have I been missing something? Is there a new angle this time? And that applies even more in our own lives. If God keeps saying something, it's because we need to listen.
Now God moves on to talk about vows, and he says that if any man makes a vow, he must stay true to his word. That seems fair enough. If we promise to do something, honesty and honour demand that we do it. And if we know that we must keep our word, then maybe we will think more carefully before giving it and avoid making rash promises or speaking insincerely. God doesn't stop there though. He goes on to say that if a woman who lives at home makes a vow and her father confirms it or remains silent, then she is bound to her word; but if her father forbids it, her pledge no longer stands. In the same way, if a married woman made a vow, her husband had the power to confirm or nullify it. If a widow or a divorced woman makes a vow, it is binding, presumably because there is no one to release her from it. Basically, if a woman lived with a man, be it her father or her husband, he had authority over her and all of her decisions. A woman was only free and empowered to make her own decisions if she was on her own, and therefore in a more vulnerable position where her choices were limited anyway. The implication is that women are not capable of making sensible or reasonable decisions, and so if there is a man on hand, it should really be up to him. Remember I said yesterday that it was impossible to deny that there was misogyny in the Bible? Well this is a prime example. And it's not right. God gave every one of us free will and that means we all have the right and the power to make our own decisions, women included.
God then tells Moses to take vengeance on the Midianites, and then he will be "gathered to [his] people". In other words, he has one last mission and then he'll die. It's not much of an incentive to get on and do what God says, but Moses chooses obedience anyway. He goes straight to the people and instructs them to arm one thousand men from each tribe and send them into battle. They destroy the Midianites, killing every man, including the five Midianite kings and Balaam (who it turns out who do hear of again) and burning their towns. Apparently that's not enough though. When the Israelite warriors return, Moses instructs them to kill the Midianite women also, as they were the ones who led the Israelite men into sin. It's bloody and it's brutal and it's hard to believe that it was ever the will of God. Especially when you consider that Moses tells the people that all those who have killed or touched anyone who has killed must purify themselves and their garments and all that they took into battle. Killing their enemies has made them unclean, and that means that it is wrong. Even if God really did send them into battle, to defend themselves or their honour or whatever, it was clearly never His ideal.
All that remains now is for the Israelites to divide the spoils of war. Half is set aside for the soldiers, and half for the community. From the soldiers' half, 1/500th is to be given to God; while from the community's half, 1/50th is to be given to God. I pointed out yesterday that the land was divided equally between the people because they were all equal, so this uneven distrubition may seem strange, but the circumstances here are different. The people got an equal share in the land because it was a gift from God, but the soldiers got more of the bounty because it was a reward for their actions. They got more because they did more. We shouldn't try to apply this too literally - God doesn't work a rewards-based system and there are no heavenly brownie points - but I do believe that the more we put in to life, the more we get out of it. It may sound like a hideously cheesy motivational speech cliche, but cliches are only repeated so often because there is truth in them.
No comments:
Post a Comment