Dragging - Deuteronomy 25

I’m not going to lie, Deuteronomy is starting to drag and we still have 9 chapters to go but if I keep on trucking, I should be done with the Torah in the next two weeks. I started the Old Testament in January 2022, meaning that I’ve been in the Torah for over 4 years. Granted I’ve had some serious set backs and taken time off but that’s a long time and I’m excited to move on. Anyway, the first 3 verses of chapter 25 talks about punishment for a criminal which was “forty stripes.” TB says that this is in contrast to the usual 100 stripes that the surrounding pagan communities were doing demonstrating that the God of Israel was more merciful than those other surrounding gods. TB also notes that this was because God wanted to ensure correction, not punishment and this was the amount of whipping that was deemed adequate for that. He said that any more than that would more likely permanently harm the person thus limiting his ability to support himself, and at that level of physical punishment people started to loose bowel and bladder control which would have embarrassed them forever in the eyes of the society. The IM notes that to ensure that no more than 40 stripes were administered due to a miscount, only 39 were usually administered and quoted when Paul said that 5 times he was whipped by the Jews with 39 stripes.

They couldn’t muzzle an ox when it was working in the field. This is one of those where it confirms how much God loves animals. The ox would pull the plow but also eat the whole time it was doing it so it took a lot of goading by the people to keep the animal on task so the people would just muzzle the ox so it couldn’t eat and God said no to that. Verses 6-10 deal with a man who died without leaving children and what happened if his brother refused to marry the widow and give her children. This is an interesting concept because when the man died without children, boys specifically, their names were essentially lost to Israel forever which was on par as if they had sinned and had their name removed from Israel that way. With a son, that name could live on forever. Additionally, the property rights would be dispersed among the other relatives and the woman would basically have no one to take care of her as she aged. The brother’s refusal to give the widow children in his brother’s name was the most likely recipient of the property so he’d be motivated by an increase of wealth to not do that.

TB brought up the situation with Judah and Tamar, where Tamar was married to the oldest brother, who died, and then married the second brother who didn’t refuse to have sex with her, but did refuse to get her pregnant by pulling out and “spilling his seed on the ground.” This brother was killed by God for his wickedness and TB said he doesn’t know the specific wickedness but I think I do. He wanted to have sex with a woman and not protect her by giving her children, and thus retaining his brother’s property for himself. The command continues, that the woman should accuse the man of not doing his duty in front of the elders, take his sandal off his foot and spit on the ground next to his bare foot. TB said that the uncovered foot was a phallic symbol and the spit on the ground was representative of the brother that “spilled his seed on the ground” as a call back to the wickedness that Judah’s second son did. Interesting.

Verses 11-19 seem completely unrelated on the surface but TB tied them altogether. The first has to do with two men fighting and the wife of one of the men grabbing the man who is not her husband by the balls, which funnily the KJV translates as “the secrets,” if she does this, she should have her hand cut off and no one should feel sorry for her. TB notes that Israel had a strict anti-mutilation policy and that this punishment did not fit the crime. He said that it was metaphorical and that she wasn’t actually supposed to have her hand cut off but what the real message is about is unfair fighting, two against one, cheating. This corresponds with the next section which commands for “perfect” and “just” weights and measures which presumably is for buying and selling, not to cheat. The last bit has to do with remembering the Amalikites because when Israel was passing by them, they attacked the back of the formation which were the old and weak people trying to keep up, again cheating, fighting unfairly. This will be one of the reasons why God will require their destruction at a later point.