There is very little to be said about this chapter, so I'll just write it up quick here. In fact there are only two issues the SAB brings up, and one of them has already been addressed. Whether or not one accepts my explanation, I don't think I have more to add to what I've already said regarding the failed conquest of Canaan.
Actually, the second point isn't exactly a new one to address. So the priests (and the rest of the nation) managed to cross the Jordan River without getting their feet wet. This is apparently absurd, while the concept of water piling up "upon an heap" upstream of them is not absurd? I don't get it. Look, it's clearly a miracle; what should one expect?
Actually, this event has perhaps some interesting significance due to the fact that supposedly very few people who had seen the parting of the Red Sea in person were still alive at this point. This event is a very similar miracle.
Showing posts with label parting of the Red Sea. Show all posts
Showing posts with label parting of the Red Sea. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Her witchcrafts are so many? (Exod. 22:18 et al., witches)
A girl I briefly dated in college with whom I was friends for quite some time used to always say of the Salem witch trials, "Why is it that people always say that it's a shame that these women were falsely accused of being witches? Does that imply that if any of them were actual witches (which a few of them may have been) that would make it morally acceptable to kill them?" It was a rhetorical question in her view; of course it would not be morally acceptable. I think when it comes to the Bible, these questions need to be given some more comprehensive treatment.
Exodus 22:18 simply reads "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." However, the issues brought up are far from simple. There are two terms here that need to be explored: "witch" and "live". The latter turns out to be the most simple. It may be that the command here is not to kill a witch so much as to cast her out of the community in some manner. The Hebrew verb here may actually have to do with prosperity rather than physical life, implying that if there is a woman offering some sort of service termed as "witchcraft", then you should not solicit her. (While the term is not used there specifically, King Saul solicits a woman who "hath a familiar spirit" to help him in 1Sam. 28. It seems pretty clear that this was a bad idea.) While the possibility exists, (and note that the way in which she should be killed is not specified) it is likely that the intention here is that witchcraft be a capital crime. Either way, be it "kill witches" or "ensure witches do not prosper", there's clearly a command here to be prejudiced sharply against them.
Having already discussed capital punishment, I therefore turn to a discussion of the term "witch". Even in modern English, the term is rather vague. Judging by the pop culture phenomena of "Harry Potter", "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" and "The Wizard of Oz", witches are human-like (but somehow not quite human) individuals that have the ability to change reality around them by waving sticks at things. While this particular idea of what witches are like is probably not, nor has ever been, realized in the non-fictitious world, the truth is that witches do exist.
While the term "witch" is used informally by many as an epithet for a woman who is ugly and/or spiteful, in a more technical sense, the term still refers more specifically to a person (more commonly female, but not always) who either practices magic in some unspecified manner, or more likely a practitioner of the religion known as Wicca. For those not familiar, Wicca is:
So this leaves two possibilities which are not necessarily distinct. Although Wicca as we know it today did not exist in those days, there no doubt were similar pagan religions, and magic, be it of the showy, supernatural sort or simply some sort of "herbal magic" could easily have existed at pretty much any time in history. What would make either of these wrong?
Well, the pagan one is easy. If I have talked about religious intolerance in the Bible before now, I don't recall, but this is as good a place as any to address it. As I've said in my other blog, here in America, we have a nation that promises by its Constitution certain freedoms, including freedom of speech and religion. I'm all for it. Despite being a "fundie" who will be among the first to tell you that I believe Jesus offers the one and only path to the salvation of your soul, I am glad to share this nation with atheists, pagans, Muslims and even Scientologists. But that's not what ancient Israel was all about. While we here are trying to build a society from a variety of cultures that will strengthen each other through diversity, God's aims in creating Israel was to have a nation that would be uniformly existing for the sole purpose of glorifying Him. Now that brings up other philosophical issues that libraries of books no doubt have been written about, this is the Bible, and this is God speaking to His people, and within that context, God is free to say essentially "My way or the highway!"
As I said in the post on capital punishment, there are essentially three things you could be killed for in Israel: murder, sexual impurity, and improper religious practice. The third category exists because especially in this case, God is trying to create a new religion more or less from scratch. His people have lived in the midst of pagan nations, well, since forever. Abraham lived among pagans in Ur, and he moved to Canaan where he lived among other pagans. His great-grandchildren, the sons of Jacob, moved to Egypt and spent 400-odd years there among yet another pagan society. Now that they are finally big enough to be their own nation and they are (supposedly) about to have their own land, God is demanding a cleansing. Many Biblical scholars have noted that there is a parallel in these stories to the concept of Baptism, a Jewish ritual that of course was taken up in a big way by Christians. This is a fresh start for the nation, and God has them pass through the waters of the Red Sea, drowning the Egyptians. God is washing the pagan-ness out of these people, and He wants them to stay clean.
As for magic, God simply doesn't want people to depend on any power other than Him. This may also be related in a more direct way to paganism, of course, but there is certainly a sense in which God is warning them away from anything supernatural that is not God Himself, because it is very likely something evil.
I hope this is coming across clearly enough. I've been stalling on this one not because it's a difficult one per se (in the way that the abortion and capital punishment posts were), but in such a small verse, there are some big issues to deal with, and I've spent far too much time mulling it over in my mind, and probably overcomplicated it in the end. I hope that's not entirely the case.
Exodus 22:18 simply reads "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." However, the issues brought up are far from simple. There are two terms here that need to be explored: "witch" and "live". The latter turns out to be the most simple. It may be that the command here is not to kill a witch so much as to cast her out of the community in some manner. The Hebrew verb here may actually have to do with prosperity rather than physical life, implying that if there is a woman offering some sort of service termed as "witchcraft", then you should not solicit her. (While the term is not used there specifically, King Saul solicits a woman who "hath a familiar spirit" to help him in 1Sam. 28. It seems pretty clear that this was a bad idea.) While the possibility exists, (and note that the way in which she should be killed is not specified) it is likely that the intention here is that witchcraft be a capital crime. Either way, be it "kill witches" or "ensure witches do not prosper", there's clearly a command here to be prejudiced sharply against them.
Having already discussed capital punishment, I therefore turn to a discussion of the term "witch". Even in modern English, the term is rather vague. Judging by the pop culture phenomena of "Harry Potter", "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" and "The Wizard of Oz", witches are human-like (but somehow not quite human) individuals that have the ability to change reality around them by waving sticks at things. While this particular idea of what witches are like is probably not, nor has ever been, realized in the non-fictitious world, the truth is that witches do exist.
While the term "witch" is used informally by many as an epithet for a woman who is ugly and/or spiteful, in a more technical sense, the term still refers more specifically to a person (more commonly female, but not always) who either practices magic in some unspecified manner, or more likely a practitioner of the religion known as Wicca. For those not familiar, Wicca is:
A polytheistic Neo-Pagan nature religion inspired by various pre-Christian western European beliefs, whose central deity is a mother goddess and which includes the use of herbal magic and benign witchcraft. (American Heritage Dictionary)So which of these witches is the sort that is supposedly to be killed? While I think we can rule out the sort that is simply fitting of the epithet, it's worthwhile to note that the supposition that many have is that many of those who were killed in the Salem witch trials were of this type. (I don't like the way she looks/acts, so I'll call her a witch and let the authorities handle it.) I am going to assume the Bible however is not referring to this sort of person.
So this leaves two possibilities which are not necessarily distinct. Although Wicca as we know it today did not exist in those days, there no doubt were similar pagan religions, and magic, be it of the showy, supernatural sort or simply some sort of "herbal magic" could easily have existed at pretty much any time in history. What would make either of these wrong?
Well, the pagan one is easy. If I have talked about religious intolerance in the Bible before now, I don't recall, but this is as good a place as any to address it. As I've said in my other blog, here in America, we have a nation that promises by its Constitution certain freedoms, including freedom of speech and religion. I'm all for it. Despite being a "fundie" who will be among the first to tell you that I believe Jesus offers the one and only path to the salvation of your soul, I am glad to share this nation with atheists, pagans, Muslims and even Scientologists. But that's not what ancient Israel was all about. While we here are trying to build a society from a variety of cultures that will strengthen each other through diversity, God's aims in creating Israel was to have a nation that would be uniformly existing for the sole purpose of glorifying Him. Now that brings up other philosophical issues that libraries of books no doubt have been written about, this is the Bible, and this is God speaking to His people, and within that context, God is free to say essentially "My way or the highway!"
As I said in the post on capital punishment, there are essentially three things you could be killed for in Israel: murder, sexual impurity, and improper religious practice. The third category exists because especially in this case, God is trying to create a new religion more or less from scratch. His people have lived in the midst of pagan nations, well, since forever. Abraham lived among pagans in Ur, and he moved to Canaan where he lived among other pagans. His great-grandchildren, the sons of Jacob, moved to Egypt and spent 400-odd years there among yet another pagan society. Now that they are finally big enough to be their own nation and they are (supposedly) about to have their own land, God is demanding a cleansing. Many Biblical scholars have noted that there is a parallel in these stories to the concept of Baptism, a Jewish ritual that of course was taken up in a big way by Christians. This is a fresh start for the nation, and God has them pass through the waters of the Red Sea, drowning the Egyptians. God is washing the pagan-ness out of these people, and He wants them to stay clean.
As for magic, God simply doesn't want people to depend on any power other than Him. This may also be related in a more direct way to paganism, of course, but there is certainly a sense in which God is warning them away from anything supernatural that is not God Himself, because it is very likely something evil.
I hope this is coming across clearly enough. I've been stalling on this one not because it's a difficult one per se (in the way that the abortion and capital punishment posts were), but in such a small verse, there are some big issues to deal with, and I've spent far too much time mulling it over in my mind, and probably overcomplicated it in the end. I hope that's not entirely the case.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
The LORD is a man of war (Exod 14)
Finally back from a long hiatus, most of my work situation has been properly arranged, and I am going to try to spend some time posting on my blog. While my other blog is going to be focusing on the separation of church and state here in the USA, here I will be conversely be focusing on the establishment of a theocracy in the Middle East, of course, as once the Israelites leave Egypt, the nation of Israel really begins, despite having no land to settle on for quite some time.
Most of the issues pointed out in this chapter have to do with Pharaoh's heart being hardened, which I addressed in a previous post. In the midst of all of this heart-hardening, I think the SAB missed something that they might want to mention. Namely, that God instructs the Israelites to camp in such a manner that they feign being vulnerable. The plagues are not quite enough for some reason; God wants to destroy the Egyptian army and embarrass the nation of Egypt.
If the SAB is looking for absurdities, and likes to mark miraculous occurrences as such, then they've missed one of the biggies. God causes the sea to become dry, and the Israelites cross over it that night. Note that there is no talk of "parting" the Red Sea (although there may be a hint of it in verse 29), but rather the wind blows all the water off to one side. This act is not considered an absurd concept as a miracle, but having chariot wheels fall off is. Also, in the midst of this, the SAB notes as an absurdity (I think it's supposed to be a contradiction, which seems to make more sense) that there are horses still available for the Egyptian army, since they were all killed in Exodus 9. I stand by essentially what I said before, which is that the verse in question says beasts that were in the fields were struck down. Most likely, the army's horses were kept in stables, and thus many of them if not all may have survived the plagues.
As a side note, it would be an interesting discussion to examine why these miracles, done by God, had to be preceded by a small action on Moses' part. If God wanted to allow the Israelites to walk across the bottom of the sea on dry ground, does He really need a waving staff to make it happen? I can think of a few reasons for God having Moses do this, but I'm not going to give appreciable time to it in this blog unless I come to text that seems more clearly to beg the question.
So God drowns the Egyptian army. The SAB marks this as cruel and/or violent, which I suppose is deserving enough, but it should be noted that there is something that's just naturally cruel and violent about war. Remember, these are not just a few Egyptians out for a leisurely Sunday drive, but an army, and no doubt their aim was not exactly a kindly one. In a way, this was an act of war upon Israel and upon God. God destroyed the army to put a final end to it, and Israel was finally a free nation.
Most of the issues pointed out in this chapter have to do with Pharaoh's heart being hardened, which I addressed in a previous post. In the midst of all of this heart-hardening, I think the SAB missed something that they might want to mention. Namely, that God instructs the Israelites to camp in such a manner that they feign being vulnerable. The plagues are not quite enough for some reason; God wants to destroy the Egyptian army and embarrass the nation of Egypt.
If the SAB is looking for absurdities, and likes to mark miraculous occurrences as such, then they've missed one of the biggies. God causes the sea to become dry, and the Israelites cross over it that night. Note that there is no talk of "parting" the Red Sea (although there may be a hint of it in verse 29), but rather the wind blows all the water off to one side. This act is not considered an absurd concept as a miracle, but having chariot wheels fall off is. Also, in the midst of this, the SAB notes as an absurdity (I think it's supposed to be a contradiction, which seems to make more sense) that there are horses still available for the Egyptian army, since they were all killed in Exodus 9. I stand by essentially what I said before, which is that the verse in question says beasts that were in the fields were struck down. Most likely, the army's horses were kept in stables, and thus many of them if not all may have survived the plagues.
As a side note, it would be an interesting discussion to examine why these miracles, done by God, had to be preceded by a small action on Moses' part. If God wanted to allow the Israelites to walk across the bottom of the sea on dry ground, does He really need a waving staff to make it happen? I can think of a few reasons for God having Moses do this, but I'm not going to give appreciable time to it in this blog unless I come to text that seems more clearly to beg the question.
So God drowns the Egyptian army. The SAB marks this as cruel and/or violent, which I suppose is deserving enough, but it should be noted that there is something that's just naturally cruel and violent about war. Remember, these are not just a few Egyptians out for a leisurely Sunday drive, but an army, and no doubt their aim was not exactly a kindly one. In a way, this was an act of war upon Israel and upon God. God destroyed the army to put a final end to it, and Israel was finally a free nation.
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