with the Commonwealth of Israel. The General Equity Principle still binds us. So whatever wisdom we find, those things that are appropriate for application in the New Covenant setting, we certainly take those principles and apply them. Notice in Chapter 21 at verse 1, these are the judgments which you shall set before them. So concrete applications of the General Principles that are given in Exodus Chapter 20 in terms of the Ten Commandments. So in chapter 21, we start off with laws concerning servants, and then it moves on to laws concerning homicide and bodily injury, and then property damage. We left off on that when we finished that in terms of property in chapter 22 at verse. verses 16 to 20. So if a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride price for her to be his wife. If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride price of virgins. You shall not permit a sorceress to live. Whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death. He who sacrifices to any god except to the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed. You shall neither mistreat a stranger nor oppress him, for you are strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child. If you afflict them in any way, and they cry at all to me, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will become hot, and I will kill them with my sword. Your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless. If you lend money to any of my people who are among you, you shall not be like a moneylender to him. You shall not charge an interest. If you ever take your neighbor's garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down. For that is his only covering. It is his garment for his skin. What will he sleep in? And it will be that when he cries to me, I will hear, for I am gracious. You shall not revive God, nor curse the ruler of your people. You shall not delay to offer the first of your ripe produce and your juices. The firstborn of your sons you shall give to me. Likewise, you shall do with your oxen and your sheep. It shall be with its mother seven days. On the eighth day, you shall give it to me. And you shall be holy men to me. You shall not eat meat torn by beasts in the field. You shall throw it to the dogs. Amen. So as we move through this particular section, Remember, the previous section is what's called casuistry. It gives a general sort of a situation that would serve the judges in terms of applying it to specific situations. And not every particular detail is covered, but there is enough so that the judges have some code, some statute, some command from God on how to deal with individual situations. Now, as we move on in verses 16 and following, it's more There's specific prohibition, don't do this or this will happen. And so tonight I want to look at the law concerning the seduction of a virgin in verses 16 and 17, and then the three capital offenses indicated in verses 18 to 20. So he condemns witchcraft, bestiality, and idolatry. So in the first place, let's look at the law concerning the seduction of a virgin in verses 16 and 17. Now the position here is intriguing because we move from property issues into these laws, miscellaneous laws, concerning society. Some have certainly included verses 16 and 17 with the previous section on dealing with property, because you've got to pay this bride price, it does seem like there's some sort of a business transaction in place. Stuart says these verses, though they belong with what precedes, may be considered transitional in that they conclude the section on property, responsibility, and compensation, and as well introduce the following section which deals with various laws and it looks forward. So the emphasis, as I said, are on laws concerning society in this section that we're dealing with. Now, we'll deal with that bride price in just a moment. Hopefully, we'll try and defang it of how offensive it may sound to our modern ears. But in the first place, notice the particular issue in 16a. If a man entices a virgin, is not betrothed, and lies with her. When we look at this particular passage, and we compare it, as we will in a few minutes, to Deuteronomy chapter 22, the woman is compliant, the woman is enticed, the woman is seduced, and the woman does comply. This is not a case of rape. Again, we're going to compare it to chapter 22 in the book of Deuteronomy, which expands or amplifies on some of these sexual sins that I think at times give Christians cause for concern, and certainly the enemies of Christ, ammunition because they misinterpret what's going on in Deuteronomy chapter 22. So the man entices a virgin. He most likely does it in a manipulative way. Matthew Poole says, with persuasions, with promise of marriage, with allurements or rewards. Notice the specific intention. He wants to have sexual relations with her, sexual congress. So what happens is that she complies with him. She yields to the particular enticement. Now, if that does occur, if a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, notice what the specific sanction is. He shall surely pay the bride price for her to be his wife. So if he goes into her, she's compliant with that, then he should do the right thing and marry her. Now, in verse 17, if her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride price of virgins. So the father may refuse, the father may resist, and that being the case, the man violated the woman, so the man nevertheless has to pay this particular bride price. Now, there's no price, no monetary sort of figure applied to this particular section. Again, if we compare Deuteronomy chapter 22, it's 50 shekels that the man is on the hook for in terms of what he ought to pay. Now, I'm going to quote Stuart again. This is a bit of a longer, long-ish quote, but I think it does put in context this whole issue of bride price. Now, before I read this, I just want us to consider our modern situation, our modern approach to fornication. No strings attached whatsoever. In fact, there's applications that you can put on your phone that are to say, well, that seems barbaric, having to pay money for a particular woman. Well, it's pretty barbaric when men can go into women today, and there's no responsibility whatsoever placed upon either of them. So Stuart mentions, he says, part of the utility of the bride price was the way it forced the man to make a full and formal arrangement for marriage that properly involved both his interests and those of his bride-to-be. as well as the interests of his family and hers. The bride price requirement necessarily involved the family's insubstantial formal negotiations, and the price showed that something serious and important was at stake. Taking a woman to oneself and taking away her virginity were honorable if the proper negotiations had been completed, and a proper indication of her worth had been paid to her family, and the couple were legally married. Simply having sexual relations with her, with or without her permission, devalued her and showed blatant disregard for her worth. also showed that a person, or when the premarital sex was consensual, that the couple viewed marriage or its covenant sign, sexual intercourse, as less than a formal, legal, lifelong contractual commitment. The betrothal slash bride price system was designed to make marriage harder to come by than what could be achieved on whim or quick decision. and it elevated marriage accordingly because people instinctively value what is hard and costly to get. So again, we look at passages like these and they are a puzzle to us because they're so contrary or foreign to the way that we operate. But as I said, a moment's reflection upon the way that persons engage in sexuality today shows us the dignity involved and shows us the responsibility involved with this particular arrangement. The families were involved. There was sanctions imposed upon a man for recklessness in terms of his own sexuality. There were problems affixed to the woman in terms of her sexuality. to be a virgin or an unmarried non-virgin in Israel carried stigma. It was a difficult proposition for this particular woman. So the law is given in some sense as a preventative measure. You need to know what's at stake when you act in a reckless behavior. When you look back in these laws concerning property, remember that negligence is punishable. If you're a negligent person, you're an irresponsible person within the body politic, more often than not, you have to pay. Well, the same is true with sexuality, and the same is true with reference to the covenant, the covenantal nature of marriage. If you are not prepared to enter into that covenantal arrangement, then you're not prepared to have sexual relations. And so this law would hopefully function as a preventative maintenance to those that might be engaged in some sort of lawlessness or sexual immorality. Now turn over to Deuteronomy chapter 22. As I said, this amplifies some of the concrete applications of the seventh commandment in terms of civil society. There's one particular issue that we need to consider because I think it gets misrepresented and there seems to be this contradiction between a betrothed woman and a non-betrothed or a single woman. So look at Deuteronomy chapter 22. I'll read beginning in verse 22. If a man is found lying with a woman married to a husband, then both of them shall die. The man that lay with the woman and the woman. So you shall put away the evil from Israel. That's a case of straightforward adultery. Notice in verses 23 and 24, this is the seduction of a betrothed woman. If a young woman who is a virgin is betrothed to a husband, and a man finds her in the city and lies with her, then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones. The young woman because she did not cry out in the city, and the man because he humbled his neighbor's wife, so you shall put away the evil from among you. So, this woman is betrothed to another man. That's a binding legal contract. Notice that she's referred to as a wife. Well, she willingly complies with this seduction, and she goes willingly with the man. So, you have a case here of the seduction of a betrothed woman. So, in a sense, it is similar to what you see in the previous verse concerning adultery. Now notice in verses 25 to 27, this is the rape of a betrothed woman in the countryside. So notice in verse 25, now this distinction between out in the countryside and in the city has to do with the ability to alert persons as to what is going on. If you're out in the countryside and you scream, it's quite possible nobody's going to hear you. Whereas if you are in the city and you don't scream, then that shows complicitness on your part. If you're in the city and you don't scream, it's probably because you have gone willingly with Him. That's why it presses that, it points that out in verse 24. Notice, "...then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones." The young woman, notice, "...because she did not cry out in the city." What's the implication? She was being raped. She should have cried out in the city because in the city there would be people that would hear her and come to her rescue. So she is complicit. She goes along with this particular man. But then again, the contrast in verse 25 points to rape. If a man finds a betrothed young woman in the countryside and the man forces her and lies with her, that is necessary to establish rape. This emphasis on force. Then only the man who lay with her shall die. But you shall do nothing to the young woman. There is in the young woman no sin deserving of death. For just as when a man rises against his neighbor and kills him, even so is this matter. For he found her in the countryside, and the betrothed young woman cried out, but there was no one to save her." See the distinction there. The seduction of a betrothed woman in verses 23 to 24, she could have cried out, got assistance, but she didn't. That underscores that she was complicit, and she went with this man who seduced her. Now, in terms of the rape, this woman was out in the countryside, she cried out, there was nobody to help her. As well, we have the emphasis upon the force that was utilized to make sure that this fellow got his way. Now, the next section, verses 28 and 29, correspond to the passage in Exodus. So what we have in verses 28 and 29 is a corresponding situation with what we have in Exodus chapter 22 at verses 16 and 17. Notice, if a man finds a young woman who is a virgin, who is not betrothed, So the modern commentators, or rather the modern God-haters, say, well, if you rape a betrothed woman, you're liable to be executed. But if you rape a virgin, a non-betrothed woman, then you're not liable to be executed. That's a bit of a problem in biblical ethics, I would suggest. Well, I can rape somebody, and all I have to do is pay the bride price, and I'm okay. So some take this specifically verses 25 to 27, and they see a contradiction, or they see a relaxing in verses 28 to 29. You're really valuable if you're betrothed. You're not so valuable if you're not betrothed. So let's look at verse 28. If a man finds a young woman who is a virgin, who is not betrothed, and he seizes her and lies with her. Now, the seizes there, I think the NIV translates it as forces. It's not forces. It's a different verb altogether. The seize, in our minds, suggests some sort of force imposed upon her. But that's not what's happening. It corresponds to what's going on in Exodus 22. This girl is complicit, because notice what it says. He seizes her and lies with her, and they are found out. Then the man who lay with her shall give to the young woman's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife because he has humbled her. He shall not be permitted to divorce her all his days." It's dealing with the same sort of a situation. A man seduces a woman and she is complicit and goes along with him, just like we have in Exodus 22, 16, and 17. If your Bible translation has forces in verse 28, that will give rise to what appears to be a contradiction. So if you're a betrothed woman, you're protected under the law up to and including capital punishment on the part of the rapist. If you're not betrothed, well, it doesn't matter. because all he has to do is pay the bride price. You see how that gets into the mind of the pagan or the heathen, and he thinks he has a really good case to make you look like a moron or a fool, because your Bible sustains execution for somebody that's betrothed, but it doesn't sustain that with reference to somebody who's not betrothed. But verses 28 and 29 envisages a woman that is compliant just like we have in Exodus chapter 22 verses 16 and 17. And then this section ends on affinity. Notice in verse 30, a man shall not take his father's wife, nor uncover his father's bed." It's just like incest. So incest is by blood, and affinity is by marriage. Our confession of faith speaks to both of these things in chapter 24, paragraph 4. It says, marriage ought not to be within the degrees of consanguinity. That has to do with blood. You're not supposed to marry, be a first cousin or closer. And then, I'm pretty sure it's first cousin, well I know it's closer, but first cousin I think is, you know, you can't. And then beyond that, I don't know, I'd give second or third cousin, you know, just to make sure there's some wiggle room in there. But it says, marriage ought not to be within the degrees of consanguinity or affinity. So affinity is when we are brought into a relation by marriage. So in 1 Corinthians 5, for instance, when Paul upbraids the church in Corinth because a man had his father's wife. That's the problem of affinity. It's his father's wife, probably not his mother, wherein he's, you know, connected to her by blood, but he is connected to her by affinity. And so, marriage ought not to be within the degrees of consanguinity or affinity forbidden in the word, nor can such incestuous marriages ever be made lawful by any law of man or consent of parties, so as those persons may live together as man and wife. So going back to Exodus chapter 22 verses 16 and 17 corresponds to what you have in Deuteronomy 22 at verses 28 and 29. The problem is the seduction of a virgin who complies with the seducer. So, obviously, in this passage before us, in Exodus, he has to pay the bride price. If, in fact, he does marry her, the stipulation in Deuteronomy 22 is that he can never divorce her. He can never write her a certificate of divorce. There are some people that teach that there's never divorce in the Bible. I'm not sure what Bible they're reading, because the Bible does say there is divorce. In Deuteronomy 24, we see permission given, or the Bill of Divorcement written, and the specifications involved. You get to the religious reformers, the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, They're actually commanded to divorce their pagan wives and to put them away. So the Bible does authorize divorce. It doesn't authorize it for any old reason. It's only for porneia or sexual immorality and for desertion. I would include spousal abuse. under desertion. If somebody is beating their spouse, they have deserted them. They're not functioning the way Christ is with reference to his church. But with reference to this man, if he does seduce her, if she is complicit, if the father refuses her to be married to him, then he has to pay the bride price. Either way, he has to pay the bride price, but he must always stay or remain married to her. So that's the law concerning the seduction of a virgin. Notice, secondly, the three capital offenses. The first has to do with witchcraft or sorcery. You shall not permit a sorceress to live. Now, it's in the feminine there. You shall not permit a witch or a sorceress to live. Typically, that's a woman. The law certainly applies to what we would call a warlock or a male witch or a male sorcerer. Now, in terms of the condemnation of witchcraft or sorcery in the Bible, I think perhaps one of the clearest passages is Deuteronomy 18. Deuteronomy chapter 18. You can turn there. And we're going to Deuteronomy because it's a bit more amplified in terms of the details, and I think it helps us to see or understand what's going on better in Exodus chapter 22. So, Deuteronomy chapter 18 contains a lot of information. It deals with the priest and the prophet in Israel. The priest and the prophet in Israel. The first section is the provision for priests. So in chapter 18 verses 1 to 8 it talks about the provision that is to be made for the priests. Now the priest represented the people to God. So the priest would go on behalf of the people to God. The prophet comes on behalf of God to the people. For those who've been somewhat familiar with military service, there's a rank in the military called the first sergeant. The first sergeant functions kind of as a prophet and as a priest. He represents the commander to the troops and he represents the troops to the commander. And that's what a prophet and a priest does. Prophet comes on behalf of God to declare the Word of God to the people. The priest goes on behalf of the people to God to let their needs be known, to intercede on their behalf, to make intercession. So the priesthood was a vital component in Israel's cult or religious exercise, and so you needed to provide for the Levites. The next section deals with the prohibition of sorcery. The prohibition of sorcery. What's the emphasis in Deuteronomy 18? Israel is not to be governed, or Israel is not to conduct herself the way the pagan nations around them did. You're governed by the law of God. You're governed by the Word of God. You've got priests that function in terms of sacrifice and cult. They appear in the presence of God for you. In terms of hearing from beyond, that comes from God through the prophet. So notice in 18.9, when you come into the land which the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations, the Lord your God drives them out from before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For these nations which you will dispossess listen to soothsayers and diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not appointed such for you." Now incidentally, as you move through the law code, you'll see why the Canaanites were dispossessed from the land. Again, God-haters, pagans, heathens, atheists, agnostics will take the Old Testament and say, wow, look at that. God, the Yahweh of Israel, commands the children of Israel to go in and commit genocide amongst the Canaanite peoples. That's just horrific. No, it was an act of judgment. It was an act of chastening. When the Canaanites engaged in soothsaying and witchcraft and sexual perversion and the sorts of things that they engaged in, God used not-so-righteous Israel as the means of judgment for the less-than-righteous Canaanites. Now what happens when Israel starts to ape the conduct of the Canaanites? He raises up Assyria to drive out the northern kingdom. He raises up Babylon to drive out the southern kingdom. He's not capricious, he's not arbitrary. You go into his land and you pervert it with your godlessness, he's going to judge you. But back to the particular text. The nation of Israel was not to call upon these things or look for a word from beyond via the means that the pagans around them used. They were a nation governed directly by God and the prophetic word was the means by which he would communicate to them. Now verses 15 to 19 underscore the promise of a prophet to come. This is the passage that does tell us that Christ is going to come. Verse 15, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren, him you shall hear according to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb. Remember on the Mount of Transfiguration, when Christ is transfigured before the disciples, and you hear the sound of the Father, the voice of the Father, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. And then what does He say? Hear Him. Well, what's the purpose? It is to emphasize that he is the prophet of Deuteronomy 18. Him you shall hear, according to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb, in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire any more, lest I die. And the Lord said to me, what they have spoken is good. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brethren, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. And it shall be that whoever will not hear my words which he speaks in my name, I will require it of him. And then the passage ends with the penalty for the false prophet. Notice in verse 20, but the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die. And if you say in your heart, how shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken? When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of him. So you have the priest and the prophet in Israel. The people of God were to listen to the prophet of God. They were not supposed to conjure up dead spirits. They were not supposed to engage in the sorts of conduct that is condemned here. You have that instance in 1 Samuel chapter 28, when Saul approaches the witch at Endor because she wants to talk to Samuel. And one commentator on 1 Samuel, David Samura, he says, the very need for such prohibitions is an indication that the problem of necromancy, that's a communication with the dead, and of religious practices related to the dead, was widespread in ancient Canaan. The passage before us Deuteronomy 18 indicates that same thing. You're going in to this land. They've got other gods, they've got other means, they've got other ways that they seek for the Word from their gods. You're not supposed to use that. You're supposed to stay far away from that. Dale Ralph Davis, I think, helpfully points out, he says, we must remember that Scripture describes such practices not as futile, but as pagan. When you look at the witch at Endor situation, I don't think that was Samuel. Commentators are divided. Bible scholars, teachers, they're divided. It was Samuel. Others say it wasn't Samuel. But there was something. I don't think it was Samuel, but it was somebody. It was something. And so what Davis says here is right. He says, we must remember that Scripture describes such practices not as futile, but as pagan. Yahweh forbids Israel to use these means, not because they do not work, but because they are wicked. The attempts by people to dabble in the occult, that stuff is forbidden. That's an abomination. Again, it's not, well, you know, it's useless, it doesn't work. That's not the argument from Scripture. The argument from Scripture is not, don't do it because it's futile and it doesn't work. The argument from Scripture is it's an abomination. It is a rejection of the living and true God. So, of course, the Old Testament condemns sorcery, condemns witchcraft. The New Testament does as well. Remember Simon Magus in Acts chapter 8. He was Simon the magician who wanted to purchase the gift of being able to convey the Holy Spirit on persons. Acts chapter 19. What was one of the besetting sins of the city of Ephesus before Paul came and preached and they got saved? They were into the black arts. They were into occultism. They were into black magic. And then in the book of Revelation at 21 and in chapter 22 you see a condemnation of sorcery. Interestingly it's where we get the word pharmacy. So drugs were used in combination or in concert with sorcery and witchcraft sort of practices. So again, the Word of God condemns it. It's a pagan, heathen, wicked, and abominable practice. So back in our passage in Exodus chapter 22, again it's very cut and dry. You shall not permit a sorceress to live. In other words, this is a capital offense and you must put this person to death. In the next instance, you have the condemnation of bestiality. This is a very unsavory passage of Scripture, but nevertheless, we need to deal with it. Notice in verse 19, whoever lies with an animal, and that of course means sexually, to engage in copulation, whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death. Now, intriguingly, this isn't the only place that the Bible addresses this particular subject. I remember many years ago, we pray for the Hamiltons. We love the Hamiltons. They're active in terms of Myanmar and China. Well, before they were in China, Andy was a pastor. Actually, way back when, he played professional NFL football. He was on the Kansas City Chiefs. And then he was a pastor in Bossier City, Louisiana. And somewhere in his 20 years there, he preached a series of sermons on, you know, sexual fidelity and essential age. Really good messages. Mid-90s. Not sure if they're available anywhere on the internet. But I remember specifically when he got to bestiality, he said, you know, it should cause us as image bearers of the living God to hang our heads in shame, that God even has to address that practice, that he has to even speak to that practice. I think that John Gill hits that nail on the head. He says, this is a crime so detestable and abominable, so shocking and dishonorable to human nature, that one would think it could never be committed by any of the human species. and that there was no occasion for making a law against it. But such is the depravity and corruption of mankind that divine wisdom saw it necessary and to deter from it made it death. It was a capital offense. And for us today to say, well, that was then. It's now, brethren. I mean, there's an alarming amount of stories that come up from time to time about this particular crime, about this particular offense. I think I've told you before that at least he was. I don't know if he's still alive. He's still functioning. I think he still is. His name is Peter Singer. He is the professor of bioethics, I think, at Princeton University. And I remember several years ago, he made the news because he was advocating that bestiality was perfectly acceptable. He said, except with chickens, which leads one to believe or think, why would he say that? I mean, who would say such a thing without some sort of experiential knowledge? But as far as he was concerned, bestiality was appropriate. It was OK. So this isn't so outlandish. And again, it's not confined here. It's in Leviticus 18 at verse 23. It's in Leviticus 20 at verse 15 and 16. And then specifically turned to Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy chapter 27. It's the curses, the blessings and the curses in Deuteronomy 27 and 28. That's how, you know, this book comes to an end. Now there's obviously chapters after 28, but the sort of apex or pinnacle of covenantal sort of arrangement ends with blessings and cursings. There's blessings if you obey the law, and there's cursings if you disobey the law. So if you look specifically at the curses in Deuteronomy 27, notice in verse 21, cursed is the one who lies with any kind of animal. Now, when we look at Deuteronomy, specifically, we look at the children of Israel on the plains of Moab, poised to enter into Canaan. Now, as you can probably surmise with the warnings in Deuteronomy 18 and Leviticus, specifically 18, 19, and 20, the Canaanites had their issues. They were a debauched people. In fact, one commentator says the degree of sexual perversion in Canaanite culture was such that bestiality was fairly commonplace. Hittite laws, for example, even permitted cohabitation with certain animals. Now, again, certain animals were forbidden, but certain animals were permitted. So they didn't have a blanket universal prohibition against bestiality in the Hittite law code. So it wasn't, you know, perhaps as uncommon as one might think in the land of Canaan. And as Western civilization continues its swift decline, I think we're seeing sexual perversion really abounding in ways that perhaps we never thought we would see. So if this particular sin or crime becomes even more pronounced and even more protected and regulated, it seems the logical step with kind of the directions we're going. So, again, we ought to pray that there would be godly leaders, or at least leaders that aren't so debauched as to think that it's okay to mutilate children or to lay with animals. One commentator commenting on Deuteronomy 27, 21, I think brings out why it was wrong. Now, you know, the very supposition that it might not be wrong is obviously foolish, but he points out some things here. He says, it was so serious, because it involved man, created in God's image, having intercourse with animals, which were a lower order of creation. It was, therefore, a total rejection of God's purposes in creation." I think we need to appreciate that argument from creation. Now, there's obvious arguments from redemption that we can make to combat certain sins and crimes, but we ought not to jettison the reality that God, in the created order, through the light of nature, has revealed things that are either right or wrong. And creation is about order, it's about structure, it's about consistency, it's about those things that reflect the goodness of God. So when we invert that created order, that's demonic, that's satanic. You see that sort of in the fall narrative. God makes Adam. to rule over, not in a wicked, vicious way, his wife, to lead, love, and rule over his wife, and they together are to exercise dominion over the animals. What happens when the fall comes? It inverts that whole created order. Now you've got the animal talking to the woman who's passing the fruit to her husband. So it's an inversion of God's created intention right at the outset or right at the entrance of the fall. He goes on to say, moreover, it was a pagan practice in which people thought they could attain union with the deity symbolized by the animal. This would help to explain its presence in the book of the covenant alongside prohibition of sacrifice to any pagan god. So back to our text in chapter 22, that's the next passage. So you've got A prohibition against sorcery, verse 18. A prohibition against bestiality, verse 19. And then a prohibition in verse 20 concerning idolatry. All three of these are capital offenses. All three of them are a direct assault upon the covenantal order that God established at Sinai. And so this is to invert, it is to act in contrast to what God had decreed. So notice in verse 20, he who sacrifices, that's synecdoche, that's a part for the whole, it has to do with worship. The meaning here is, he who worships any god, he who sacrifices to any god except to the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed. So the law speaks to the worship of a false god. The law forbids idolatry. When you look at the the first commandment, you shall have no other gods before me. You shall have no other gods, another translation is, besides me. So you're not to put anything before God, but you're also not to add anything to God. And when you survey the Old Testament, very often the issue with Israel was not an absolute repudiation of Yahweh. It was more of, Yahweh does this, but we need these other gods to sort of help us in that. In other words, it's called syncretism. So at Mount Carmel, when Elijah the prophet lays down his challenge, the god contest, if Yahweh is God, then worship him. If Baal is God, then worship him. More than likely, they weren't repudiating Yahweh. They were trying to add Baal to Yahweh. They weren't just saying, you know, there's no God except for Asherah. There's no God except for Moloch. No, there were probably those instances to be sure, but 2 Kings 17, you can turn there, you see the syncretism very clearly on display. So in 2 Kings 17, this is the fall, of the northern empire, or northern kingdom rather. Remember Israel at the time of Jeroboam and Rehoboam in 1 Kings chapter 12, the kingdom split. You had the 10 northern tribes of Israel, then the two southern tribes of Judah. 2 Kings records the fall of the north in 2 Kings 17, and the fall of the south in 2 Kings 24. So in 2nd Kings 17, notice in verse 24, if you're using the New King James, it says Assyria resettles Samaria. So when the Assyrians would go in and conquer a people, they had kind of an interesting way that they would go about that. They would dispossess the land and they would try to keep people off kilter. They would take mountain people and put them on the sea. They'd take sea people and put them in the mountains. They would do that to weaken the conquered forces so that they could muster and, you know, fight back and ultimately destroy. So in Samaria, which was the capital of the northern kingdom, there were probably, there were Israelites left there. but a large amount of them were taken away, and then other conquered peoples are put in that particular region. So that's the setting. So notice in verse 24, then the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Kuthah, Avah, Hamath, and from Sepharvim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and dwelt in its cities. And it was so at the beginning of their dwelling there that they did not fear the Lord, And before we continue on, you've probably seen passages that talk about hooks and noses. That would be the Assyrians. Another way that they would take these conquered peoples is they would hook their noses and put them on a stringer like fish, and then they would put them in these various places. So again, there's probably still Israelites living there. We see that in the text. But they bring these conquered peoples and a good bit of the Israelites were taken away to other places. So it says in verse 25, it was so at the beginning of their dwelling there that they did not fear Yahweh. Therefore Yahweh sent lions among them which killed some of them. So they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, The nations whom you have removed and placed in the cities of Samaria do not know the rituals of the God of the land. Therefore you sent lions among them, and indeed they are killing them, because they do not know the rituals of the God of the land. Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Send there one of the priests whom you brought from there. Let him go and dwell there, and let him teach them the rituals of the God of the land. Then one of the priests, whom they had carried away from Samaria, came and dwelt in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear Yahweh. However, every nation continued to make gods of its own, and put them in the shrines on the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in the cities where they dwelt. The men of Babylon made Sukkoth, Bainoth, the men of Kuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, and the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak. And the Sepharvites burned their children in fire to Adramelech and Ahimelech, the gods of Sepharvay. So they feared the Lord and from every class they appointed for themselves priests of the high places who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places. The author here expects you to get that he's being ironic. He wants you to understand he is not condoning this practice of marrying your God with Yahweh and saying that they feared the Lord. This is dripping with sarcasm. Because we know that God does not share his allegiance with anybody or his glory with anybody now This is a case of settled peoples taking their gods and marrying them with Yahweh The point is is that Israel did the same thing? Israel look to Asherah Israel look to Baal Israel look to Molech not in their absolute repudiation of Yahweh But as helpers to try to get stuff that they thought would happen So verse 33, they feared the Lord, yet served their own gods according to the rituals of the nations from among whom they were carried away. To this day, they continue practicing their former rituals. They do not fear the Lord, nor do they follow their statutes. Now he's telling you, when they try to marry these things, it's not genuine fear of God. So these are settled peoples marrying their God or using their God along with Yahweh for the express purpose to get the lions out of the land. This is utilitarianism. The point is that Israel herself does this. Turn to the prophet Zephaniah. Zephaniah chapter 1. The prophet announces why God's judgment is coming upon the nation. And in Zephaniah chapter 1, specifically in verse 4, we see this. We'll back up for just a moment to verse 2. I will utterly consume everything from the face of the land, says the Lord. I will consume man and beast. I will consume the birds of the heavens, the fish of the sea, and the stumbling blocks along with the wicked. I will cut off man from the face of the land, says the Lord. I will stretch out my hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. I will cut off every trace of Baal from this place, the names of the idolatrous priests with the pagan priests, those who worship the host of heaven on the housetops, those who worship and swear oaths by the Lord, but who also swear by Milcom, those who have turned back from following the Lord and have not sought the Lord nor inquired of Him. So again, there would have been, in Old Covenant Israel, perhaps, those who repudiated the existence of Yahweh. Oh, there is no Yahweh, there is no true and living God. But most likely, the majority, it would have been syncretism. They wanted Yahweh, but they wanted what these lesser deities would have to offer. And I think Stuart makes the observation well. He says, Syncretism, the merging and blending of religious beliefs, was so common in the ancient world as to be virtually ubiquitous. That means everywhere present. A typical ancient person would not deny that Yahweh existed, but might well deny that he was the only god, or indeed that he was anything other than Israel's national god, i.e. one god among the many gods of many nations. Israel's temptation was to follow this line of reasoning. So they get into Canaan, and the Canaanites that they didn't dispossess, remember they were told to dispossess them. Why do you think God said dispossess them? Because if you don't dispossess them, you're going to be going to bail services with them. You're going to be bowing to bail, praying for rain, just the way your pagan neighbors are doing. So he says, Israel's temptation was to follow this line of reasoning and to appreciate Yahweh as their national God, their national deliverer and defender, but to find in Baal and Asherah the divine expertise for crop and animal fertility. In Dagon, the expertise for grain abundance. That was the particularity or the peculiarity of those gods. So Baal and Asherah had to do with fertility in terms of crops. Dagon, grain abundance. When Samson destroys the grain fields, that is a religious commentary as much as it is a political commentary upon the Philistines. When he burns the grain, he's saying that Dagon, the grain god, can't even do his job and protect your food. He goes on to say, in Molech, the divine expertise for family prosperity. I have to study that one further, because as far as I know, Molech was only good for child sacrifice, so I don't know why they would go for family prosperity. He goes on to say, it can even be said that what the Israelites were tempted to do when they entered into idolatry was never to reject Yahweh outright, but simply to reject his exclusivity. Again, probably there were those, probably a small minority did reject them outright, but the vast majority of the condemnation of idolatry in the Old Covenant is, yes, we serve Yahweh, but we like these other gods because they provide immediate relief for their areas of particular emphasis. And then in terms of the application of this, I don't want to keep us much longer, but Deuteronomy chapter 13. Deuteronomy 13, you can turn there. We won't get into the details. I'll just give you the sort of an overview of what's going on in Deuteronomy 13. But with reference to sort of an amplified version or a three-fold illustration of execution relative to the violation of this particular principle. Chapter 13, 1-5, if a false prophet arises and solicits you to commit apostasy, you are to kill him. Verses 6 to 11, if you are tempted by friends or family, even the wife of your bosom, to engage in apostasy, that person is guilty of a capital offense. And then verses 12 to 18 deals with a public display of revolution in a particular city. Now, there's a religious aspect, obviously, in having other gods before God. But there was also a political aspect involved as well. What are we looking at in terms of the Old Covenant law code? Yes, it's a religious document. Yes, it specifies the terms of worship in terms of Israel's God. But it's a civil law code. It functions as a constitution. What happens when somebody rejects the ultimate authority in the civil polity? We call that treason. And so typically in any body politic, traitors are executed, they're put to death. Craigie makes the observation, he says, the legal penalties noted in this chapter, chapter 13, may seem at first sight to be excessively harsh, but the reason for the severity lies in the nature of the crime. the continued existence of the covenant community depended literally upon allegiance to the Lord of the Covenant. I suggest that's exactly what we see there in Exodus 22. The three capital offenses that are indicated are gross, exaggerated forms of complete rebellion against the final authority of God Almighty. How do you meet that rebellion? You execute them. You put them to death. There's no remediation for them. There's no fixing them. If you're going to engage in witchcraft, if you're going to engage in bestiality, if you're going to sacrifice to another god, you have breached the covenant in such a way that there's no remedy for you. You must be executed in terms of the body politic. He says, thus the crime is considered not simply in light of the actions of the perpetrator, but in light of the effect of the crime on the welfare of the whole people of Israel. Of all potential crimes in ancient Israel, the one described in this chapter was the most dangerous in terms of its broader ramifications. To attempt deliberately to undermine allegiance to God was the worst form of subversive activity, in that it eroded the constitutional basis of the potential nation, Israel. In its implications, the crime would be equivalent to treason or espionage in time of war. So going back to and concluding our study in Exodus chapter 22, these three particular offenses that are capital in nature are a threat not just to the religious order, but to the civil order as a whole. If you are a sorceress, or a sorcerer, or you engage in bestiality, or you sacrifice to another god, the just judgment of God Most High is execution for your crimes. Yes, it's sin. Yes, you shouldn't engage in that, but it's also an outward act of criminal activity, and the sanction appended to it is capital punishment. So in conclusion, I think verses 16 and 17 paradoxically teach us the dignity of marriage. Marriage is to be taken seriously. Fornication is condemned. Sex outside of marriage is not permissible. There's often that caricature that Christians are anti-sex. Christians are not anti-sex. God gave sex, but it's to be utilized in the covenant boundaries of marriage. If it is utilized outside of those covenant boundaries, then it is a sin, and God says, don't do it. So everywhere we see that marriage is good, that sexual relations within marriage is good, and that if you violate that, there is penalty attached. as well, the particular wretchedness of the three capital offenses, we don't need to rehearse them again, and then the maintenance of the covenantal order. So as you look at this particular section, you're going to see its relationships in terms of God, society, God, society. What's the emphasis? If we reject God, if we reject the first table of the law, The second table is probably of no concern to us whatsoever. When you move through the prophets, you see that the prophets condemned the children of Israel, oftentimes in terms of second-table obligation. And the reason why they're engaged in second-table infraction or transgression is because they've abandoned their first-table obligation to the living and true God. You don't have one without the other. If we disregard the living God, we're going to disregard men. But if we love our neighbor as ourself and we function responsibly in terms of the body politic, that is a manifestation or a demonstration that things are most likely right in terms of our relationship to the true and living God. So you see those emphases here in the law code, love to man, love to God. Love to God in order to provide love for God. Well, I'll close in a word of prayer. Our Father in heaven, we thank you for your word. We thank you for its clarity on these matters of capital offense. We thank you as well for the consistency that we find in terms of the issue of marriage and all of the things that you stipulate concerning that. Help us to think wisely and biblically in terms of application of these truths in our own hearts and lives, and with reference to church life in this new covenant era, we know it's not a direct one-to-one correlation, but there is certainly general equity and wisdom that the church needs to navigate according to. Thank you for this time. We bless you for your goodness and for your word, and we praise you through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.