'What' Ain't No Country I Ever Heard Of

I finally finished! I have overcome God's will to bore me to death. He came close, but I prevailed. Now we can move on to Numbers, which I think has some more real murder in it.

Old Testament
Book Three: Leviticus
The Law of Holiness
Chapter 25: Jubilee! Give it all back.
Chapter 26: Piles of Rotting Carcasses
Chapter 27: One more chapter about vows

Chapter 25 was interesting, and chapter 26 was awesome. The latter was the first appearance of the God we all know and love from Jules in Pulp Fiction. Chapter 25 is interesting from a property law point of view. God sets up an interesting system, "jubilee." The authors of the Old Testament enjoyed numbers (see Pi). So in chapter 25, God says that every seventh day shall be the sabbath for rest. Then every seventh year you shall not farm the land, to let the land rest. Then, after seven cycles of seven, after the 49th year, is the year of jubilee. (Sounds a little like Harvest Home, doesn't it?) During jubilee, all land returns to the patriarch. What that means is, no land purchases are actually purchases; they are more like leases. The patriarch (by which I think they must mean the twelve tribes) own the land (through God). Whatever economic activity happens during the 49 years is fine, but then everything is reset in the 50th year.

This system extends to all property, including humans. If a member of a tribe falls on hard times and sells himself into slavery, it is only until the next jubilee. So, if something is sold close to jubilee you calculate how many years are left before it has to be returned. (This is actually rather obvious and God probably didn't need to explain it to us--I think the market would have taken care of it.) Anyway, it's an interesting system, that, it seems, allows for a market economy, but still keeps the land tied to the community. Of course, although God says to do it, no one does this today (I assume they don't even do it in Brooklyn or Israel, right?) It would be interesting to see how disruptive such a system would actually be. Let the rich gather wealth for 49 years, then respread it and start over. I like it.

Chapter 26, God, for the first time, gets medieval on our ass. After 25 long long boring chapters of rules, he tells us what will happen if we disobey. My notes say that this section was a common practice in ancient contracts. First come the terms of the contract, then comes a section of curses in case you breach. I like that too. I think if as an attorney I ever do transactional work I'm going to advocate for a section of curses at the end of every chapter.

God is so good in this chapter, I just want to quote some of it for you. Almost the whole thing is worth repeating, but I will try to pick out the best parts. Oh, it's important to point out once again before I get started that God has already breached his contract with Israel on at least three occasions, and this entire Levite contract is unenforceable because a contract cannot be unilaterally modified without further consideration offered. But anyway, as always, God is nothing if not hypocritical. But he really goes off on Israel here!

First, in verses 3-13, God says all the wonderful things that will happen if we do conform to his statutes. We will get rain at the proper time, he will rid our lands of dangerous beasts, etc. Well, how exactly will this work? After he says all the good things, he says the consequences of disobeying his statutes. Well, does this system work person by person? Or the whole community? Then we get back to the problem he had at Sodom and Gomorrah--what if some people are good and some are bad? The consequences of being bad are hardcore. But if one person is good, how's he going to make it rain on one farm and not the others? How is he going to rid one farm of wild beasts and not the others? Clearly by "you" in this passage he means the collective "you" of all of Israel, but how does an entire community conform to statutes as one?

Anyway, here are the consequences:

"I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting disease, recurrent fever, and plagues that dim the sight and cause the appetite to fail." V. 16

"Those who hate you shall hound you on until you run when there is no pursuit." V. 17. I love that.

The structure of this section is what the notes call "progressive intensification." So first, I'll do these things. If you still disobey, I will do the following, and so on. Above was the first round. Then:

"I will break down your stubborn pride. I will make the sky above you like iron and the earth beneath you like bronze. Your strength shall be spent in vain." V. 19-20.

Next intensity:

"I will multiply your calamities seven times." V. 21.

"I will send wild beasts among you; they shall tear your children from you, destroy your cattle and bring your numbers low; and your roads shall be deserted." V. 22 (Is Cormac McCarthy's book referring to this verse?)

Now it ratchets with every threat.

"If in spite of this you do not listen to me and still defy me, I will defy you in anger, and I myself will punish you seven times over for your sins. Instead of meat you shall eat your sons and daughters. . . . I will pile your rotting carcasses on the rotting logs that were your idols, and I will spurn you." V. 27-30.

"I will scatter you among the heathen, and I will pursue you with the naked sword; your land shall be desolate and your cities heaps of rubble." V. 33.

"I will make those of you left in the land of your enemies so ridden with fear that, when a leaf flutters behind them in the wind, they shall run as if it were the sword behind them; they shall fall with no one in pursuit." V. 36.

That's about it for the fire and brimstone language. But another verse makes it explicit how God repeatedly goes back on his word. "If then their stubborn spirit is broken and they accept their punishment in full, I will remember my covenant with Jacob [and Isaac and Abraham]." He already made this promise; he has no right to put conditions on his performance now!

Leviticus ends with a whimper, with a few more rules about payments and things.


--bibletoenail