A Study of Jewish Law
-The Covenant of Destruction-
-The Laws of Lending & Slavery-
provided as a public service by
The Tom Shepherd World Educational Foundation
Overview: The descendants of Abraham, the Israelites, have become slaves in Egypt. Yet God promised Abraham to be the God of his descendants, to bless them and provide a homeland for them. Exodus tells how God keeps his promises through a series of miracles and wins the Israelites' freedom. The Israelites are then led into the Sinai by the 80-year-old Moses.
Exodus 34:10-14
And Moses said: Behold, I make a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels such as have not been done in all the Earth, nor in any nation. Observe what I command you this day. I am driving out before you the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite. Take heed to yourselves, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you are going, lest it be a snare in your midst. You shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images, for you shall worship no other god than I, for I am a jealous god.
Overview: The Israelites were led by Moses to an encampment near Mount Sinai, where he claimed God gave him His law, which included: (1) Sacrifices for sin; (2) The establishment of a priesthood; (3) Rules for ritual and moral purity; (4) The institution of religious holidays; (5) The rules of lending to the poor; and (6) The law concerning slavery
Leviticus 25: 35-38
If one of your brothers becomes poor, and falls into poverty then you shall help him like a stranger or a sojourner. You shall invite him to live with you, however, you may take no usury or interest from him: you shall not lend him money for usury, nor lend him your food at a profit.
I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt in order to give to you the land of Caanan and to serve as your God.
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The Laws of Slavery
Leviticus 25: 39-51
If one of your brethren who dwells by you becomes poor and sells himself to you, you shall not compel him to serve as a slave. As a hirred servant and a sojourner he shall be with you and shall serve you until the Year of Jubilee. Then he shall depart from you, he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family. He shall return to the possession of his fathers. For they are My servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves. You shall not rule over them with rigor.
As for your male and female slaves whom you may have, from the nations that are around you, you may buy male and female slaves. Moreover you may buy the children of the strangers who dwell among you, and their families who are with you, which they beget in your land; and they shall become your permanent property. And you may take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit as a possession. They shall be your permanent slaves. But regarding your brethren, the children of Israel, you shall not rule over one another with rigor.
Now if a sojourner or stranger close to you becomes rich, and one of your brethren who dwells by him becomes poor, and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner close to you, or to a member of the stranger's family, after he is sold he may be redeemed again. One of his brothers may redeem him, or his uncle or his uncle's son may redeem him; or anyone who is near of kin to him in his family may redeem him; or if he is able he may redeem himself. Thus he shall reckon with him who bought him: The price for his release shall be according to the number of years, from the year that he was sold to him until the Year of Jubilee. It shall be according to the time of a hired servant for him. If there are still many years remaining, according to them he shall pay the price of his redemption from the money with which he was bought.
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various scholarly perspectives
Questions for the student:
Are the laws of The Torah compatible with democracy?
Is the philosophy of the Torah compatible with the American way of life today?
Why do you think American slavery came about?
Why do you think the Holocaust came about?
Why do you think the Palestinian people today resent the Israelites?
Why do you think synagogues, temples and churches are desecrated even in the 21st Century?
Would you honor a god that authorizes the destruction of other peoples' houses of worship? Would you honor a god that authorizes slavery?
Would you respect those people who honor such a god?
Do you understand why some people have abandoned the barbaric, god-fearing philosophies and declared themselves Egalitarians, Humanists or Buddhists? Think about it.
Did you know that during World War II an estimated 150,000 German Nazi soldiers were half-Jews, who had been disenfranchised by their own Orthodox Jewish people simply because their mothers were Aryan or Gentile?
Did you know that of the 36,000,000+ people who lost their lives during World War II, 6,000,000 reportedly were Jews and 30,000,000+ were Gentiles, including those American Armed Forces servicemen, predominantly Gentile conscripted enlisted men, who laid their own lives on the line to end fascism.
Nazism, Judaism, Hinduism and Islam are ALL fascist philosophies.
Read: Hitler's Jewish Soldiers:
The Untold Story of Men of Jewish Descent in the German Military
by Bryan Mark Rigg
Browse sample pages from Rigg's book and purchase from Amazon.com
by and about
Bryan Mark Rigg
See book list at
Amazon.com/books
My Journey into Buddhism
by Brother Tom Shepherd