ExodusSample

Some of the content of the laws in the chapter today might seem very foreign to us as modern readers. It is important we take ourselves back to the context these laws were written in, rather than back projecting from our current society onto the ancient Israelites.

When we see it in this way, these laws are actually incredibly counter-cultural for the time. People would go into slavery to pay off debts they owed. The idea that you would let your slave go every seventh year was unheard of. This is connected to the sabbath, one of the ten commandments. We will come back to this in a couple of days.

Even those who accidentally killed someone would have mercy by providing places for them to go, and human life was seen as so sacred that an ox that killed a person would not be eaten.

Overall, this passage shows us that laws are sometimes needed, but there is a higher way. If the Israelites had chosen intimate relationship with God despite their fear, perhaps there would not have needed to be all the intricate and strange laws we read about. This is indicated by Jesus when he says all the laws can be summed up by loving God and loving people (Matthew 22:34-40).

Peter lays out the same call that Yahweh gave to Israel for followers of Jesus: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people” (1 Peter 2:9).