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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.