Leviticus 24: A stoning is ordered

Synopsis:

God is ordering fine oil be burned all the time and some really nice cakes baked for Aaron to eat when a fight breaks out in the camp. This fight is between the son of an Israelite-ish woman (whose father was Egyptian) and a full blooded Israelite. Long story short, the Israelite-ish boy blasphemes God and Moses orders him to be stoned for his crime. He then reiterates the laws about killing and the punishments for these crimes. (Eye for an eye).

In other words:

Someone curses God and is stoned to death by the tribe.

What I think happened.

This is an interesting chapter because in the midst of all these rules, we are given a little bit of conflict between two unimportant people. They are so unimportant that the only person whose name is remembered is the Israelite-ish woman who wasn’t even involved. (She is Shelomith daughter of Dibri of the tribe of Dan). Regardless, something interesting happened and part of the reason why is because the man in question wasn’t a full blooded Israelite. The image this story conjures for me is that some race bating was happening. He was being hassled for not being really an Israelite and he responded by saying I don’t give a crap about your god anyway!  The context is that this is a child of a member of a cult and he is described as a boy, not a man. Regardless, he’s stoned to death. This reminds us we are dealing with a group of religiously radical people.

Favorite bit:

The cakes baked for Aaron. 12 cakes are baked, one cake has 2 tenths a deal of flour in it. Leviticus 24:5)

Moral lesson Learned:

If you find yourself surrounded by members of a cult – keep your religious opinions to yourself (Leviticus 24)