BibleProject - Deuteronomy Q + R

Episode Date: April 7, 2017

This week is our second to last release in our Old Testament Q+R series. We talk Deuteronomy. It's an interesting read. Moses is delivering his farewell address, a soliloquy urging Israel to follow God and his commandments. But some of his commandments seem pretty strange, especially to modern Westerners. Why did God have commandments about how slaves should be treated? Did he approve of slavery? And what about Israel's treatment of other nations when they would invade? Tim and Jon discuss these questions and many more. Thank you to all our supporters! You are so meaningful to us! Q's and Timestamps: What does "love the Lord your God with all your heart soul and mind mean"? (8:25) What does “the Lord is one” mean in the Shema? (20:40) Is there the Holy spirit in the Old Testament/ in Deuteronomy (22:45) Why did ancient Israel have slaves? (23:30) Giants in the bible? Deuteronomy mentions giants, are these connected to the Nephilim in Genesis 6? (31:05) What do the laws in Deut 20 mean about taking a wife as a captive from war? (36:53) Does obeying the law teach you to love God? (40:35) What is the true context of Deuteronomy? (44:30) Links: Original video conversation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ANVZLvXfvc Deuteronomy videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMhmDPWeftw and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5QEH9bH8AU Music Credits: Defender Instrumental by Rosasharn Music

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Hi, this is John at the Bible Project. In this week's episode of the podcast, we're gonna release another live question in response we did on a YouTube last summer. This time, we're talking about the Book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy is a great book. It's a speech by Moses. It's his last words to ancient Israel as they prepare to enter the Promised Land.

We cover a lot of great questions, including a discussion on the Shaman, a prayer found in the Book of Deuteronomy. We address the question, why did God allow ancient Israel to have slaves? And what's the deal with the Bible talking about giants that lived in the land? Were there actually giants back then? Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Hey everybody.

Hello. Welcome to this week's Bible project, live Q&R. Mm-hmm. It's Tuesday. It's Tuesday. It's Tuesday, and we are going to be talking about Deuteronomy. Yeah, we want to field your questions on the book of,

oh, well, right, in the Greek tradition. Deuteronomos. Deuteronomos. Deuteronomos. Deuteronomos. Dutorum, Mottos, Dutorum, Adi. I said Adi. Dutorumus. Dutorumus, yeah. Dutorum, in the read scripture version, we talk about, we highlight it, because it's kind of helpful.

If Dutorum is second, and then Nomean or Namaas is law, so it's Moses going through the law. Second law. Yep. Second time. Second time, repeating the law. Second law. Yep. Second time. Second time. You're reading through the law. In the Hebrew tradition, which is older than the Greek names, it's called Devareem, the words.

The words. The words. That's awesome. It's the first line in the book. I feel like the Hebrew names of these books are way better in the wilderness for numbers. Yep. That's a way better name. Totally better name.

The words, a way better name. Yep. The words. If we have a new art, the bit of it is called Vajakra, and he called out, it's the first word of the book. And he called out. And God called out to Moses. Anyway. Deuteronomy, or the words, otherwise known as. So let's just do like an overview of Deuteronomy or the words, otherwise known as. So let's just do like an overview of Deuteronomy.

Deuteronomy, crown jewel of the Torah alongside Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus and Numbers. Which is the Torah as the crown jewel. Let's talk about the Torah in general. Oh. So first five books, this is the last of this five. We call it the Torah. You also hear the word petitouk, a lot, this is the last of this five. We call it the Torah. You'll also hear the word petitouk a lot, which is the Greek. Yeah, that's right. The penitouk is a Greek name. Penta means five, tukas means scroll. And again, that Greek title, earliest we can trace it back, is in the mid-100s AD. So the oldest way that this work is referred to

is called Torah Moshe, the Torah of Moses or Hath Torah. That's how it's referred to as Renemaya and the prophet. That's how the biblical authors refer back to this thing. You refer to it as the Torah. The Torah. Or the Torah of Moses. So they don't view it as a five separate books. They view it as one unified literary work.

Which is, affects how you read it. Especially a book like Deuteronomy, because it really, even though it's one big speech, it's one long collection of speeches from Moses, but it's set into the narrative of the Israelites going through the wilderness on their way to the promised land, which itself is carrying on the story from Mount Sinai and the Exodus and Abraham and so on. So this is Moses' speech to the children of the Exodus generation. So the people who were adults, when they all went out of slavery in Egypt, they died in the wilderness because of the whole debacle.

Yeah, imagine that you spent your entire life. And this is all you knew. You lived in the wilderness. Yeah, being on the go. You traveled around like, let's see, we're bored at Mount Sinai. Yeah, right. Yeah, right. Yeah, being on the go. You traveled around. Let's see, we're born at Mount Sinai. Yeah. Right?

Yeah, right. Yeah, she is. And all you know of life is you travel around. And you collect man- So, you collect man- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, You just heard stories. You just heard stories. Yeah. And life is wandering around. And now you need to know why you're going into the land. Yeah. What's expected of you.

And the story that you're a part of. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. So Deuteronomy, an interesting film is just to like, it is. That person growing up in the wilderness. And then. Yes.

And just that setting helps explain so much of what Deuteronomy is. In terms of the shape of the book, I hope you guys... Yeah, you can see the poster, the shape of the book, at the core, it's a big section, 12 to 26 chapters. It's Moses... You go to my screen, I have it up. Oh yeah, it's Moses repeating, and as it says,

in the first chapter, he's expounding on the laws. This section right here. Yep, it's one of the tracings. In the middle, yeah. But chapters 1 to 11 read like a collection of sermons, and that's Moses getting passionate with the children of the Exodus generation. Don't be like your parents. Be faithful to the

covenant, God rescued you, he loves you, he wants to bless the nations through you, so obey the laws of the Torah for goodness' eggs. And then the Shema is part of the Shema's heartbeat of that, so there's already some questions we'll talk about that. And then this final third section. It's another sermon like collection, and actually, but Mahir Moses shows his hand. So he says, follow the Torah. Don't be like your parents. Here's the terms of the covenant for you all over again.

Yeah, and then down here, right in the poems of warning. And then here, at the end, he says, first of all, I know that you're gonna fail. Yeah. If Moses was a coach, he would be a failure of a a coach because it's like the locker room speech before the game Yeah, and what he's saying is I know you're gonna lose you're gonna fail abysmally. Yeah, be a bad half-time speech I wouldn't have that ever happened zone half-time speeches. I was thinking about that and one of the The final NBA games with I think the

Warriors were down by like 30 points or something at halftime. And what if you just kind of like, all right guys, correct? What's our best option? Yeah, let's just lose gracefully. Go out gracefully. But what he says is, on the other side of your failure, God's going to fulfill his promises that he made to Abram to bless all the nations.

And so where Deuteronomy sets you at the end of the Torah is God is going to bless all of the nations through this family somehow, but this family is going to fail miserably. So the only way forward is for God, as Moses says, to do some act of grace to transform the hearts of his people so that they can obey him and so on. So the book of Deuteronomy, even though it's full of law, culminates in a promise of God's grace for people who break the law. The word love appears in Deuteronomy more than any book in the Old Testament. Yeah, that's crazy. Yep. Not the whole Bible, just the Old Testament. Not the whole Bible. John, it's second only to John. Got it.

But the gospel of John takes the cake there. All about love. Yeah. So it's really, it's an amazing Deuteronomy's an incredible book where he's trying to shape the identity of this new generation. Yeah. So there you go.

Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy. We've done two videos on Deuteronomy. Yeah. Yep. There you go. I think that Do you know what I mean? We've done two videos on Deuteronomy. The words on Deuteronomy. Yep. There you go. I think that's kind of our overview. Cool.

So let's jump in to the questions. Oh good. We've got a lot now. Great. Well, let's start with the Shema. The Shema. Part of the centerpiece of Moses' speech in chapter 6. It's kind of a condensed form. If you want

to memorize any lines from Deuteronomy or get with the heartbeat of the book of the Bout is what Israel is called to do, it's the Shema. Yeah. Is this Ben's question? Is that what you're going to do? Um, sorry, there's two. You're going to read it. Yeah, great. Yeah, let's do Ben, Ben Brown's question. Yep. So Ben Brown asks, what does the shaman mean by Love God with quote all your heart soul and strength. Mm-hmm. What does it look like to love God in these three

ways? Yes, so yeah, because it does say love the Lord your God with all your heart all your soul all your strength. Mm-hmm. So Was he just being really thorough there? Why not love God with all your mind, or with all of your intellect, or wit? Love God with all your wit. Your wit, or brain. Yeah, or brain.

Well that was actually easy, because there's no Hebrew word for brain. Yeah, or brain. Well, that was actually easy because there's no Hebrew word for brain. They didn't even have a concept of that this was the center of all that. They must have had a word for the fleshy stuff inside someone's head. The gray matter? Yeah, they probably did. It didn't occur in the Bible. Doesn't show up in the Bible. So heart, if you study the way heart is used throughout the Old Testament, heart is where

you feel, so that's similar to how we use the word heart. In fact, that's about the only way we use the word heart in our culture. This is feelings, emotions. Yeah. So that's true in the Old Testament, but there's many, many uses of heart that have to do with your will and desire and volition. Where you make decisions based on what you want. It's about choice and desire. We say that, we kind of have that as well, the desire of my heart.

Oh, you're on strike. Yeah, okay, desire. But you don't really make a decision with your heart, but your heart has desires. Yeah, it's more like, I went with my heart on that one, more like kind of like your heart. Yeah, instead of thinking it through, I went with my heart. Yeah. But in Hebrew, thinking it through

would be done in your heart as well. That's right. Okay. Yeah, that's right. So there's no brain where your desires and will, what you want, and where you choose things. That's what we're thinking about. And feel things that's all based on here in your heart.

Isn't that interesting? Yeah. So your sense of self is down here. More. Correct. For us, our sense of self is here. The brain. Yeah, brain-centered.

Yeah. Yeah. And then Hebrew culture, it was heart, and then gut self is here. Brain centered. Yeah. Yeah. And then Hebrew culture, it was heart, and then gut, where you feel deep emotion. That's in the gut. In your own. Literally intestines. In intestines. Yeah. Your gut.

Yeah. So you can get angry in your intestines, stuff like that. But so, so first of all, so love with your heart is about your choice and commitment. So, isn't just about your passion, it's also about your... Yeah, we think love with all your heart conjure up warm fuzzies. What Moses is saying is, it's a choice that you make to be faithful and devoted to the God who rescued you. And it's about getting to a place where that's what I actually want and desire.

So that's heart. And then soul is our best English word, but it doesn't. It doesn't get, so the Hebrew word is nefesh, which literally means throat. Huh. It's used throat. Yeah. So the Lord you got with all your heart. Like the deer pants for the water. So my nefesh pants after you, oh God. Wow. Where does the deer pant? So should the salt, should that salt actually be translated through? So my throat longs

after you. Well, it's, but your throat there is a metaphor. It's a metaphor. It's the central organ that where you breathe through and where you eat through. And so because of metaphor for what? A metaphor for your very being, where you're very self. So nephus, so, so your sense of self and the sense of your, sorry, or back to heart. It's the passageway to your core your, sorry, go back to heart. It's the passageway to your core. So let's go back to heart.

So the sense of self is your heart is your desires, but also how you like your decision-making faculty is down here in your chest. Your deep desires are down here in your belly. But your passageway, the passageway to it, yeah, you would think of as like your innermost being, or you're like, yeah. And it's just, that's a very, there's a small set of occurrences where it seems to refer specifically to throughout.

Okay. But that's sort of like, like many words, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's where we came from. Originally, when someone was like, how do I describe the essence of myself? Well, the word I'm going to use is the same word as throat, because when we talk about panting, as a dear pants, so my nefesh pants for God. And it's all about, because it's okay. Yeah, isn't that interesting?

So then nefesh just becomes a way of saying, your whole self as a living being. It does not mean the non-material part of you that survives after death. That's a more of a Greek thought. It does not have that idea anywhere in the Old Testament. And arguably, you can hardly even find that meaning in the New Testament except for one or two occurrences. But for the most part, that word soul, when you read meaning in the New Testament, except for one or two occurrences.

But for the most part, that word soul, when you read that in the King James, is there a connotation, connection to voice? Your voice comes from your throat? Is what really bad puppets asked? It's not. I think it's about the passage of life. It's the entry way to your being.

And then it just comes to be a way to describe someone's being as a living creature. So, heart has to do with your decision and will and desire. Your nefesh has to do with your whole being. So, with your desires, with the whole of your being, which includes your desires, but it also includes your body. Your whole body. Because it's the entrance to your whole body. That's right.

If your brain's not here and that doesn't matter, really your head is just to put stuff into the rest of your body. Correct. Like, yeah, yeah. Which is weird. We think about, what's frees our head so in the future, we can still be around someday. So for for us like our ads the most important part they would

have frozen the torso i get but the whole thing but most most significantly from here down that's what i've never thought the john colons bring cryogenics into the ronnie so and then last thing is your strength is our best English translation, meh-ode.

So think in Genesis where God says that the world that he's made is good. Good, good, good. But then on the last occurrence, he says, very good. That's the same word meh-ode. It's the word much or very. So with all of your muchness. So, with every, my paraphrases, with everything that you have.

With your physical, like how much you could bench press. That's not what they're doing. Yes, with your entire capacity. So, with your whole emotions, with your whole being, and then everything that you are capable. Everything you're capable of. Yeah, that's it. So not just your capability. Yeah, it might like, I'm going to listen to God.

Look at my muscles. Yeah, with every capable moment, and opportunity you have, opportunities, I'm going to devote those to showing love and faithfulness to God. Did the Shema. It's a little universe into itself. Why is it really? I'm kind of disappointed in how little I knew about that. Yeah, the Shema.

So that becomes, it's very early entered into the Jewish prayer traditions. And your possessions with your muckiness, include your possessions, Ben Brown asked. Oh, I'd have to do a little homework on that off the top of my head. The word in this context, what's you talk about? Your heart and your being to talk about your mood is talking about your capacity.

I guess it includes what you have at your disposal. Yeah, is talking about your capacity. I guess it includes what you have at your disposal. Whichever you're disposable. The tools you have, the stuff. But it's not limited. Are all three of these together found in other literature? Does it represent... Not my ode.

This is not my ode. The might or the strength. Shun Horton just asks, is a three together in idiom for everything? For sure, like okay. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, it is idiom, but it's a much more powerful way because it's identifying your will and emotions

with your whole body and being and with every capability and opportunity that you have. It's a little left out. Yeah, it's beautiful. And then what about the Shmau Shmau Shmau? Now why does, now Jesus says, what are you doing with all your mind? Yes, he does.

So, and that was someone brought that up. Yes, he does. Yes, yes, in, um, wait for it. Wait for it. So this is then the book of Matthew. Logan Roland, why does Jesus add mind? It's a good question. Logan. It's a great question. I'm just looking up. This is in Matthew chapter 22. Where? You want to go to his? Boom. An expert in the Torah, test Jesus, saying, which is the greatest commandment, and he says,

the first is the Shema. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and with all your mind. Boom, boom, boom. That's not in the Shema. Yeah, you know what else is interesting is that this is in the parallel version of that in the Gospel of Mark where Jesus says, he actually quotes a whole shema of all the commandments somebody asked in which is the most important. The most important one Jesus answers is, listen to Israel, the Lord of God, the Lord is one. So we quote, quotes the first line.

Yeah. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. Oh, so it's an added. So in Mark, in Mark, it's four things. Jesus has added one, and then I think actually Matthew has edited Mark's account to make it three again to match the, but that's a whole other conversation that's fascinating. So is it because possibly... So Jesus adds mine? Because now there's a new category of thinking about thinking, which is we use our brain, our mind. Yeah, correct. What's the Greek word?

I just want to make sure, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, no, that's just uniquely Matthews. Yes, you know. Is that the word? Nus, yeah, with all your mind. So it's adding specifically the mental category, which... Which was there in the Shema in heart, but now in this culture, in this Roman culture.

It's Jesus creatively expanding on the Shema. To add in... He's translating. Yeah, yeah,ema. To add in these translations. He's being a good cultural translator. Cultural translator. That's right. I think it's probably more to it. I could do more homework on that. I'd love to hear what it's like.

What would be a good cultural translation in English? What people think. Oh, well, when I say it at the end of our Sunday gatherings at Door of Hope, I often pray the Shema, and I translate it as with all of your heart, with all of who you are, and with everything that you have. That's my common language. Paraphrase, no. But that's included. She's just who you are. That's a good point.

That's actually a really good point. Great. Thank you, Ben Brown, for launching us on that long exploration of the Shema. Well, let's talk about one more thing in the Shema. I mean, it takes much time, but the Lord is one. Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay. So, listen to Israel, the Lord our God.

The Lord is one. Literally, is how it reads in Hebrew. In many English translations, preserve that. That's how most people know it. That's the Lord is one. The challenge there is I don't think that communicates to English readers what Moses was trying to get across. Moses isn't trying to make a philosophical statement about the unity of God's being. If you look in the context, it's all about Israel as to worship only the God of Israel, not any other gods.

So he's using the word one there, not as an analysis of God's internal something, whatever that means, that's a metaphor. Okay. Pointing to my body. You know the part of the metaphor. He's one kind of body. But he is the one God for us. In contrast to the many other gods that they're going to be tempted to be devoted to

in the land of Canaan. So that's why many English translations, and that's who we went with, in the translation here, is love the Lord alone. Yeah. Like, he's the only one. He's the only one. The only one.

Yep, the Lord. Love the Lord, your God. The Lord our God is the only God for us, and love that God with all your heart. So there you go. So we're taking a view there on what the meaning of that word is. We could be wrong, though I think if you study the usage of the word one, it's commonly

it can be used as to mean alone, not just single. But what else could it mean? It could mean you could be referring to the God as a two? Correct. Yeah, that would be just single one. But what else could it mean? It could mean you could be referring to the God isn't too? Correct. Yeah, that would be the other one. The God isn't one deity manifest in multiple ways, or manifest in multiple forms of deity, that kind of thing. Synchresly asked, did they know about the Holy Spirit back then?

We're going to be doing a theme video on the Holy Spirit. It is coming out sometime this year. We're working on it right now. The Holy Spirit is a major player in the storyline of the Torah. Moses, in fact, in Numbers 20, 11, Numbers 11, wishes that God's Spirit would inhabit and transform the hearts of all of God's people. So most of his hope was in the Spirit, transforming Israel so they could actually fulfill the Shema. So yeah, the Holy Spirit, it's a significant player in Natorah.

Already. Okay. Other questions, let's see. Garen Forsyth, you had a question, when Moses gets into the laws right here, there's a number of laws about slavery in the section of Deuteronomy. So Garen Forsyth, you're asking, how would you address someone's questions about slavery in the Torah?

What, like, what would the question be? Why is there slavery? Here's a common question. Why did God allow slavery? In Israel. If Israel is supposed to be some form of a renewed humanity or a light to the nations. Why would God allow Israel to keep perpetuating this institution of slavery like the other nations around them?

That's a great question. It's a really good question. So there is a first thing. Deuteronomy chapter 15 is the center of almost all the laws about slavery in Israel. It's really significant to note one, when I know not everybody on the live stream is an American, but for Brits, for people who live in the UK, for people in America,

for whom the Atlantic slave trade is a huge part of a plot you know, a bloat on our history. So our western minds are trained to think of certain things, even when we hear that word, that we cannot import into the Bible. So they didn't, they didn't, slavery was different. It was different. The Atlantic slave trade was very complex, but I think it was one race

for people group, you know, conquering and then enslaving another. So it was based on ethos. It was a different type of human. A sub-human. Yeah, sub-human. And it was often based on criminal forms of kidnapping these people. So none of that stands for slavery in ancient Israel. So who were the slaves? So in Israel, the way it's described, the most common form of slavery was what you could

call debt slavery. Okay. So it's basically when somebody declares bankruptcy in ancient Israel, what you, your debts don't get absolved yet. You got to work it off. You work it off. So if I, you know. So I work for your family now until I can pay back. Yeah, basically the person that you owe, you go live on their land, all your property becomes theirs and you become their property until you work off the loan.

And slaves could actually hold very high social positions. So that's another difference. Think of Joseph, he was a slave in Egypt and he ran an entire prison facility. Like a CEO, would. So slavery didn't indicate necessarily your spot in society, but it did mean that you were someone else's property, even if you held a really influential position. So here's what's significant about the laws of slavery in Deuteronomy 15 is every seven

years, it was called the sabbatical year, that every seven years all debts would be canceled and all slaves who had debts that made them slaves were to be canceled in separate. I thought that was every 49 years. Every 49 years, which is every 7-7 years, becomes the year of Jubilee. And there, it's true again, all debts are canceled, slaves are released. And then all a land that might have been lost

because of that family going bankrupt gets returned back to its original family tribe. That's Jubilee. So, even though, so here's what God's doing. It seems with slavery. It's so altering it, altering the institution through the seven year cycle, that it's a reminder that it's not.

That would have been revolutionary. I just, yeah, absolutely. Jubilee, what every seven years? Yeah,, I mean it still sounds kind of ridiculous like the Jubilee or Seven years I can just like cancel my credit cards and black sorry guys. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah, the Jubilee or so out of control Upside down yeah for ancient cultures. It actually doesn't even seem like the Israelites really ever did it We don't have this year is the Jubilee Come and just said 2016. 2016.

Is that true? Well, I feel like I should know something like that, but I didn't, but that doesn't mean it's not. It just means I didn't. I haven't kept up with it on a modern calendar. Anyway, yeah, the year of Jubilee. So someone once put it to me this way that I think puts it in cultural perspective for why God, this is another example of God working with Israel as he finds them.

Where he meets them and Israel doesn't, they're not a completely alien culture as they go into Canaan. They look like an ancient Near Eastern people group, but in profound ways God calls them to transform the way they live as a society in a way that is the city on the hill and the light to the nations. Someone once put it this way, if you can imagine in our world a life without electricity in the modern world It would be that radical of a shift to just up and overnight for God to say no slavery whatsoever Which doesn't mean that you should have done it, but what God appears to have done

There's this is real on a trajectory Just a system for them to be able to do that. They're not to be brand new types of. Yeah. Well, everybody. Yeah, it would be like an alien culture dropped off of Mars. So anyway, I think it doesn't deal with attention fully. But it is important for us modern Westerners

who live in cultures where in theory slavery has been abolished to not just import our view of things onto the Bible. And essentially from now we'll look back at the time we're living in. Oh yeah. And it'll be like wow those guys were doing that and they're calling themselves Christians. Yeah, yes, totally.

Like, and God was putting up with it. Yeah, they bought all their groceries and plastic bags, they threw away. Not important, like what was this, except it probably? was putting up with it. Yeah. They bought all their groceries and plastic bags. They threw away. Not in Portland. What was it, except in Portland? It's illegal in Portland. You know, I was in the very lion in Zoot Pans.

There was a show called Portlandia, if you don't know it. And there was a skit that was real popular about someone getting arrested for using plastic bags at a grocery store. And I was actually, I lived near that grocery store. It was in that skit. And I was in that line checking out a couple weeks ago and I didn't have a bag. I got a paper bag from anywhere. I like getting paper bags because I use them as trash. Sorry, that's random. Okay, let's see. We talked about the Shema, we talked about slavery. Let's see. Should we we talked about the Shema we talked about

slavery Let's do a fun interesting one. Shall we? Yeah, I'm about giants. Oh Let's see here's what I'm about giants. Is there more? Garen you asked one about giants, but somebody else did too Garen will go with yours, but a number of you asked about the giants so Deuteronomy mentions people who are giants. Are these connected to the Nephilim that appear in Genesis 6? If so, how? Garen, and all of you who asked about the giants of the Bible.

It's a great question. It's crazy. It's a giant, it's a big, large people. I mean, there's still giant people around today. Yeah, so let's play for the NBA. Let's try it. Let's try it in context. Almost every culture of every time in human history has had unusually large people who

could perform great feet. Some nationalities more than others. Some nationalities. Yeah, that's correct. yeah, that's, yeah, exactly. So, when the Israelite tribes go in to investigate the land in the previous book of the Torah numbers, they said they saw people there who were tall, like the Nephilim, we were like grasshoppers in their eyes. And at the beginning of Deuteron,

I mean, you're intimidating. Oh, yeah. You're like, spying out these people that you're supposed to displace. And they're massive. Yes. Yeah, imagine. And you're just like,

their doors are bigger, their castles are probably bigger. Yeah. You know, we're perhaps the Hebrew people, especially small. Oh, you know, that's interesting. I haven't done a ton homework on this, but I do know that a Semitic people groups tended to be shorter. And I really, I just know this, there was a group of British scholars who did a survey of every known

Jewish skeleton from the second temple period in and around Jerusalem and the average height of a male was mid five foot Mid five foot mid five so it would be very five five six Yeah, but then they tried to reconstruct based on the shape of the skulls what what Jesus would have looked like if he was an average Jewish man. Google it, it's really fascinating. He's not attractive at all. How do you Google that? Google, let's just, let's do it. I've done it before, but I forget.

Let's see. British, scholars, Jesus' face. British scholar Jesus' face. British scholar Jesus' face. The real face of Jesus. Popular mechanics. Popular mechanics. Yeah, there it is. View Google, British scholar Jesus' face.

Oh, maybe you're all looking at it. No, I don't. I don't update Adobe right now. There it is. You never wanna update Adobe, that's amazing. So that's the face of a mid five foot average Judean, living in and around. And they can figure that out from the shape of the skull.

Correct, I don't know how. But there you go. There you go. So that isn't what Jesus looked like. That's what a average Jewish man looked like of which Jesus was. Yeah, yeah. That could have been Jesus' friend. So here's what's average Jewish man looked like of which Jesus was. Yeah, that could have been Jesus' friend.

So here's what's also interesting then. There have been numerous tombs found on the east bank of the Dead Sea in and around southern Israel, which was ancient Canaan, where unusually large skeletons were found. I was just reading you a dictionary entry, because Moses refers to large people in the land of Canaan. He calls them in Deuteronomy, the Anakim, the Anakites, the Anakim. That's what Moses calls them.

Yeah, that's right. And I was reading in the dictionary entry about the Anakim, an anchor Bible dictionary. There have been tombs found. One in particular, there were two female skeletons found that were seven feet tall. Yeah, that's a large female. The date to this time period.

So the Philistines that produced Goliath, they were actually, their whole culture was imported. They came re-sailed over. Yeah, but they produced galactyl like people. So there you go. Or galacth had some sort of tumor on his growth. Like Andre the giant. Oh, that's what that's what Gladwell was saying in his Malcolm Gladwell. Yeah, there you go. Unusually large. So what is the relationship to the nephilium of Genesis 6? And there we get into the bottomless pit of speculation about what the Nephilim are in Genesis 6. But all that Genesis 6 says, actually Genesis 6 doesn't even say that the Nephilim are the

offspring of the sons of God and women. It just says that in the time period that that happened, the Nephilim were also in the land and that they were great warriors. So this is just the biblical way of referring to ancient, super big, large humans who are incredible warriors. They're called Nephilim. Do we have any words to re-eventify? Do we refer to big people like we's called NBA players?

I don't know I know so little about I had this talk I was working with this guy a super tall. I was like seven foot and Everyone were always asking me plays basketball and He got so frustrated because he because he didn't play basketball. And so his answer became when someone came up to him and said, hey, are you basketball player? You would say, no, do you play miniature golf? That was a great response. Yeah, that was a good response.

That's good. I like that. Pituertary Glenn, that's what I was thinking of Rita. Thank you. Thank you, Thank you Rita. Okay, so there's, I see a number of questions about just different particular laws in the law collection. And all, just to say as a blanket to all of them, there are many laws in here where clearly

God is working with Israel as he finds them. So he doesn't completely abolish certain practices like we would prefer God to, but he tends to work with them and tweak or transform them. So one person had a question about, is this in the like slavery? Okay, sorry, I just saw it in the live feed, so I'll pull it up here. It was a question about the rules of war in Deuteronomy 20, where an Israelite soldier could take captive a king and a woman that he saw and wanted to marry. And if he wanted to do that, she had to shave her head and clip her fingernails and dress in mourning. And

only then can he marry her. So this is actually a good example. We have a whole thing on this in the video about not comparing the laws with modern laws. So we're in a context of the Assyrian empires and later raping, pillaging, that kind of thing. So Israelite soldiers were never to behave like that. They could take as a captive of war a canonite female, and that one bothers me, and it probably bothers many of you too.

But what that soldier was commanded to do was to allow the woman to grieve, shave her head. Which brings a lot of humanity to that point. Yeah, to allow her to grieve, to allow a full, read the law, around me, 20, allow her a whole period of ritual grieving and mourning. That's why she shaved her head for the day. And only then, the fingernail clippings, we don't know what that means. We don't know what that means. Maybe I did.

But, and only then could he marry, then he has to marry her. So just... Which is, again, from our perspective, that whole thing seems screwed up. But think about what's happening there. Israelite soldiers cannot rape. And they can't sleep with women who are captives of war. They have to marry them and commit their lives to them

if they actually want to. So that's a pretty high standard in its ancient context. So that's one example. So all these laws, you always have to remember not to import the way that we see things, but to realize that God's coming and meeting them at where they're at, and then taking them giant leaps forward in ethics. Or even just sometimes a leap forward. Or even just a leap.

You know from our, yeah. So that's why we say in the video, compare the laws in this section with their ancient counterparts, with the code of homerabi the middle a Syrian laws the code of urnamo you can google all these things and find modern translations of them and read them to your hearts delight I specifically recommend if you can't sleep at night that's my opinion so that's So that's a good question. Is there so many good questions coming in?

Yeah. Krusty Short, you asked the question, does following the law teach the Israelites to love God? So that gets to the question of, why is this book that has at the center of it hundreds of laws? You frame them with sermons that use the word love more than any book in the Old Testament. So the short answer to that question is yes. The way that Israel will show its love and devotion to the God who rescued

them is by living according to the terms of the covenant. So the Book of Deuronvi doesn't separate those. It joins them together. The obedience and faithfulness is how they show love. It's not how you do it. And bonus, go read Jesus' upper-room discourse in the Gospel of John and he joins love and obedience to his teachings in the same way. He says, if you love me a little bit, what I command you. So he's there echoing Moses's joining of love and obedience there. So yes, love. Read a

white in Deuteronomy Moses says, what I'm commanding is not too difficult for you, but clearly elsewhere it says they can't obey. So it's too difficult. Or not. Jump into your computer. Jump into my computer. Switch over. Oh, you can still hear. Yeah, my laptop is fine. Great. What do you mean jump onto a laptop?

Is it too difficult? Oh, that's screen. Screen. Oh. Is it too difficult? Oh, that's right. This is the question right here. Yep. Is it too difficult? So, in chapter 30, Moses says, listen you guys, you can obey the laws of the Torah. He says it.

It's not in heaven that you have to go find what God wants you to do. It's not out in the sea. He says it's in your heart for you to be able to do it. So in one sense, Israel is fully capable of living by the terms of the covenant. They could do it if they put some thought to it. However, Moses doesn't say that they can't, what he says is, you don't. And you've shown yourselves incapable by your constant failure. And so there is a tension there. You're right. Moshe says, obey the Torah. But then what he's observed after 40 years,

plus with these people, is that they don't. And that forms the plot conflict that you see at the end of Deuteronomy, where he calls him to obey, but then he says, but you're going to fail. And I know that. And so what he says is the only future hope is for God to circumcise your hearts, to remove metaphorically circumcise, to remove something from your heart, so that you can love an obey. So the whole plot sets you up for God to do something by means of his spirit to transform the hearts of his people. So that tension there is not an accident or a contradiction. It's what the story is trying to show you what needs to happen. That God's people need a heart transplant. We'd also want you to recite the Shema in Hebrew. Oh yes. Do you have a memorized?

I do have it memorized. Shema is Israel. I don't know. I don't know. I have taught the Allah, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Oh, shacha, uvachol, mehodehaha. Strength. With all your muchness. Your muchness. But I did this because how you muchness. This is what I'm capable of.

This is my whole being and this is my heart. Cool, we'll be done. Read a white. Let's see. There's another question up here. Austin, how's. Wait, is that? Do we get all?

No, Amy Reynolds. Amy Reynolds, sorry, Amy Reynolds had a great question. To be true disciples of Jesus, is it essential to study the Bible in this way by understanding history, language, and original intent? That's a great question, and I wanted to do it because Deuteronomy is such a good example of if you only read it in English and never think about its context in the story of the Bible, its context as an ancient document. You can still follow Jesus. Of course you can still follow Jesus. Of course you can. Of course you can. But I do think your understanding of Jesus will be impoverished and less profound and

less integrated than it could be. Because Jesus saw himself as a part of this family and as bringing this story to its conclusion. And he didn't think Deuteronomy could just mean whatever he wanted to mean. He thought it had an intention by an author that is God's intention, melded with the human author's intention to speak to God's people. So I do think that as a follower of Jesus grows,

they owe it to themselves and to Jesus to learn how to read the Bible wisely. It doesn't mean becoming a Bible scholar, but it doesn't mean putting in some effort to learn things that I wouldn't otherwise learn. And look, we got a lot of free time on our hands nowadays. Right? Wikipedia if you have the yeah, to all. Oh, and we have a lot of tools.

A lot of tools. So it's like, people like to learn languages. Yeah. It's a great language. Yeah. Yeah, I never, for one second, I think that everybody should learn Hebrew or Greek. But I do think that if the body of Christ

really is what it is, that there are people who should dedicate themselves to that and then help bring everybody up. I don't have any intention right now in my life to learn Hebrew. Yeah. However, I love learning how that language reframes things in a way that I haven't thought about because you think in language. So if I think about who I am myself, I have language for that in English, so that creates my

paradigms. And when we have these discussions about how it's thought about biblical authors, it stretches the way I have to think. Which I think is really important. It expands your horizons. It's a cross-cultural experience. Just like going to Paris or whatever, Dominican Republic. It expands your humanity. And so learning to read the Bible in a wise, holistic way

also expands your humanity. And I think deepens your devotion to Jesus. So yes, there you go. Let's see. Should we wrap it up? OK, so thank you for being a part of this. Thank you for coming. Thank you, everyone here that donates the project.

It's a super fun to work on this. Yeah, very grateful. Yeah, you guys are awesome. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Bible Project. We've got one more in this series. It's going to be a release on a question and response of the book of Jonah. Just a quick note, the Holy Spirit video that we said we were making in this episode, well, it was made and it's available to watch on our YouTube channel YouTube.com slash the Bible project.

We are incredibly grateful for you joining us and being a part of this project with us. It's joy to work on it and we couldn't do it without you. Thanks for being a part of this with us. you