BibleProject - The Law as a Covenantal Partnership - Law E2

Episode Date: May 6, 2019

In part 1 (0-21:00), Tim points out that the laws are not a “law code” but terms of a covenant relationship. The laws are not a “constitutional code” (i.e. a divine behavior manual) dropped from heaven. Rather, they illustrate the official terms of the covenant relationship between Yahweh and the people of ancient Israel. The 613 laws all fall within the ceremony of God’s covenant with Israel in Exodus 19-24. Tim asks the question: If these laws aren’t a judicial code, then what are they? The laws are the shared agreement between God and Israel that was put forth in their covenant ceremony. We witness this relationship between Israel and Yahweh, Tim shares, as outsiders. People today were not at Mt. Sinai when the covenant was ratified. Instead, the law is used as “torah” for us, or “instruction,” meaning they reveal more about ourselves and God and the human condition. The Torah, Tim says, is a narrative about a covenant relationship, not a law code. He points out that there would have inevitably been more rules and laws governing ancient Israel than the 613 laws included in the Bible. In part 2 (21:00-26:00), Tim expresses how the law served as “relational authority” between Israel and God. The laws served as a witness to Israel’s difference from other kingdoms, that they were a “kingdom of priests” who all had a relationship with God. Ancient Law: Examples from History In part 3, (26:00-41:30) Tim explains that to best understand the ancient laws of Israel, one should also understand how other ancient laws worked. Tim brings up the Code of Hammurabi, the most well known ancient law code. Tim shares the start of the law code of Hammurabi: “When lofty Anum, king of the Anunnaki and Enlil, lord of heaven and earth, the determiner of the destinies of the land, determined for Marduk, the first-born of Enki, 6 the Enlil supreme powers over all mankind, made him great among the Igigi, called Babylon by its exalted name, He made it supreme in the world, established for him in its midst an enduring kingship, whose foundations are as firm as heaven and earth— “at that time Anum and Enlil named me to promote the welfare of the people, me, Hammurabi, the devout, god-fearing prince, to cause justice to prevail in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil, that the strong might not oppress the weak, to rise like the sun over humankind, and to light up the land. “Hammurabi, the shepherd, called by Enlil, am I; the one who makes affluence and plenty abound; the one who relaid the foundations of Sippar; who decked with green the chapels of Aya; the designer of the temple of Ebabbar, which is like a heavenly dwelling. “When the god Marduk commanded me to provide just ways for the people of the land (in order to attain) appropriate behavior, I established truth and justice as the declaration of the land, I enhanced the well-being of the people.” The Epilogue and Prologue to the Law Code [From Martha Tobi Roth, Harry A. Hoffner, and Piotr Michalowski, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor] Here are a few laws in the code of Hammurabi: #196: "If a man destroy the eye of another man, they shall destroy his eye. If one break a man's bone, they shall break his bone. If one destroy the eye of a freeman or break the bone of a freeman he shall pay one gold mina. If one destroy the eye of a man's slave or break a bone of a man's slave he shall pay one-half his price." #250 (xliv 44–51) “If an ox gores to death a man while it is passing through the streets, that case has no basis for a claim.” #251 (xliv 52–65) “If a man’s ox is a known gorer, and the authorities of his city quarter notify him that it is a known gorer, but he does not blunt(?) its horns or control his ox, and that ox gores to death a member of the awīlu-class, he (the owner) shall give 30 shekels of silver.” Here is the epilogue of the law: “May any king who will appear in the land in the future, at any time, observe the pronouncements of justice that I inscribed upon my stela. May he not alter the judgments that I rendered and the verdicts that I gave, nor remove my engraved image. If that man has discernment, and is capable of providing just ways for his land, may he heed the pronouncements I have inscribed upon my stela.” The Epilogue and Prologue to the Law Code [From Martha Tobi Roth, Harry A. Hoffner, and Piotr Michalowski, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor] Tim brings up some interesting observations, puzzles and problems that ancient laws present. This code is one of the most frequently copied texts from the ancient world, copies ranging over 1500yrs, and yet, as he quotes: “Of the many thousands of Mesopotamian legal documents in our possession, not one of them cites the Code of Hammurabi, or any other ‘code’ as a source of authority. This in spite of the fact that the code of Hammurabi was esteemed and recopied for more than a millennium. All of this suggests that ancient near eastern law codes were of a literary, educational, and monumental nature, rather than legal and juridical.” (Joshua Berman, Created Equal: 84) The code of Hammurabi was copied and recopied for over a thousand years. But across the centuries, none of the dozens of monetary fines were changed (which they would have if consulted and used for legal purposes). The code is nowhere near comprehensive—you won’t find any laws concerning inheritances, one of the most important features of landed-agricultural life in Babylon. Copies of the Code of Hammurabi have been found in royal archives but never in the sites of local courts, and never with caches of legal documents (receipts, divorce certificates, etc.). Additionally, there are no ancient legal texts that ever cite or even refer to the Code as a source of law. In the thousands of ancient legal texts that do exist and address the same topics as the code, they are usually at odds with the sentences and fines given within it. So, if these compositions were not legal codes, (1) where could the law of the land be found? And if they were not legal codes, (2) what was their purpose? Tim shares this quote: “Archaeologists have unearthed thousands of law-practice documents from the ancient near East, documents such as land transfers, financial contracts, and court rulings where law was applied to actual situations (divorces, civil disputes). There have also been discovered dozens of ancient law codes (Hammurabi, Ur-Namma, Lipit-Ishtar, Eshnunna). A curious problem emerges when these practice documents are compared with the law collections. The law as practiced in those cultures often differed from, even contradicted, the laws as stated in the collections. Penalties found in court decisions are repeatedly inconsistent with the penalties inscribed in the collections. Prices established in contracts don’t match those given in the law codes. This has raised important questions about the purpose of these collections. Whatever their purposes were, they do not appear to have dictated actual legal practice. Scholars have come to see that these law codes as academic and monumental collections, but not the source of law in these societies.” (Michael Lefebvre, Collections, Codes, and Torah, 1) Two Kinds of Law In part 4, (41:30-49:30) Tim explains that the ancient world would have been known as a common or customary law society, whereas our modern world is largely known as a statutory law society. He shares more quotes: “The scholarly consensus is that law in Mesopotamia was customary/common law. A judge would determine the law at the moment of adjudication by drawing on an extensive reservoir of custom, accepted norms, and principles from the legal texts with which he was educated. The law would vary from place to place, and neither the Code of Hammurabi nor any other text was ‘the final word’ on what law should be applied. Indeed, the association of “law” with a written collection of statutes and rules is a modern anachronistic imposition from our own culture. It is no surprise, therefore, that neither Mesopotamia, Egyptian, or Hittite culture has any word for ‘written law,’ that we find in later Greek as thesmos, or nomos.” (Joshua Berman, Inconsistency in the Torah, 112-113) “The law collections, instead, are anthologies of judgments from times past, snapshots of decisions and customs rendered by judges or even by a king. The collections were a model of justice meant to educate and inspire…. They were records of precedent, but not of legislation….they instilled in later generations of scribes a unified legal vision.” (Ibid.) Tim says this has helped him understand three main purposes of the law: Judicial Education texts: Collections of the most common representative decisions from a culture, compiled to train the moral-instincts of leaders, not to legislate actual practice. Monumental Propaganda: Like the Code of Hammurabi, the code praises the king’s wisdom and justice and claims that his decisions are in fact divinely inspired. Educational texts: These are compilations for training the scribal class, introducing them to a literary tradition of justice. 
 In part 5 (49:30-63:00), Tim further delineates the differences between common law and statutory law: Statutory Law The law itself is contained in a codified text, whose authority combines two elements: (a) the law emanates from a sovereign (a king or legislative body, etc.), (b) the law is a finite and complete legal system, so that only what is written in the code is the law. The law code supersedes all other sources of law that precede the formulation of the code. Where the code lacks explicit legislation, judges must adjudicate with the code as their primary guide. Common Law With common law, the law is not found in a written code that serves as a judge’s point of reference or limits what they can decide. Rather, the judges make decisions based on the mores and spirit of the community and its customs. Law develops through the distillation and continual restatement of legal doctrine through the decision of courts. Previous legal decisions are consulted but not binding, and importantly, a judge’s decision does not create a binding law, because no particular formulation of the law is binding. The common law is consciously and inherently incomplete, fluid, and vague. Under common law, legal codes are not the source of law, but rather a resource for later judges to consult. Tim shares a helpful metaphor from Sir Matthew Hale (“the greatest British common-law judge of the 17th century”): The common law can change and yet still be considered part of the same legal “system” just as a ship can return home after a long voyage and still be considered the “same” ship, even though it returns with many repairs, new materials, and old materials discarded and replaced. In the same saw, law collections create a system of legal reasoning that a judge accesses to apply in new and unanticipated circumstances. A Helpful Illustration from History Common law traditions flourished for most of human history, because they require a homogeneous community where a common story and common values are assumed and perpetuated by all members of a society. 19th century German legal theorist Carl von Savigny called this the Volksgeist, “the collective spirit and conscience of a people.” Where social cohesion breaks down, it becomes more difficult to anchor the law in a collective set of values, and this is what happened in 19th century Europe with the rise of immigration, urbanization, and the modern nation-state. Nineteenth-century Germany faced transition from a historically tribal state into a modern state (Otto von Bismarck and Carl Savigny continued to advocate the common law tradition of their past). One of his most famous students was Jacob Grimm (1785-1863), best known for his collaboration with his brother Wilhelm. These brothers did exhaustive research into their cultural folklore and produced comprehensive editions of Germany’s moral heritage in their anthology called “Kinder und Hausmarchen” = “Children’s and Household Tales” (2 volumes in 1812 and 1815), including the classic tales of Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, Rumpelstiltskin, Sleeping Beauty, and the Frog Prince. The Brothers Grimm established a methodology for collecting and recording folk stories that became the basis for folklore studies. Between the first edition of 1812-15 and the seventh and final edition of 1857, they revised their collection many times so that it grew from 156 stories to more than 200. In addition to collecting and editing folk tales, the brothers compiled German legends. Individually, they published a large body of linguistic and literary scholarship. Together in 1838, they began work on a massive historical German dictionary (Deutsches Wörterbuch), which, in their lifetimes, they completed only as far as the word Frucht, 'fruit'. Tim points out that the Grimm brothers bridged the gap between folklore and common law in German society into a society of more statutory law in Germany. In many ways, Tim says, this is how Israel came to treat the law. The stories surrounding the laws allowed Israel to illustrate what happens when the rules are or are not followed. Examples of Law Implementation in Scripture In part 6 (63:00-end), Tim points out that many times in the Bible, the actual implementation of the laws are totally different from the given or written laws. There are many cases where narratives about legal decisions either differ from the statements of practice in the biblical law codes, or the decision is offered without any recourse to a law code. For example, in 2 Samuel 14, David gives a ruling contrary to every law and principle in the biblical law codes concerning murder. David simply excuses his son Absalom (who murdered Amnon) with no appeal or defense of his actions and no mention of a law code. Another example is found in Jeremiah 26, the most detailed description of a trial in the Old Testament. Jeremiah is accused of treason for announcing the temple’s destruction. His defense is that another prophet before him, Micah, announced the same message and he was never imprisoned. This is an argument from precedent, not from a law code. The arguments advanced against him are offered on theological grounds (“he speaks in the name of Yahweh”) and political grounds (“he prophesied against our city”). No law codes are ever consulted to defend or accuse him. A third example is Solomon’s famous “decision” about the two women in 1 Kings 3. Solomon listens to the witnesses (the two women), and uses his intuition (which is divinely inspired according to the previous narrative) to make a decision. The concluding statement shows the real source of legal authority: “When all Israel heard of the judgment which the king had decided, they revered the king, for they saw the wisdom of God in him to do justice.” (1 Kings 3:28) Here is a helpful quote to understand why the implementation may have been different. “The Hebrew Bible strongly suggests that the earliest forms of disputes… were resolved… by intuitions of justice against a background of custom, rather than appeal to formulated rules. The biblical sources which talk about the establishment of the judicial system in Israel give no indication that judges were to use written sources. Rather, judges are urged to avoid partiality and corruption and to ‘do justice.’ But what was the source of such justice? The version attributed to king Jehoshaphat is the most explicit, ‘God is with you in giving judgment’ (2 Chronicles 19:6). Divine inspiration is also attributed to the king in rendering judgment: Proverbs 16:10, ‘Inspired decisions are on the lips of a king; his mouth does not sin in judgment.’ Solomon’s judgment (1 Kings 3:16-28) is presented as an example of just such a process…. This is not to say that judges were expected to go into some kind of trance or function as an oracle. Rather, they were called to operate by combining local custom with divinely guided intuitions of justice…relying on the ‘practical wisdom’ that existed within the social consciousness of the people as a whole.” (Bernard Jackson, Wisdom Laws, 30-31) Show Produced by: Dan Gummel, Jon Collins Show Music: “Defender Inst.” by Tents “Shot in the back of the head” by Moby Synth Groove “Scream Pilots” by Moby “Shine” by Moby Third Floor 
 Show Resources: Joshua Berman, Inconsistency in the Torah Bernard Jackson, Wisdom Laws Martha Tobi Roth, Harry A. Hoffner, and Piotr Michalowski, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor Michael Lefebvre, Collections, Codes, and Torah
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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 in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

This is John at the Bible Project, and today on the podcast we continue our conversation on the law. In the modern world, we understand law as a set of legal requirements that society has for us, things you can do, things you can't do, and if someone's behavior is in question, we go to the written law and we see what it says. It's the final authority. And we call this statutory law. What we have to do is try to imagine a culture where things don't work like that.

We have to imagine where people who live in a society have a set of views about a transcendence concept of justice and goodness and righteousness. But the written law codes are not the official statement. They are illustrations written in specific times and places, but no one written statement is the final arbiter or word. It's a statement that participates in the long history of statements. This is really hard for us to appreciate, but imagine you live in a society where you have written laws, but you also have your cultural stories, you have the wisdom of the elders, and all of these

things are consulted. But not as the final authority, but as a way to help you get to a deeper authority. That is God's justice. Law isn't the right word anymore. Yes, wisdom. It's wisdom and the fear of the Lord living in a way that corresponds to God's will. And the law for ancient Israel wasn't simply a set of things to do and not do. It was a relational agreement about how to be in a covenant with God. The laws are relational authority for ancient Israel and they were to be formed by that relationship and to take on the character traits of God's justice and generosity, the character

so that other nations could look at ancient Israel and be like, whoa, that's a different way to be humans. So today we discuss the difference between statutory law and what we'll call common law. It's a subtle difference, but it will help us appreciate how to read the laws in our Bible. It was a paradigm shift that's been immensely helpful for me in understanding what the Torah is and the laws within it. Thanks for joining us. Here we go.

We are talking about laws, biblical laws, the law code in the Bible. In the law code, in the Bible. In the first few books of the Bible. Yep. They're all in the first five books of the Bible. Yeah, and actually they're not in the first book, Genesis, in the second, third, fourth, and fifth. Yeah.

Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. You'll find them dispersed throughout those books. Yes. Over 600. There's over 600. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And we had a really great conversation on why do we have all of these laws?

Yeah. And I think the takeaway was, well, we can know for sure that the reason wasn't to give a complete list of laws to live by. Yeah. Of God's will for human life. Yeah. Yeah. It's not designed that way.

If that was its purpose, it failed. Yeah, right. Yeah, right. Had that. Yeah. Talk about problems in the law codes for readers, ancient, and modern, why the same principle or law will be worded in different ways, or sometimes contradictory ways.

Do you boil the Passover lamb? Or do you roast it? That kind of thing. Yep. Do you remember this Sabbath? Or do you keep the Sabbath? That's a smaller one. Yeah, yeah.

But it's just interesting that why would, if you're gonna repeat a law, why wouldn't you repeat it? Correct. With the exact same words? Correct. It just be crystal clear. And then we talked about this, this re-binnic tradition of both trying to distill all the laws into kind of this smaller set of axioms or values

or whatever that helps you understand all the laws. And then also the re-binic tradition of taking a law that doesn't seem to explain enough of what you need like the Sabbath and then expounding on it, creating more law. Yeah, cool. Yeah, so here are a handful of perspectives. It'll probably take us a couple episodes

to kind of talk through these. But I found these immensely helpful to just let each one of these, they're six individual perspectives, but they work together. And if I was going to try and recreate the journey I've been on over the last many years in understanding how laws work in the Bible, it's bound up in these six statements of perspectives. These six statements with perspectives. These six perspectives helps you understand what the laws are, why they're in the Bible, and how I should relate to them. Okay. Yeah. Cool. There you go. Number one.

We've already kind of established this, but we'll just make it clear that the laws, the 611 or 13 that the laws, the 611 or 13 laws, are not a law code. They're not a code. Meaning... Meaning, if we went down to the courthouse, the Portland courthouse, where you go to sort of Jerry Doody and all these things. So there are judges, and actually I don't know if they're... Maybe they might be housed in the state. There's like a research library, a consulting library there where cases can be paused and

judges and attorneys can like go consult the law. Most of it's being digitized. Actually, most of it's probably already been digitized. But in other words, the law code, the law code that governs our land is that actual body of written text is somewhere that is to be consulted when judges are applying the law. And you're saying that the laws in the Bible are not that correct, but they are written because they're written in the Bible. Oh yeah, they're definitely written totally.

They're written in a section of the Bible called the law. They're written in a section of the Bible called the law. They're written in a section of the Bible called Torah. Torah. In Hebrew. Which you can translate as. Which means instruction or teaching. Yeah, yeah, importantly. Actually, importantly, there isn't a Hebrew word that quite precisely corresponds to our

word law. The words in the Hebrew Bible are custom or practice instruction or teaching command The closest would be statute, which means something inscribed But even all those are different than our concept of the law. I actually I should probably work that out At some point I haven't taken that one to the bottom yet But the point is is that that whatever the first five books of the Bible are, they aren't an ancient version of what judges consult on the digitized law code

of the statutes of the state of Oregon or the United States. Now arguably did that exist? Yeah, actually, I'm gonna show you pictures of one. Well, actually, sorry, the simple answer to your question is no, those didn't to your question is no. Those didn't exist in the ancient world. And for an important reason, because our concept of what a law code is in our days fundamentally different

than how they conceived of laws and codes in the ancient world. But we'll get there. So if the laws aren't a comprehensive code, what are they? What are they? Well, the narrative presents them as the terms of a covenant agreement between two parties, namely Yahweh and the people of Israel. In other words, the Torah is a narrative about God entering a formal relationship with a group of people.

And these laws in the narrative are the terms of their agreement. Okay, now it just feels like we're just, this is semantics now at this point, because the terms of an agreement that have consequences. Yeah, we don't call that law in English. Yeah, we would. Really? What would you call that?

If you and I formed... Oh, okay. Let's say you and I started a nonprofit together. Okay. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. That's my imagination. Yeah, maybe. But let's say we wanted to formalize, it doesn't work for a nonprofit. Let's say we started a for-profit. Okay. And we wanted to formalize whatever, how our relationship works and who does what, whatever. And we're going toize whatever how our relationship works and who does what, whatever. And we're going to agree on that. Yeah, we might call them stipulations. Yeah, what do you call those? Well, I mean, we were just looking at these the other day during a board meeting. There's what do they call them? Oh, we call them bylaws, which is how the

bioproject board the rules of operation. So if we have a whole society of people and we're agreeing, this is how we're going to live together. That's the only agreement is we're going to live together here in a way that's hopefully peaceable. And so we call those rules law, commonly in English. That's the law. But if two parties intentionally form a relationship

to accomplish a goal together, we wouldn't normally call the terms of the relationship laws. We would call them... Bilos. Terms, we would call them stipulations. We call them Bilos. Well, yeah, look at this. I just googled it. The main difference between a Bila and a law is the laws passed by a national, federal, or regional state body. By-law is made by a non-sovereign body.

And it drives its authority from another governing body. Oh, I see. So if we were just kind of like, we're going on a hike and we're gonna be on the hike for seven days. Let's create some rules. Rules of the road. Yeah. Let's agree on what our relationship is going to be like for the seven days.

You wouldn't call those bylaws because we're not adhering to. We're not being governed by. Correct. And we could write them out and sign on them. It's very common. Very common. In hiking? No, just in like day-to-day life.

Two neighbors want to overlap their property to make a common deck or something. I didn't write it up. I had to buy a used car recently. And so they did a couple of repairs. We had to write up a terms of them guaranteeing. Now all of these repairs, and all these terms drive their authority, but the authority, I guess the authority in a covenant relationship is the relationship

itself. Yeah, not some bigger and usually the yeah, exactly. That's the difference. That's the difference. What's the authority? Correct. Is the authority some governing sovereign body, a group of people who all say that they exist as some state or they're.

That's right. More is the authority just merely, but that is a type of relationship. I'm sorry, this is getting weird. No, of course it is. I guess here's the difference. I live in the state of Oregon. There is a number of governing bodies that have determined what are the laws of the land

that I try my best to abide by. Yeah. There's the city of Portland. There's Moetnaum County. Totally. There's a state of Oregon. That's right. And if I go to whatever the state capital or the courthouse in Portland or log in online, I could find that law, that's those lists of statutes written that have been authorized.

And that's a law code. It's a law code. Okay. When I open up the first five books of the Bible, I am not reading a law code. Yeah. I'm reading a narrative about one party in the ancient world, the people of ancient Israel entering into a covenant relationship with the deity. And the laws are telling illustrating the terms of the agreement between these two parties that I'm not one of. I wasn't at Mount Sinai. It's a narrative about

a covenant relationship. That's what the Torah is. It's a narrative about a covenant relationship. That's what the Torah is. It's a narrative about a covenant relationship. And that narrative is very instructive for me. That's what the word Torah means, instruction. It's a paradigm shift. The laws are not a law code. Rattura is not a law code for all people of all time. It's a narrative about a covenant relationship between Yahweh and Israel and the laws. There's a lot of them, but they're not comprehensive. They're selected to match the numerical value of the word Torah. And they illustrate the nature of their covenant relationship. That's the first key paradigm shift I invite people into. So for me, okay, so I want to make sure I'm since parent shift in the same way if

We were to write a story About how all the Oregon laws Came to be or kind of the like the big the big grand like how why do we why does Oregon exist and why are these laws? We we could we would tell the story, we would then pull from the law code. Right, yeah. Specific laws that would, would help us understand the story. And if we wanted that to be instructive

for then now, what does it mean to be an organian? Then we have something more similar. Yeah, that's right. To the Torah. Correct, yeah. It's not the law code. Yeah. Yep.

Correct. The law code existed and exists somewhere else for some other purpose. This is a narrative. I like your hiking example actually. If you and I went backpacking Yeah, and we wrote up a two-page agreement about who gets the water at the end of the day Who cleans the dishes after dinner? Yeah, how many How many miles will hike? How many miles will hike in a day? Right, we ride all up, because we've learned that we're like, whatever, super contentious and like, have to make this clear. And then, let's say we both live in the state of Oregon.

And so, we are inspired by some of the laws of the land. Like, oh, you know, one of the laws in Oregon is people do this, people know that. And so we use wording and concepts from our state law code and we borrow them and adapt them in our little formal agreement between us. And then if one of us was two years later, write a narrative about our hike and include large selections of our formal agreement in the narrative itself. That would be more like what the Torah is. So you're saying that the original set of terms of this covenant, even itself, is in a

law code. Ah, well, we'll talk about that. Okay. The what, how law worked in the ancient world and what law codes were is different, totally different than our culture. My point here is just what is the Torah, the five books of the Bible in front of us. They are a narrative about a covenant relationship. They're not a law code. They're a narrative about a covenant relationship. The covenant relationship had terms. Those terms we call laws. Common English, yeah, or by laws. Well, I'm just saying when

we talk about, this whole series, how to read the law. Oh, I yeah, or by laws. Well, I'm just saying when we talk about this whole series, how to read the law. Oh, I understand. Yes. Yeah. That's the word we use. Yeah. Should we stop calling it that? Well, no, no, we should just use the word law. Okay. But it's covenant law. It's covenant law. It's not lock hoe in the way that we understand law. That's right. So after I use the word law the first time I just swap it out for the word terms covenant terms Covenant so covenant law and covenant law is different than law code Yeah, yeah, like what the main difference what I heard you say is that it's based on a relationship Mm-hmm. Yeah, both parties take it upon themselves to operate by these terms for the sake of this relationship.

And I'm just going to be a jerk for a second. And it just says in that what all law is. Yes, in a way. Okay. Yeah, totally. Yeah, we agree to live in the city of Portland. We will live by these laws. But a covenant relationship is specific and you know, it's a covenant video.

It's a partnership to accomplish something a particular thing together. Yeah. Here in Portland, it's accomplishing what the well-being, I don't know. My main purpose is to simply say, the literary form of the first five books of the Bible isn't a law code. Yeah, that's, I get that.

It's a narrative about a covenant. And the laws illustrate the terms of that covenant relationship. Now, I guess maybe this one we have, it's not a law code, it's a narrative about a covenant. Another way to say that is not a law code, it's a narrative about a law code based on a covenant. It's a narrative about a covenant that has drawn upon an ancient law code that is not contained within the Bible itself. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. There have to have been more rules governing the life of ancient Israel. Yeah. What we have are 611. I just hear you trying to make a... I'm trying to make a difference between... terms and lock in lock code.

Okay, got it. Yeah. In my mind, they get too blurred to complete. Right. Yeah. What you're saying is they're basically there are two subsets within the same type of group. Yeah. Which is the bigger group is just rules governing common life together. Yeah. And so and that's that's granted. Totally granted. You're right. So what you're asking is helping me clarify what my main point is and is not. There are laws within the covenant terms in the Torah that through Moses and then the prophets and scribes who shaped the Torah after him, the way they conceived of God wanting them to live fit within the ancient cultural context, but also adapted it in an important way. That's a later perspective. So, okay, first point. Not a lock up.

Not a lock up. This is the narrative design shape of the covenant making ceremony in the book of Exodus. So, when they leave Egypt and they go to the foot of Mount Sinai, that's Exodus 19. Exodus 19 through 24 is where the 10 commandments appear and it's where they sign on the dotted line to like enter the covenant.

The narrative of six chapters are designed in this real precise symmetry. On the outer frame is chapters 19 and 24. There's all this verbatim language. But in chapter 19, they approach the mountain. Moses goes up and he invites all Israel to listen to my voice and keep my covenant. That's the opening lines Listen to my voice, which is the Hebrew word for obey. Yeah, there's no word for obey It's just listen to listen So listen my voice and keep my covenant and Israel says all that Yahweh is spoken we're gonna do and Yahweh comes down and he reveals

This is the I do in a marriage ceremony. Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's right. spoken, we're going to do. And Yahweh comes down and he reveals, this is the I do in a marriage ceremony. Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And then the next thing is the cloud and fire comes down the mountain and God speaks the Ten Commandments. Then you get a little narrative at the center of this whole section

about how the people don't want to go up the mountain. They say, we're going to die if we go close to God. So Moses, you go up for us. He goes up on their behalf and that's right in the center of this. That's right in the center. And then you get the next body of covenant laws, 42, the 42 laws. In both the 10 commandments and in those 42 laws, the first command is don't make any other gods. Don't have any other gods and don't make any idols. Moses comes down after getting the 42 laws and it's the same divine appearance of cloud and fire. Moses writes the scroll of the covenant.

People say the same thing they said in chapter 19, all they always spoke and we will do. So this is the first revelation of law in the story. It's the Ten Commandments and the laws and it's sandwiched in between in 1924, a covenant actual ceremony. So my point here is just the even the first time laws are introduced in the narrative, it's in a marriage ceremony between Yahweh and Israel. So that tells you the purpose of the laws that illustrate the terms of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the little bit of the If Israel obeys these terms, the opening prologue to the covenant in Exodus 19, we've talked about this before, this is where we get the phrase kingdom of priests. So if you as Exodus chapter 19 verses 4 through 6, if you listen to my voice and keep my covenant, then result if you listen in obey.

So condition. If you listen in obey, then you will be my own possession among all the people, because listen, all the earth is mine. So I could choose a lot of different people here, you guys. I chose one people, but you're only gonna fulfill your purpose if you obey the covenant. If you do, then you'll be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. We made a whole video about this. In the law video, the kingdom of priests is about being sacred representatives to the nations.

So there you go. The laws are relational authority for ancient Israel, and they were to be formed by that relationship and to take on the character traits of God's justice and generosity and character so that other nations could look at ancient Israel and be like, whoa, that's a different way to be humans. Yeah, that's cool. That's the idea. Now, that's the purpose of the terms of the covenant,

which is synonymous with law code in a way, or with law. So to go back to this American thing, like life liberty, pursuit of happiness, all of our laws are for that purpose. So for Israel, it's to be a kingdom of priests, to then show the world, the nature of God, and I mean, this whole recreation of the world. For America, let's say, let life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. So there's a kind of a parallel there, but what we don't get in the Torah is then the whole

list. Correct. You get a sampler. We get the sampler. Yeah. And it's couched in the narrative. Yeah, that's right. That's right.

Yeah. Of how it came to be and the significance of it. That's correct. And we actually watch the ceremony. Yeah, you watch the what? Yeah. I think you get to hear and the significance of it. And we actually watched the ceremony. Yeah, you watched the wedding. And then you get to hear some of them. Correct. And then, yeah.

Yep, that's the feel. And of course, a lot of the rationale for the selection of the laws, like in both those cases, the 10 commandments and the covenant laws, both begin with the first command as don't have any other gods and don't make idols. The first narrative after this, wedding ceremony, is the story of the golden calf. Yeah, right. So they're designing it so that you can see that the law isn't going to be upheld.

Correct. So in other words, this is going to be a later perspective that we'll get to. But this narrative about you and me going on a hiking trip and agreeing to the terms of our relationship and including even specific of the rules in the narrative that we've agreed to. To imitate the Torah, our narrative would then have to go on until story after story of how you and I violate the agreement. The story would be like, so Tim and John,

they wrote out a list and the first thing on the list was don't wake each other up until 8 a.m. Yeah, that's right. In the first morning of the trip, John got up at 6.30 and started just singing and clanging pots, pelting Tim with pine cone Yeah, that would that's what the narrative would be like in which case again you have to back up and you say

What's the purpose of this narrative? Yeah, is this narrative trying to tell me that I'm supposed to be all these laws And if I'm gonna go on a hike with my friends Yeah, am I gonna then go and just mine all the laws and then now those are hiking rules? Yeah, so yeah, at that point I just wanna say, let's just stop and be patient. Let's let the story tell itself. Let's try and understand how laws worked

in the ancient world, how laws work in this narrative, and then this clarity emerges. But that's the first paradigm shift, terms of the covenant. It's not a lock- the first paradigm shift, terms of the covenant. It's not a lock-up, it's the terms of the covenant. Another helpful way to see how the Torah is not an ancient law code is to compare it to actual ancient law codes. Like we have them. They've been discovered.

And so this is wonderful, because it's like, oh, not only is the Torah not a law code, it's a narrative about covenant. But if we wanted to see what an ancient law code looked like to compare to the Torah, we have them. And there's the most famous one. I actually, I don't know how famous it is anymore. It's called the Code of Hammarabi. Yeah. I really know of it because we've talked about it. Oh really? Well, never heard of it before. I may have, but I never really became in any way familiar with it, so we start talking about it. All right, well there you go. Let's talk about the Code of Hama-Rabi. Hama-Rabi. Hama-Rabi. So in 1901, there was an Egyptian egyptologist, an expert in ancient Egypt, named Gustav Yekier,

next for an ancient Egypt named Gustave Yakiair, French, and he found this huge basalt stone pillar in Susa of what was then called Kuzestan, which ancient Kuzestan is in modern-day Iran, southern part of modern-day Iran. So this is massive stone, it's like over six feet tall. It's big. And if you look the length of the pillar is mostly just written in this ancient cuneiform script, but at the top of it is a picture. And it's a picture of a king, Hamrabi, on the left, he's standing. And he is approaching the throne of a seated royal figure who's a God, a deity. And actually, just notice this is related to our other conversations about spiritual beings. But notice that the deity, whose name is Shamash, which is the word sun.

Oh, like the SUN. SUN, the sun. So he is the Sun. He's the Sun God. Notice the seated Shamash, the Sun God, is as tall as homerabi is standing. He's a giant. He's a big dude. Oh, he's a giant. The giant. Oh, yeah. Do you have to use your giant? Yeah. Yeah. So and it's what Shamash, he's handing to Hammurabi.

He has a ring and a staff. He has fire leaping off of his shoulders. That's how you know he's Shamaash the sun god. And he's handing to Hammurabi a ring and a staff which are symbols of divine royal authority. So it's a picture of, imagine this is propaganda you put of yourself if you're a king. I got this stuff from the coming. I've been commissioned by the gods to rule the world. Here's an image of it.

Here's an image of it. Look, it's proof. And so here's the prologue. Here's the first words. When lofty Anum, king of the Anunaki, and Enlil, Lord of Heaven and Earth, the determiner of destinies of the land. They determined for Marduk, the first born of Enki, these are all gods, different coalitions of gods. He made a great kingdom, he made Marduk great, and he called Babylon the kingdom's name. So in other words, this, it begins with a story about how Babylon, the kingdom over which

I reign is established by the most powerful gods out there. So this Lachod starts with the narrative too. This Lachod starts with a narrative about how the gods founded our kingdom. Yep. He made Babylon supreme in the world, established for him in its midst, an enduring kingship whose foundations are as firm as heaven and earth. That's handy. When the gods start a kingdom, they appoint a human king.

And at that time, Anum and Enlil, who established Babylon and the kingship, they named me to promote the welfare of the people, me, Hamurabi, the devout, the God-fearing prince, to cause justice to prevail in the land, to destroy the wicked in the evil that the strong might not oppress the weak to rise like the sun over humankind. Just stop. These are the words right below a picture

of Hamurabi being commissioned by the sun. But now, Hamurabi himself is toerabi being commissioned by the Sun. But now homerabi himself is to be the Sun rising over the land. Think of Genesis 1 in terms of the Sun, Moon and stars rule over the day and night and then humans rule over the land. The Suns are a sign of God's power. The humans are an image of God. We're in the same thought world here. Yeah, but in the homerabi's luck code, the sun is the God, not a sun is the God. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, and here the sun is a deity. The sun is the deity. Yeah. Yeah. In Genesis 1, the sun moon and stars are created beings who are images of God's glory.

And so are humans. Here the sun is the ultimate God. And he only appoints one human. In Genesis 1, all humans are the image of the divine ruling. Here, there's one deity, the sun, appointing one human, the king, to light up the land. Hamarabi, the shepherd, called by Enlil, the one who makes affluence and plenty abound. The one, this important, the one who relayed the foundations of Sipar, ancient temple city, who decked with green the chapels of Aya, the designer of the temple of Abhabaar, which

is like a heavenly dwelling. So the gods have appointed me. And I created the temple of Abba Bar, which is like a heavenly dwelling. So the gods have appointed me. And I created the temple. And the first thing I did was rebuild ancient temple city and build the temple itself. And by the way, the temple here on earth is like the heavens. He makes the temple an image or a mirror of the heavenly temple of the gods. Same thought world. Totally.

Yeah, totally. So then what he says is, this is top of the next page, is when the God Marduk commanded me to provide just ways for the people of the land, appropriate behavior, I establish truth and justice. I enhance the well-being of the people. And then what begins is a list of 282 laws.

And these laws read a lot like the laws of the Torah. Here, I'll just let you read a couple. Number 196. If a man destroyed the eye of another man, they shall destroy his eye. If one breaks a man's bone, they shall break his bone. If one destroys the eye of a free man man or break the bone of a free man, he shall pay one golden mena, mena, mena. If one destroys the eye of a man's slave or breaks a bone of the man's slave,

he shall pay one half of his price. Yeah, okay, so it's Puzz. Eye for eye. Right? There's a very similar law in the Torah. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, wound for wound. There's a price in the Torah, too, isn't there for two, wound for wound. There's a price in the Torah too, isn't there? Totally, yeah, it's called damages.

Where if, yeah, you injure somebody, and they're laid up for a while and can't work, pay them damages if you injure somebody's slave, that's kind of thing. Yeah, totally. Yep. Number 250, if the Knox goes to death a man, while it's passing through the street,

that case has no basis for a claim. Yeah. Sorry, dude. So if you're off, it's passing through the street. That case has no basis for a claim. Yeah. Sorry, dude. So if you're off, it's an ox stay out of its way. Yeah. Totally. But keep next next one. Oh, 251.

If a man's ox is a known gorg. Yeah. If it did a second time or third time. Okay. And the authorities of the city quarter notify him that it's a known gorg and he's not blunted. Yeah. He doesn't. He hasn't shaved off the horns. Yeah.

And that ox gores a death of a member of the, ooh, a wheelie class. Wheelie class. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. Yeah. I'm going to lick them up the wheelie class. Then the owner shall give 30 shuckles of silver.

That's how much, how much a person's life is worth. It's great, I mean, it's very practical. Yeah, exactly, yeah, it totally is. We see a wheelu-class. It just says a person of standing. I think it means a citizen. Yeah. Yeah.

So again, the reason here is there's a whole section of laws in the covenant code in Exodus that we just read. About the goring. About the goring ox. Ox, yeah, totally. Which apparently, I mean, in farming communities, of course. Yeah, you're gonna have ox cruising around. Yeah, totally. Which, I mean, you've been in farming communities, of course. Yeah, you're gonna have ox cruising around. Totally, yeah.

It's a common problem. Yeah, spear you through. Yeah. And so, if it's just a one-off, you know, then, sorry, sorry, that happened to you. But if it happens a second, third time, then you get the ox as a problem. Yeah, totally.

So, that's just a sampling, but these are three good examples that show like, yeah, these are formed in exactly the same vocabulary as the law of the Bible. Okay. You finish the 282 laws and here's the epilogue. May any king who appears in the land in the future at any time observe the pronouncements of justice I've inscribed upon this statue. May he not alter the judgments I've rendered or the verdicts I gave, nor removed my engraved image.

If any man has discernment and is capable of providing just ways for his land, may he heed the pronouncements I've inscribed upon this statue. So here's a law code. It looks like a law code. It presents itself. There is a little narrative. Yeah. But it's just it's a foundation narrative to tell you why this is important. Why this? You're hearing the word of the gods. And then it presents the list and then it ends with a little warning to any leader after me should do this. And was this supposed to be an exhaustive list then?

Like, we'll talk about that. But let's just, here's what an ancient code looks like. Yeah, okay. This is not the Torah. Okay, right. The Torah doesn't look like this. What it looks like is that the Torah is the narrative about ancient covenant and that the authors of the Torah

have selected certain laws out of a pre-existing kind of law code. Yeah. Now, we don't know if there was ever some sort of statue with laws on it or written of some sort of exhaustive thing like this. Okay, this is interesting. After Moses is about to die and he commissions Joshua, he says, when you go into the land, after you make your first settlement, find a huge rock. And cover it with plaster and then etch into it the words of the Torah. So he tells him. And then there's a narrative in Joshua about Joshua doing this. So the question is, what did he write? He almost certainly didn't write the whole Pentateuch, Genesis through Deuteronomy. So what

he's writing is some ancient version of the laws of the covenant that you could write on a standing stone. Yeah, we don't know what that is or have record of it. So there was something out there that was drawn upon, but the point is the Torah is a sampler of something that pre-existed. And if we want to know what kind of thing might have pre-existed, here's the code of homerobics. It's a wonderful example. Yeah, not only is it an example, but some of the laws like those three we read are very

similar. Very similar to laws found in Israel's laws. Okay, so here's some puzzles about the law code. This is an episode about the code of honorably. But these problems with the code are helpful, I think, for coming back to the laws of the Torah. This is from a scholar named Joshua Burerman, who's up to be quoting his work quite a lot later on. He says, this code is one of the most frequently copied texts

from the ancient world. Over a course of 1,500 years, the Code of Amrabi was adopted by other kings, recopied new statues. I mean, this thing, this was like went viral in the ancient world. Ancient viral, lock-head. So we have dozens of copies from all throughout the ancient world of the code of homerabi. We also, in ancient Babylon, the Hittite, Kingdom, ancient Canaan, we have thousands of legal documents that have been discovered, land, agreements, purchase agreements, divorce certificates. So Joshua Berman goes on, he says, of the thousands of Mesopotamian legal documents in our possession, not one of them quotes from the code of homerabi, or any other code as a source of authority. This is in spite of the fact that the code of homerabi, or any other code as a source of authority. This is in spite of the fact

that the code of homerabi was esteemed and recopied for more than a millennium. All of this suggests that ancient Near Eastern law codes were of a literary or educational or monumental nature rather than legal and judicial. In other words, whatever law codes were in the ancient world, they existed. Konovah Mrabi is one of them. What was their purpose or function? Did they exist so that judges who are trying cases could go look at the pillar and be like, what should I do here? Hmm, law 253 says this and now I will apply that principle. That's how law works in our culture. Law code.

That's how it works. So he's just noticing, it's just interesting. With thousands of legal records from the ancient world, never once is any ancient law code quoted as a source of authority for the decision being made in these thousands of cases. That's interesting. What's also interesting is that in those legal documents, some of them rely on a civil dispute about somebody hitting another person or somebody. Some of them are about situations that are dressed in the lock-ode. And there'll be decisions that were made that explicitly contradict or the money. Remember the thing of in the code of homerabi was if somebody hits somebody slave,

they have to pay this certain amount, one goldmina. But then there'll be a document about a case where somebody did this and they'll get fine 15 goldmina's or something. So not only are these codes never quoted in actual law cases, they're not here too. There are decisions being made in law cases in Babylon that don't follow the code. So if they didn't use the code as the authority, what was the authority? Exactly. This is the problem I'm trying to expose here. The rabbit hole goes a little deeper. If you're interested. If I have your curiosity peaked. It's good. music So here it's at this point that scholars of ancient law have had to go through a paradigm shift that's still happening.

I think it began in kind of the 1980s. Scholars of ancient law. Oh, totally. It's very niche field. Yeah, it's totally a niche field. But these groups of people exist. Yeah. Yeah, it's awesome. So one of the godfather figures is named Raymond Westbrook. But essentially what we're up against here is that not all cultures have the same uses of lock-hodes. Okay. Different cultures do different things with law codes.

So this is from a scholar of this niche topic, named Michael Lefevere, who wrote a comprehensive history of how Israelites and Jews perceived the laws in the Torah throughout their whole history. I thought it was a fascinating book. But he tries to help us see the difference between what he calls a legislative society and what he calls a non-legislative society. You could also call it statutory law society and then a common law or custom law society.

And the difference is actually really simple. In a statutory or legislative society, the law of the land is an actual written text that has been authorized by a body of people. And both all the people in that land and the judges of that land, their obligation is to the written text of the law. And the written text of the law. Yeah, and the written text is the authority. Correct. And what the written text is is an embodiment of some transcendent set of values of justice that we all adhere to and this written text is the way we're going to embody it here. So, most modern, at least democracy's work, is a written text begins with the Constitution

and all the way down. So what we have to do is try to imagine a culture where things don't work like that. We have to imagine where people who live in a society have a set of views about a transcendence concept of justice and goodness and righteousness. But the written law codes are not the official statement. They are illustrations written in specific times and places, but no one written statement is the final arbiter or word. It's a statement that participates in a long history of statements. There you go. That's the basic point. Therefore, in a common law society where the written law codes are illustrations of our actual values of justice. The law codes have all kinds of

purposes, like homerobbies. There's a great example. It's royal. What that is is royal propaganda. For how the gods authorized me. And here is a, they're almost like a statement of the values of my platform. Your platform, yeah, totally. It's like a statement of homerobby's platform. But another king. And so, yeah. And so in that, he's making a case for his authority in his platform and how he How society exists under him correct, but then he gets very specific about like goring oxes

Are you saying then that the specificity? Mm-hmm isn't to say this is how it will always be the specific specificity is, here's just an example. Here's an example of how this would come to play out. Correct. And we know that ancient leaders of Babylon saw the code of homerabi as an example because they didn't follow it. But they still would follow the platform.

They would follow the principles. The principles of the platform. Correct. But when it comes to actual detailed applications, they're not following the principles. The principles of the platform. Correct. But when it comes to actual detailed applications, they're not following the numbers, the specific amount, monetary amounts for the fines. And they're not even appealing to the code itself because their obligation isn't to the code of homerabi.

Their obligation is to shamash the sun god. It just seems chaotic to me. Ah, right. All right. That's how it appears to us. Yeah. Yeah. Because then like I'm just some dude in some city run by a Babylon or some like village or whatever. Something gets brought to me because I'm whatever respected or have some authority and I'm just like yeah. Yeah. 15 meaners. You 30. Yeah.

And then it's like, what? It's like, the code says one. No, we're not even going to refer to the code. We're just going to do what the code says. Yeah, totally. Yeah, it becomes more fluid. More fluid. The law becomes fluid in its application.

How else do you explain Moses telling one generation roast the Passover lamb? And then the next generation boil the Passover lamb. Yeah. It's fluid. the Passover Lamb. Yeah. It's fluid. It's fluid. Yeah. Okay.

So. It's funny. It both makes this distinction really helps. Mm-hmm. But then also makes me feel really uncomfortable. I can't totally. Yeah, I think it makes people who live in statutory law societies.

It's a foreign way of conceiving a law in order. Yeah. It is a form of law in order. It's just a different form of law in order. Yeah. Then where do you still? Right. Here's the thing though.

So again, this is the scholar Joshua Berman. He wrote two books that have been immensely helpful to me. One is called Created Equal. I think it's how the Bible broke with ancient political thought. And what he's showing, primarily that book is reading the ancient law, the laws of the Torah, in relationship to their matching commands and other law codes. And he just shows how the social order being envisioned by the laws of the Torah was both recognizable to ancient Babylonians and Canaanites, but a total ethical revolution towards a greater form of what we would call social equality between citizens.

Yeah, it's really amazing. And sexes, gender. And a lot of it. Well, not so much on the gender front. Oh no. Yeah, his argument was actually being a woman or a slave in ancient Israel, you were better off. Yes.

Then you were in Babylon. Yes. Then you were in Babylon. Yes. But you weren't. It wasn't completely equal. That's correct. Yeah. Yeah. We'll talk about this a little bit more.

The other book he wrote is called inconsistency in the Torah. Because these discrepancies between different laws within the Torah itself have been used to build whole models of critical views of how the Pentateuch came into existence, how the different law codes were produced by completely different groups who are where it odds with each other. And so what the Torah is is a collection of actually competing, what we're competing law codes by different groups in ancient

Israel have been combined into one. This is a view that's out there. And what he is a view that's out there. And what he's saying is that's imposing a completely modern our perspective of the law code onto this ancient law code. Ancient law codes were fluid expressions of common law, which meant the same code can have what we perceive as a contradiction, but they didn't view it that way. Because law could be applied in different ways and different circumstances. Here's two illustrations that were helpful for me.

So I didn't know this. This was like Joshua Bman gave me a education in like the history of law in Europe. Statutory law, where the law code is the authority. It's a relatively modern invention in the history of the human rights. Yeah, I believe it. Specifically in the 17th and 18th centuries, because you need

kind of mass printing in order for it to really work. Yeah, yeah. Basically, it's this. It's that common law where we all just kind of have a set of agreements. Yeah. They don't have to be written. Yeah. We can write expressions of them, but no written expression is the authority. Right. He says that, that law can work in smaller homogenous societies, where everybody is kind of the same, and we all have a really tight social web and have the same religious and ethical values. It's the perfect system. And also, it's a necessary system when not everyone can read. Yep. There's not a really good way to pass around written.

Like the technology just doesn't exist. Yeah, that's right. Of like mass-perturbing. Yeah, where's the written code and who can read it? Yeah, so it becomes a more necessary way of thinking about. Yeah, that's right. So he's, he, Berman quotes from scholars who say, if you just trace the history of Europe the rise of urbanization the rise of immigration to large cities more diverse

populations in cities that have different value systems and then the rise of the modern nation state Which redefined identity not by ethnicity necessarily but by land. The people who live in this land are now it's a modern phenomenon. Totally, the modern nation state. So the modern nation state is actually, an urbanization is the, really key in the history of statutory law. And then the technology of writing.

And technology writing, post printing press. So now you have different people who have different value sets living in the same city. But we are citizens together. And so the rise of statutory law is that here's the law code and doesn't matter who you are, we do this law according to this law. That's the basic. When you give the history lesson, it makes a lot of sense and my discomfort goes away a little bit because it just feels like necessary. This is how you would have had to do law. Correct. And then I think about judicial law

and I'm like, oh wow, yeah, that is just a modern phenomena. Correct. Now I'm importing back on the Bible. Yeah, isn't that interesting? I had the same experience. It was just like, oh, wow. It's like somebody exposing that you're in a fish tank, but you didn't know it.

Swimming in a fish tank, you know? Like you're a fish and you don't know. You're in it, you can't see the glass around you and then someone points it out. You're like, oh. That's where my nose is all raw. Yeah, totally. Okay, so here's this is fascinating.

This is on the middle of page 11. This is a helpful illustration. So the point is common law societies flourished for most of human history, because they require smaller, pretty homogenous cultures, where the common values are just assumed. You're raised into the values set by your parents and your community and your uncle. So in Germany in 1800s, there was, I guess, he was the professor of law, and like the godfather, his name was Karl von Savne. He called this common value set, the Valk is German, the Valksgeist, the spirit of the people, or the collective consciousness of the people. So a common law where no written code is the official statement or the collective consciousness of the people. So a common law where no written

code is the official statement, the official statement is Voxgeist. And so if you have a situation where social cohesion starts breaking down, it becomes more difficult for the law to be just what we all know is the right thing to do. Yeah. So this is so interesting. One of Carl Sovnyy's most famous students was Jacob Grimm of the Brother's Grimm. Oh yeah. And he had his brother was Ville Helm. The Brother's Grimm.

The Brother's Grimm with all the Fables. Yeah, totally. So Jacob Grimm of the Brother's Grimm was one of the most famous lawyers and scholars of German law in Germany in the early 1800s. Their whole project of collecting the folklore and the stories of their people wasn't just to like create children's books. It was a project aimed at upholding the common law tradition. They were collecting the books guys. The books guys.

So think of all these stories. Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, Rumpel Stiltskin, Sleeping Beauty, the Frog Prince. So what they developed was a scholarly set of tools for unearthing the original form of these stories and also how they changed through time and then creating the official written editions of them. But why? Why did they put in all this work? They were trying to create the educational value code of German society in the 1800s, which begins with raising your kids.

I mean, think about it. What stories do we use to teach our kids what is right? Yeah. How do we create in our kids the right sense of what it means to be a German. Yep. And how we treat each other. Yeah. So in the early, I think it was 1812 through 1815, they created a big multi-volume edition of all the fairy tales.

But the folk tales, some of them are fairy tales, folk tales. Okay, this is fascinating. Maybe this isn't fascinating. I found this really fascinating. Again, this is Joshua Burman. So he says Jacob Grimm, the foremost student of Karl von Sovny, who was the founder of the historical school of German law studies. He believed that law must emanate from the moors, the social values of the people,

and he initiated a vast effort to recover text and traditions that reflect the values and principles of German culture. The Grimm Brothers' interest in German folklore stemmed from a conviction that those specimens of culture, these folk tales, contain the remnants of German law and liberties. Judges should adjudicate, make decisions, on the basis of a range of customary law sources. What did judges draw upon when they make a decision? Not a law code.

They could use a law code as an illustration, but also including proverbs, mythology, folklore, poetry, and the like. This is fascinating. Jacob Grimm actually derived property laws from some of the folktales found in their collection. Interesting. Isn't that interesting? Yeah, well that makes sense. So I mean, these are what's happening is, this is an example of this time in human history we're moving from common law to statutory law.

Statutory, judiciary law. And the brothers' grim are saying, hey, let's make this a really great transition. Yes. Let's take all, yes, yes, we've discovered from all of these years of customary law and let's make sure that as we're making all this judicial law that it's informed by it. And so they are an earthing all of these fables, which were what we're used to help make

the common law decisions. That's right. Yeah, again, and this is helpful also to talk about the whole Pentateuch, the, and this is helpful also to talk about the Pentateuch, the whole Pentateuch, the narratives and the laws as Torah instruction. In the same way that the brothers Grim viewed these folktales as a kind of legal education. And so I've said in what we call narrative and poetry and law, for them, those are literary distinctions, but they're all aimed at instructing you in...

What does it mean to be a German citizen? Yeah, and the Pentateuch pops into new perspective of sudden, like the fact that it's narrative and poetry and law all in one book, but it's all aimed at instructing you in discerning God's will. Well, you made in the image of God. Yeah. And to be in the family of Abraham. He correct.

Yeah. I think I feel the discomfort of many people when we compare the Torah to fables. Oh, oh, oh, God, this is just an analogy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not making that kind of comparison. Right.

I'm just saying, for people in Jacob Grim's time, where do you go to gain instruction in the ways of our people? Yeah. It's not a set of statutory laws. Yeah. You can consult a law code. That might be one illustration. But you also go to our foundation stories. Yeah. You go to the stories we tell our children and raise them on

Go to poetry. These can all become examples of the Vox Guest. The Vox Guest, that's a great word. And so in the same way the Pentateuch as a whole, not just the laws, but the whole, the narrative about the laws, everything is a part of instructing you in the Vox Guest of the Kingdom of Priests. That's the analogy I'm seeing. And even though we live in a time in human history where judicial laws the norm, we do live day-to-day, more based off of custom Mary Law. Like in that last episode we talked a lot about the hiking trip we would take in the laws

we'd like. In reality we wouldn't write a lot like some sort of code. No we just kind of know. We just know there's't write a lot, like some sort of code. No, we just kind of know. We just know, there's customary laws. There's stories of people who hike to before us for the problems that they ran into. Yeah, that's right. There's just the proverbs, and just the wise sayings of what it means

to be a good person. And we just know all this stuff. And when something comes up, we're gonna appeal to those things. Correct. You know, when I wake you up in the morning before it's like the sun came up, you're just going to be like, dude, what's the deal? Yeah, we don't do that around here.

It's not a thing you do. And that's, and that's just typically how we live is stuff of customary life. Yeah. And then when a custom is violated, you'd need to make it explicit. This is why the list of rules that like public pools is so long, you know? No running, no jumping, no peeing, no, all that kind of stuff. Right, yeah.

But the only, remember, these are all things that we could all agree on. Totally, yeah. That's right. But apparently some things were unspoken and then we realized, oh yeah, you know, you shouldn't whatever do this in the pool And so now we have to write the long list. Yeah, and then it's funny where like you get the signs that you should just say no

skateboarding and now it's no skateboarding no real ablating. Yeah, yeah, scooters. Yeah, that's right The custom behind that is like, yeah, you know, this is just for pedestrians Yeah, that's right. Let's not like destroy this property. Do you hear about the sign that our friend can put on the pool at his house? Yeah, I don't remember. He says, welcome to our ool. There's no pee in it. Yeah. And let's keep it that way.

Yeah, let's keep it that way. That's good. Yeah, I like it. I like that. It's very memorable. It's memorable. Like a fairy tale. It's memorable.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. This is helpful. This is actually, we're talking the first perspective. It's the longest one. But it rounds off. It's an inclusio with the last one.

This is the way that the Torah came to be talked about in later Judaism as wisdom, wisdom literature. When you get to the book of Proverbs, the Torah that is passed down from parents to children is equivalent with wisdom. The Torah, first five books of the Bible, are wisdom literature. And it makes a lot of sense, then, too, how the Apostle Paul uses it with the muslin yawks. Totally.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So we'll get to that in at the end. But this is the groundwork of a paradigm for approaching the whole Pentateuch, not just the laws, but the whole Pentateuch as a kind of legal education. Folks, guys. Yeah, folks, guys, legal isn't the right word. Law isn't the right word anymore. Yeah. It's wisdom. Yes, wisdom. Yeah. Wisdom and the fear of the Lord living in a way that corresponds to God's will and the point isn't to do what these characters do Necessarily because they do a lot of horrible things but watching the characters do horrible things is an education for me

Okay, it's super helpful and I feel like it could take an entire video just to do that. Make this. Yeah. Yeah. From there I feel pretty satisfying. Like we could just be done talking now. I don't know. I mean, I'm just a lot more talk about but I mean man that's its own yeah. Tree move. Yeah totally. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful.

I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. I'm going to be a little bit more careful. Here, let's just, so can I take one more step? I know we're already well into this conversation. We can do this quickly. Do you remember those problems that scholars noted about the code of homerabi?

That even though it was copied and everybody read it, yeah, no one had known. People didn't quote from it or adhere to it. The same problem exists with the laws and the penitut within the Old Testament. First of all, there are different statements about what kind of judges should be appointed in ancient Israel. Here's two ones in Exodus 18, one's in Deuteronomy chapter 1. What are the type of people who are to be promoted as judges? Exodus 18. Select out of all the people, men who fear God, their men of truth, hate dishonest gain. Do you fear God?

You have integrity and you won't take dirty money? Deal, you'll be a judge. Great. So notice, nothing about an expert in the laws of the Torah. Oh, sure. It's just someone's personal character. Oh, interesting. Is what qualifies them to be a judge?

Deuteronomy one. So I took the heads of your tribes. Wise, experienced men, appointed them as heads over you. I charged your judges. And what qualifies them? Last statement there. Don't show partiality. You'll hear the small and great alike.

You don't fear humans for justice belongs to God. You can just see it here. There's nothing about legal education, consulting written texts. And that could either because it's taking that for granted. Could be, that's right. It could be, but it's just at least it's noteworthy. Yeah.

Here's another thing, there are narratives, this is on page 13 and following. There are all these narratives where about actual like legal court scenes in the Old Testament, and the decisions being made are either different from the laws in the Torah or contradict the laws of the Torah. For example, in 2 Samuel chapter 14, after one of his sons Absalom has murdered his other son, Amnon. He's brought before the king, and David just excuses Absalom, contradicting every single law about manslaughter and murder in the Torah.

He just, no, he doesn't even appeal to, I'm the king, here's the law, my son's excused. You're just like, oh, that's interesting. So maybe he's just not following the Torah. It could be that he's not following the Torah, but he's the king, like, there's nobody gets in his face about it. There's no judges around going, no, what's written in the law? Apparently, at this time, in his history, the king's words is the law. Yeah, right. I know, it's interesting. Kind of like the code of Hanirabbi, where the gods appointed me, and I had determined.

The most detailed trial scene in the whole Old Testament is in the book of Jeremiah, where Jeremiah is being tried before the leaders of Israel, for announcing that the temples can be destroyed. And his defense, he doesn't appeal or quote from the Torah at all. What he quotes from is a story about another prophet, Micah, who had the same message and he never got imprisoned. So he's arguing not from a law, but from precedent.

Which is, we do that too, it's case law. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right. And then the arguments against him by the other attorneys they never quote from the Torah. They just say he's speaking in the name of Yahweh that the always temples gonna be destroyed They have a political accusation that he's prophesying against our city It's the most detailed court scene in the whole Old Testament and never once are the laws of the Torah Pulled out or consulted or quoted you just have to go like wow, that's really interesting

Okay And so when judges are praised like Solomon the famous decision he makes about the two ladies Yeah, it's split in the baby who are both claying the same baby as their son So he comes up with a clever solution to get one to tell the truth. And then the quote at the end of that story is, when all Israel heard the judgment which the king decided, they revered the king because they saw in him the wisdom of God to do justice. So again, they saw that he consulted the Torah and no, he got education in the Torah that trained him to become wise, to know how to make the right decision in this specific situation.

So the Torah and its laws were a part of a much larger set of educational tools in Israelite culture. It was a common law society. It makes perfect sense. Yeah. Anyway, this was so helpful. These are all examples of common law in practice. That's right.

Yeah. So this isn't just arguing from similarity with the code of homerabi. This is within the Old Testament itself. Yeah. What do you see actually in practice? It's common law. It's a common law society. There you go.

That was a long conversation, but it was a paradigm shift that's been immensely helpful for me in understanding what the Torah is and the laws within it. It is helpful and it is a paradigm shift and it reminds me again of how cross-cultural of an endeavor it is to read the Bible. Because we have these very firm paradigms of what is law and how does a culture act in

respect to law. And for me, it's just like a no-brainer. It's law code. Law code. And you go to it. What does it say? That's the law. no-brainer. Yeah, there's law code law code. Yeah, and you go to it. What does it say? Yeah? That's a law. That's a law. Yeah, and if the Bible's not doing that then the Bible has a problem And I'm either gonna just ignore it or be

Or be ashamed of it. Yeah, But we are travelers to another time and place when we read the Bible that we have to, we have to unwrap these paradigms. And that's a big one. That's a really big one that could use its own treatment. Yeah, I see. I mean, I don't know, maybe you can do it in 60 seconds. Maybe we can do it in 60 seconds.

Yeah, John, you're good at explaining complex things in the short of the time. You're, you're during the headlights right now. So this took me a few months to really process and sort through, so I was reading. So I, you know, you're doing this in like an hour. I bet we can, that little visual, podcast-less, as you can't,

but the visual that Michael Lefevere came up with in his book. Yeah, we'll put the shutters. Yep, but it's pretty helpful. It just makes it really clear. The source of obligation isn't to a written text. It's to a transcendent set of values of which the written law code is one expression, but so also can narratives and poetry and proverbs and so on. Yep, there you go. I bet we can do that. Yeah. I bet we can do that. Yeah. The rest of the things, perspectives I want to work through, will take much less time. So that is the biggest one. Okay. And I think it would be cool to capture that in a minute to three minutes. We could do it. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Bible Project podcast.

Our video on the law is out. It's part of the How to Read the Bible Series. You can find it on our website, thebibletproject.com, or on our YouTube channel, youtube.com slash the Bible Project. Today's show is edited and produced by Dan Dumbled. We're not profit and Portland organ. You can find everything we're up to at thebibelproject.com. Hi, this is Mateusz from Poland. I'm excited to be a part of making the Bible project videos available in Polish. Thank you for your support and let all your friends know these videos are available. We believe the Bible is a unified i znam na to, że te wszystkie przyjaciółki są wypowiedliwne. Wspóźmy, że jest to zimnictwa historii, że to zimnictwa z Jeziesu.

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