Women as Booty of War - OT

Can someone please explain how this law came from the Father of Jesus?

The Sinai law was a temporary imposition...“[consisting] only of meats and drinks and divers washings, ordinances of flesh, imposed until [the] time of setting things right.”(Heb 9:10 DRBY)Christ did not come to add more restraint but to set things right.

Philologos, great answer. I wish someone had told me that in 9th grade when I first came across verses like these!

To add to what was said, consider that these women would be destitute, having lost their husbands in war. Rather than leaving them undefended and unprovided for there is a law instituted to allow NON-JEWS into the family of Israel. In my view incredible mercy is shown here.

Remember that this was pre-grocery store and police department. Women had a much greater dependence upon the strength of men and the protection of marriage.

As for "a beautiful woman", men have different tastes and I'm certain the Lord can impress various standards of beauty to accomplish His will.

In view of what typically happens in wartimes - women getting raped, tortured, killed, etc, this sounds like a very appealing restraint!

Also, when we consider that even today countless women are being sold and treated like merchandise, this is also a very humanitarian restraint:

thou shalt not sell her at all for money, thou shalt not make merchandise of her

I concur, thanks for the replies.

"10 When thou goest forth to war against thine enemies, and the LORD thy God hath delivered them into thine hands, and thou hast taken them captive,
11 And seest among the captives a beautiful woman, and hast desire unto her, that thou wouldest have her to thy wife;
12 Then thou shalt bring her home to thine house; and she shall shave her head, and pare her nails;
13 And she shall put the raiment of her captivity from off her, and shall remain in thine house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month: and after that thou shalt go in unto her, and be her husband, and she shall be thy wife.
14 And it shall be, if thou have no delight in her, then thou shalt let her go whither she will; but thou shalt not sell her at all for money, thou shalt not make merchandise of her, because thou hast humbled her." (DEUT 21:10-14)

I have been pondering this passage in light of Ezra Chapter 10 for a few weeks now and marvel at the complexities of the written law. Here we have in effect 'strange wives' being authorized to be taken from among Israel's enemies. 'Strange wives' have a history of turning the hearts of God fearing and God loving men away from Him. (I Kings 11:1-3)

You will notice that she was to shave her head and nails. This would have certainly been an affront on her beauty as women of the Gentiles often broided their hair and wore costly array in order to seduce. (I Tim 2:9, Prov 6:24-35) She was in effect stripped of a great part of her beauty as if to sober the mind of the man who took her. This, to me, forced the man to reconsider taking a wife merely on the outward appearance.

And she shall put the raiment of her captivity from off her, and shall remain in thine house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month: and after that thou shalt go in unto her, and be her husband, and she shall be thy wife.

This is almost like a 1 month trial for the man. She is shorn and without the clothing and other articles of beauty she likely had when he first lifted up his eyes to behold her. She has been weeping for 30 days which certainly added nothing to her countenance if he were merely looking on the outward appearance. [i]... and after [u]that[/u] thou shalt go in unto her[/i]. 'That' is a huge word in this passage? The 'that' was God's provision for offering the man opportunity to change his mind. One of the great problems of our times is the many many folk who married based on some outward appearance. The enemy always wants to make sinners look like movie stars and Christian men who love God look like nerds (pardon the expression). I wonder how many men still kept the woman after this 30 day process?

When we get to Ezra 10 we have an odd situation indeed. We have Israel putting away their 'strange wives' and children. This, indeed, is a mystery. We just read where God allowed 'strange wives' to be taken. When we get to I Corinthians Paul tells us not to put away an unbelieving spouse if she/he be pleased to dwell with us. So what happened?

I think the key is found in the track record of these women who to a great extent brought evil upon Israel. This was the curse Balaam never got to speak- but yet effected it none the less (Rev 2:14). Inter marriage with unbelievers has been a curse upon God's people forever it seems. But if he/she be pleased to dwell with thee...(I Cor 7:12) What does this mean?

Could it mean that 'strange wives' are only [u]S[/u]trange [u]W[/u]ives if they are bent on following their own religion and attempting to turn the heart of the believer away from God? This seems to be the key, I think. But how rare is it? How often is it that a believer marries an unbeliever and they are content with their believing spouses religion? Perhaps we have all seen it. I can't begin to number the women I know who married an unbeliever and he tore her away from God. Or a man that had a wife that complained and acted out until he threw in the towel. They are still together in marriage but estranged from God. And I think our original passage is God's attempt to get the man to think twice (30 days over) about what he is about to do.

Corey_H wrote:
Robert, thanks for pointing these things out.

Sure was a "Catch 22" for the woman (or, just as likely, young girl) though. Shave your head and marry one of the men that killed your family... or be sold into slavery (and if she was beautiful, I assume, it meant she'd be a slave-harlot).

Does this kind of thing reduce Mosaic law (not including the Ten Commandments) to a set of "rules of lesser evils"?

Corey,

Remember that the whole point of the Law was to expose the sin we are prone to, and show up like the jewel it is the grace we live under in Christ.

Blessings,

Forrest

Does this kind of thing reduce Mosaic law (not including the Ten Commandments) to a set of "rules of lesser evils"?

From Ezra onward we have the development of what came to be Rabbinic Judaism. In the first century several hundred years after Ezra the Jews had taken to heart the need to be 'separate' from the gentiles and began calling even the Samaritans 'dogs'. They looked down on non-Jews.

Ron pointed out that hardness of heart was back of many of the laws. This is no doubt true. Some men would have murdered their wives just to be rid of them if they could not divorce them. Keep in mind that they could have had several wives if they could have afforded it so it was not a case of killing the one to get another. It was a viral attitude towards the woman in that he would have literally hated her and wanted her out of his sight. So the law, because of the hardness of heart, allowed the woman to go free and hence it spared her life. She did nothing to deserve death and the law protected her.

The law also in its penalties is a demonstration of the severity of the effect of sin upon humanity. This is seen in the penalties. Adultery, for example, got the death penalty. Why? Because it was a picture of the severity of the crime against humanity. In the law we see the wisdom of God in giving protocol for man's behavior. Any drifting from God's design has terrible natural consequences- so the law had penalties that show us how serious those natural consequences are. Whole volumes of books could be written on this topic.

I have also ran into a similar problem with the OT text Hosea while in seminary. While in my small OT class discussion groups which was almost entirely female an many of the women had an issue with some of tha language used to show how Isreal was going to be punished for being unfaithful to God. Since Isreal was being reimaged as Hosea's unfaithful wife the language is hurtful to many women because so many women have been abused. How do we use and recouncile these text some of my classmates refuse to use them in ministry but I don't want to totally reject any of God's word. Here is some of the text that were problematic for the women:

"Therefore I will take away my grain when it ripens, and my new wine when it is ready.
I will take back my wool and my linen,
intended to cover her nakedness. So now I will expose her lewdness before the eyes of her lovers;
no one will take her out of my hands. I will stop all her celebrations: her yearly festivals, her New Moons, her Sabbath days—all her appointed feasts.I will ruin her vines and her fig trees,which she said were her pay from her lovers;I will make them a thicket,and wild animals will devour them. I will punish her for the days she burned incense to the Baals; she decked herself with rings and jewelry,and went after her lovers,but me she forgot,"declares the LORD."Therefore I am now going to allure her;
I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her.There I will give her back her vineyards,and will make the Valley of Achor [a] a door of hope.There she will sing [b] as in the days of her youth,as in the day she came up out of Egypt.

God has used marriage as a picture of our relationship to Him. This is a committed relationship the bonds and vows of which are not to be broken. To break the marriage vow in the OT was the death penalty (Deut 22). An evil and adulterous generation does not understand this. They can commit adultery and wipe their mouth and say they have done no wickedness (Proverbs 30:20). But in the Old Testament it was not so. Both fornication and adultery could get you stoned. Why? Because you are taking the love that belongs to the one and giving it to another. Once the bond exists the relationship between the man and wife is utterly exclusive. Tyndale called adultery 'breaking wedlock'. And this is the picture we have in Hosea 2. To break wedlock or commit fornication is to commit whoredom and those who participate are called whores and whoremongers. This is strong language in any generation. Consider this passage from the New Testament:

Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge. (Hebrews 13)

Now take this to the level of our relationship with God. When one takes the love that belongs to God and gives it to another this is Idolatry. It is apostacy for a believer that is supposed to be committed exclusively to God. Hebrews 6 offers severe warnings of the most dreadful sort against such behavior. The use of terms such as whoring and whoremonger, etc. are intended to level upon the perpetrators the enormity of their crimes. A thief is a thief. A killer is a killer. A liar is a liar. A whoremonger is a whoremonger. Ravenhill once said that if we started using Biblical terms to describe these behaviors folk might think twice.

What do prople prefer? She had an affair? Use a euphamism to knock the edge off the crime? Suddenly a liar is a fibber with a lofty imagination? Nay verily! Hosea and other like passages are powerful pictures of God's position on man's behavior. It is colorful and loud. It is marvelous expression of how He feels about things. When we read Hosea- we get the message.

I understand and agree with alot of what you are saying but my classmates and I are concerned for women who have been raped or abused and who when reading this passage think God condones rap or abuse of women. No one was talking about adultry which still would not justify a woman being raped or abused but just how imagery like this may make some abused women think God condones their abuse or how some sick men could use this passage to justify rape or abuse of women.

I understand what the metaphor in Hosea means in reference to our relationship with God but I also have never been raped or abused for a woman who has experienced these things it may be hard for them to get what the passage is saying about their personal relationship with God because they are reminded of the pain of their abuse.

Part of the explanation of many of these laws is God restraining men rather than remaking them.

God's heart for marriage is also shown in the Old Testament :-

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Mal 2:14 Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.
Mal 2:15 And did not he make one? Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore one? That he might seek a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.
Mal 2:16 [b]For the LORD, the God of Israel, saith that he hateth putting away[/b]: for one covereth violence with his garment, saith the LORD of hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.
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The passage also re-enforces the "two shall become one" principle. In the cases where Israelites were instructed to put away their foreign wives, it may be that the spiritual condition of the foreign wives in question meant having 'oneness' made it impossible to have 'oneness' with God :-

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1Co 6:15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid.
1Co 6:16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to a harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.
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It's interesting that the genealogy in Matthew Ch.1 only notes the mothers when the marriage had an 'abnormal' original : Thamar, Rachab, Ruth and Bathsheba.

PassingThru

...but just how imagery like this may make some abused women think God condones their abuse or how some sick men could use this passage to justify rape or abuse of women.

It may be wise to avoid it if dealing with people that aren't going to understand it, however I would be careful with the idea of avoiding passages of scripture on a permanent basis:

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2Ti 3:16 [b]All[/b] Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
2Ti 3:17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.
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Surely any magazine rack in petrol stations and supermarkets or nearly any television program is going to provoke more pain to someone that has suffered abuse than this vivid imagery for the severeness of sin, especially since they are produced in a pro-abuse spirit ?

PassingThru

I understand and agree with alot of what you are saying but my classmates and I are concerned for women who have been raped or abused and who when reading this passage think God condones rap or abuse of women. No one was talking about adultry which still would not justify a woman being raped or abused but just how imagery like this may make some abused women think God condones their abuse or how some sick men could use this passage to justify rape or abuse of women.

I think it would be a stretch to use the passages in this way. The reality is that these women should be outraged at things that distort men's perception of women such as pornography and the secular media. If I were in such a class I would certainly point that out. The are also laws in the Old Testament that deal with rape and that carried the death penalty also. So I think the important thing is to emphasize the fact that God does not condone any sinful behavior and calls what it is what it is. If someone extrapolated some statement from God's word and conjered some excuse to rape or abuse then there were laws to deal with them. the problem is not with the laws or its language- but with the people who would mishandle it. I would focus on that fact rather than even remotely implying God was somehow at fault for wording things as He did. ;-)

Surely any magazine rack in petrol stations and supermarkets or nearly any television program is going to provoke more pain to someone that has suffered abuse than this vivid imagery for the severeness of sin, especially since they are produced in a pro-abuse spirit ?

And the enemy is a master at making [u]God[/u] out to be the 'bad-guy'. People do not rape and abuse because of God's word- but in spite of it.

I will take back my wool and my linen,
intended to cover her nakedness. So now I will expose her lewdness before the eyes of her lovers; no one will take her out of my hands.

Here I think it is important specifically to look at what God meant by this in the passages before and after. I think it would be a great error to read into this passage the behavior of men who abuse with a God who loves His people. When I read what God is saying- it is that He is going to stop funding their harlotry with His goodness. They had been attributing God's goodness to their lovers. But that was going to stop. And when it stopped; who would deliver them? When God dried up the earth for 3.5 years- who can deliver? It is because of God's mercy that we are not consumed. If He shut down His goodness right now- who would deliver us? Who has the power to deliver when God withholds His provision? God does not owe us anything. What we have from Him is His goodness. If He but lifted His hand (the hedge as it were) our enemies would over take us. When God liftes the hedge- who can deliver?