The Seventh Commandment:
Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread.
So what is this obsession with yeast? What makes yeast so abhorrent to God? Surely, even if the People did not know that yeast was animals, God did. He made them, after all. But then God never understood anything about germs and viruses, preferring instead the idea that demons invade sick people. Do you suppose Noah brought 2 yeasts in a little bowl of warm sugar-water, with him on the ark? If Moses has to talk about them, surely Noah had to have something to do with it. Or Mrs. Noah.
Jesus said, in his ambiguous way he really likes, "
Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and of Herod."This implied a hidden agenda. Yeast was mysterious even for Jesus. Slip a little into the mix, and watch the magic! Thanks to careful observation--science, we now know what Jesus/God and his followers didn't. Yeast reproduces in the mixture, when it is warm, and when there is enough moisture, and enough sugar for it to eat.
In First Corinthians, Paul said,
Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast–as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.
Some say Paul was telling us to get rid of our own sins. More sinister, is the idea that we should cast out anyone near us that we deem "evil." One bad apple, as they say. Whatever it means, the evangelists are simply obsessed with--and a little afraid of--yeast.
Oh, and if you were wondering, the preferred commandment seven is
Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery.
That's not very interesting. Just another commandment that everyone considers "good," but nobody bothers to make into a real law. A good thing, too. While many courts love to poke their ugly faces into our sex lives, heterosexual adultery remains a grand old tradition. Maybe that's one aspect of our lives we acknowledge that we should have some control over.
But thanks for listening, diary.
6 comments:
How does the Bible define adultery? I would define it as "cheating" or having sex with someone other than your spouse without your spouses consent or knowledge.
But what about open marriages, or group sex where multiple married couples get together for a little fun? Is that also "adultery" in Biblical terms?
The bible has NOTHING to say about marital infidelity. But people prefer to pretend and look the other way .
Numbers 31 17 says
"17Now kill all the boys and all the women who have slept with a man. 18Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves."
Keep them for yourselves. It didn't say "marry them."
And hosea:
2When the LORD first began speaking to Israel through Hosea, he said to him, "Go and marry a prostitute,[a] so some of her children will be born to you from other men. This will illustrate the way my people have been untrue to me, openly committing adultery against the LORD by worshiping other gods."
Yay god. Can he BE more Passive-aggressive? Then he really shows them:
1Then the LORD said to me, "Go and get your wife again. Bring her back to you and love her, even though she loves adultery. For the LORD still loves Israel even though the people have turned to other gods, offering them choice gifts
Anyway, the Lord loves prostitution.
As I see it, there are two possible explanations for including a commandment against adultery. "Adultery" predates marriage as a concept, having been around as long as pair-bonding. In a tribal society and also today, this can result in any combination of 1-2 males and/or 1-2 females trying to kill each other. Only a society of drooling idiots would require a god-like figure to point this out, and such a society would have no interest in mitigating this kind of strife, so they wouldn't be likely to write it down. Ask any police officer how much fun domestic disputes are. So this leaves us with two possibilities: either the god-stamp was put on this to try and make it stick, or this was just another rule that was bound to be broken and therefore was used to create guilt. Come to think of it, these explanations are not mutually exclusive.
I don`t know how the bible can keep adultery straight, when men in the bible are having hundreds of wives, and prostitution is generally a-ok. Basically, the commandment is for women.
Ah! I think you're on to something! I never looked at it that way. The Judeo-biblical culture is so male-dominated, I assumed that it applied to men. Your way, it was meant for married women, and therefore was only truly concerned with issues of patrimony. "Thou shalt not have other men's children!" This would clear up a few apparent contradictions.
Oh , there are definitely laws against men committing adultery. But considering the zillions of stories in the bible of "Holy" men having many children with concubines and prostitutes, it doesn't hold any weight. Consider David, or Isaac, or Jacob, or Abraham. The story of Sarai and the concubine and their baby-making contest. Where's the no-no from God about adultery? But if Sarai went off and did a male slave, it's bye-bye Sarai.
Post a Comment