Torah Portion: Deuteronomy 21:10-25:19
This week’s Torah Portion encompasses a varied group of instructions to Israel regarding anything from marital relationships to what to do if you stumble on a bird’s nest. Running through the instructions are common threads which reveal God’s nature and heart for his people, including justice (fairness in relationships, not taking advantage of people), compassion (care for others, including the most vulnerable) and purity.
God’s Attention to Detail
This call to purity is nowhere more visible than in Deuteronomy 22:9-11, whose verses at first glance appear relatively unconnected and perhaps a little strange:
“You shall not sow your vineyard with different kinds of seed, lest the yield of the seed which you have sown and the fruit of your vineyard be defiled. You shall not plough with an ox and a donkey together. You shall not wear a garment of different sorts, such as wool and linen mixed together.”
The prohibition on mixing seed demonstrates that God has appointed particular places for everything he has created, including the smallest and seemingly inconsequential things. As he said through the prophet Isaiah: “Does he [the farmer] not plant wheat in its place, barley in its plot, and spelt in its field?” (Isa 28:25)
Yoking an ox with a donkey would have been cruel for the donkey, a slighter beast with less strength and a different step. God encourages compassion for the beasts of the field but we are also reminded of Paul’s instruction to believers to “not be unequally yoked with unbelievers” (2 Cor 6:14). Notably, oxen were clean animals while donkeys were unclean.
Finally, blending together plant fibres (e.g. linen) with animal fibres (e.g. wool), which differed markedly in just about every way (e.g. strength, washability), would not have made for good quality garments and may have defiled people’s worship by causing them to sweat in God’s presence (e.g. Ezek 44:17-18).
God’s Appointed Order
In these verses, we catch glimpses of God’s heart: the significance and beauty of order, compassion for his creation, and practical concerns too. But these verses are also united by another principle: the importance of respecting God’s designated boundaries.
We live in the era of ‘trans’: transgenderism, trans-speciesism, even trans-humanism is on the horizon. Today it seems every boundary is made to be transgressed, every distinction to be blurred, every separation to be confused. But God’s people have always been called to preserve his created order with its given distinctions and relationships – each of which paints a picture of the most crucial distinction and relationship of all: that between humanity and God. After all, it was man’s sinful desire to usurp God’s authority and glory – “ye shall be as gods” – which precipitated the Fall.
With this in mind, we see in Deuteronomy 22:12 a command to Israel to make tassels on the four corners of their garments. This is a reference back to Numbers 15:37-41, where God told Moses that it was his purpose that the people would look at these tassels and thereby be reminded to obey all of his commands and not to chase after the lusts of their own hearts and eyes.
Likewise, let us today “throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Yeshua, the pioneer and perfecter of faith” (Heb 12:1-2).
Author: Frances Rabbitts
