Exodus: Unity of Law and Grace

Laws of Liability and Restitution

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Lesson: Laws of Liability and Restitution

Genre: Lessons with Q & A

Track: 79

Dictation Name: RR171AR79

Location/Venue:

Year: Early 70’s

Let us worship God. Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. It is good to give thanks unto the Lord and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High. To show forth thy loving kindness in the morning and thy faithfulness every night. Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Let us pray.

O Lord and our God, who art the author of all things, we come to thee mindful of all thy mercies and blessings. We thank thee that thou art our shield and our defender, our refuge from the battles and noises of the world, our peace in a world of turmoil. Draw near to us and draw us ever close to thee. Speak to us the word that we need, strengthen us where we need strengthening, rebuke us where we need thy rebuke, and make us strong by thy spirit for thy service. In Christ’s name we pray, amen.

Our scripture lesson is from Exodus 22:21-27. Laws of Liability and Restitution, our fourth. Last week we considered out of order, the fifth section of this chapter and now we return to the fourth. Exodus 22:21-17. “Thou shalt neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. Ye shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child. If thou afflict them in any wise, and they cry at all unto me, I will surely hear their cry; and my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless. If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury. If thou at all take thy neighbour's raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down: For that is his covering only, it is his raiment for his skin: wherein shall he sleep? and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious.”

In these verses, the first case, verse 21, forbids affronts to or the maltreatment of aliens. Like so many of God’s laws, no man-administered penalty is cited. God says He Himself will punish the transgressors. There are numerous references to this law. For example, Exodus 23:9, Leviticus 19:33, and 25, 35, Deuteronomy 10:18-19, Jeremiah 7:6, Zechariah 7:10, Malachi 3:5, and other incidental references. God obviously considers it a very important matter. Again and again, God also reminds Israel that they were once aliens in Egypt, and hence, they should manifest graces towards aliens in their land.

In ancient Rome, the word for strangers came to mean enemy. In varying degrees, such an attitude has prevailed all over the world throughout history. Christianity has made another standard basic, and despite violations at times, it has become basic to Christendom. The enemies of Christianity tried to subvert this fact but they cannot do so. Not only aliens, but widows, orphans, and the needy are, in God’s eyes, tests of our faith, and many verses make this clear. More than I can number at this time. What is here stated in this particular law has become a general standard throughout our culture, so that even when the enemies of the church criticize it, they are really borrowing standards from us in order to criticize it. Of course, they sentimentalize everything but all the same, only as a result of the biblical influence has the alien and the stranger been received with this kind of care, consideration, and grace.

The second case, in verses 22-24, says “Ye shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child. If thou afflict them in any wise, and they cry at all unto me, I will surely hear their cry; and my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.” This law, like the first, protects the widow and orphan who, like aliens and people in a vulnerable position. These verses also apply to the oppression of aliens, so that the penalty cited, God’s judgment, is the liability and judgment for all these sins. Now, there is an important qualification to this judgment in verse 23, “If they cry at all unto me.” This is very important, a very much neglected aspect of the law. We encounter this at different times in the law. God, as judge and avenger, acts when there is an appeal to Him. This qualification places a duty on the covenant community, upon us. If the people of God want justice, whatever else they do they must pray to God. If there is no appeal to Him for His judgment, there is no judgment from Him in these cases. Now, it’s very plainly stated. The supreme judge acts when His judgment is sought in such matters. If we only weep and wail about matters, and feel that somehow it’s going to be resolved, without appealing to God, then God lets us wallow in our evil estate.

God promises death to the guilty, and He will make widows of their wives and orphans of their children. This is simply an application of Exodus 21:23-25, “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.” In biblical law, justice is to be open to everyone, to the weak and the helpless, to the aliens, to the social outcast, and to the strong. In 2 Kings 3:16-28, we have a case where the two prostitutes appealing to King Solomon for justice. Widows and orphans however, are given a special prominence, not simply because of their helplessness, but because of the protection of the family which is basic and essential to God’s order, but justice is the right of everyone in God’s law. The prostitutes who appealed to King Solomon were not put aside by being told they were prostitutes, they got justice.

Now the third case, in verses 25-27, refers to loans to the poor. It does not refer to commercial loans or to loans to a successful man. The person in mind in a poor man, probably landless, whose robe is also his covering in the cold of the night. The law of pledges or pawns is given in detail in Deuteronomy 24:6, 10-13, and 17 which read, “No man shall take the nether or the upper millstone to pledge: for he taketh a man's life to pledge. When thou dost lend thy brother any thing, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge. Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee. And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge: In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow's raiment to pledge.”

Now several things are apparent here, very important. First, the poor man or woman is seen as a working member of the community. He or she is to receive an interest-free loan as an aspect of our covenantal community life. The only charity involved is that no interest is charged. Outright gifts of charity are another matter.

Then second, it is legitimate to ask for a pledge or a pawn. While not required, it is seen as normal. A poor man faced with a crisis may be tempted to use the same article as a loan pledge with more than one man, hence the pledge. Nothing which is essential to a man’s livelihood could be taken as a pledge, as witness millstones used to grind corn. A man’s outer robe could be taken, but not a widow’s. Such garments had to be returned every night because the very poor used the cloak as their blanket. Garments were woven in Antiquity, and they were not cheap. They also had a very long life expectancy.

Then third, the borrower’s dignity could not be breached. The lender could not enter the house to carry out the pledge. The man who was borrowing was a covenant brother, and he had to be treated with kindness and courtesy.

Then fourth, the fact of a pledge meant that failure to repay meant forfeiture. Poverty did not give the borrower freedom to exploit his wealthier covenant member. This law calls for brotherly love, not sentimentality nor self-victimization.

Then fifth, on the other hand, if a poor man is exploited then God says, “and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious.” Again, God promises to hear if there is an appeal for justice, an appeal directed to Him whatever else is done. The poor man can be exploited by the lender if he is encouraged to borrow more than he can afford to repay, and to pledge more than he can afford to pledge. This is a common ploy in many cultures. In the United States, in recent years, many farmers lost once debt-free farms because loan officers persuaded them to borrow far more than they could hope to repay. In these three cases, the offender incurs a liability and God’s restitution is to destroy the offender and the unjust social order.

The law requiring interest-free loans for the working poor has a long history. Many Jewish communities have the institution of a free loan society. Many churches also have a special fund for interest-free loans to their members. Because God is merciful, His people must be merciful. God is described by David in Psalm 68:5, we a judge of the widows, their high court of appeal. Appeal, however, must be made to God for His justice to follow.

Now, God, as we have seen, makes widows, aliens, orphans, and the needy a test of a society. He rejects a society which practices injustice, but the requirement of justice does not mean sentimentality nor self-victimization. The law pledges, militates against the lender or the borrower exploiting the other.

Now, throughout history, God has used very practical tests to reveal the character of a people. Thus, in Zechariah’s time, two sins are specifically mentioned as revelatory of the life of the people then. These are first, stealing, representing all violations of the rights of one’s fellow man, and second, false oaths and vows which manifest a man’s actual disbelief in the presence of God and His judgment. Zechariah said men are no longer covenant men, and he charges the merchants with being Canaanites, intent only on gain and personal profit. For them and all others, the center was gone. Life’s focus has become a purely personal one. Instead of being God-centered, they were focused on their private lives. So, God, through Zechariah calls them Canaanites, and no more, and like the Canaanites they could be judged and ejected.

In a powerful poem, The Second Coming, William Buckner Yeats wrote, “Things fall apart, the center cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.” No center to hold society can exist where each man is his own center. When the church thinks only ecclesiastically and business is unconcerned about Christianity and society, nor where workers see no logic apart from their demands, when the various segments of a country become specialized on their interest to the exclusion of all else, the center cannot hold.

The purpose of God’s law is to center us on Himself and His kingdom. Our Lord declares, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness [or justice], and all these things shall be added unto you.” Thus, God’s law is very important for us to know and to study. Christ is our savior, He is the starting point of the Christian life in His atonement. He is our justification, our regeneration. If, however, we concentrate on our salvation, we bypass the inescapably God-centered character of true Christianity. When men, both in the church and out of it, center life upon themselves, they warp reality and create anarchy. Man’s world then begins to fall apart. We live in such a time.

So, too, did the men of Israel when young Rehoboam took the throne. At the National Assembly, when the crown counsel arrogantly made clear that its policy, in the face of protest, would be heavier taxation and more control, most of the leaders of the tribes present broke up the meeting with a cry, “To your tents, O Israel!” Living in tents was then remote to most of them, and only a very, very limited number lived pastoral lives that required nomadic living. What the cry meant was, in a sense, “back to basics, back to the elemental forms because the center no longer holds. The sad fact is that in this episode, neither the northern kingdom Israel nor the southern Judah returned to their basic covenantal faith. Their reaction to a strong centralized state was to divide into two strongly centralized states, so they went from disaster to disaster. The study of God’s law is the best and only true response to the cry, “To your tents, O Israel.” The church which professes Christ but not His law soon professes neither. It wants deliverance by God but not obedience to Him and this is profanity.

This morning I finished reading a very interesting book. A dull book, as far as the writing was concerned, but interesting in its thesis. The professor who wrote it, J. Michael Hittle, titles it The Service City, State and Townsmen in Russia, 1600-1800. It speaks of how the Russian city was created, the purpose the crown gave to it, and step by step how things began to change, and in the concluding sentences, the author quotes one scholar, I believe a Russian scholar, and says, “It is with an almost despairing resignation that he remarks in connection with the reforms of Peter I: ‘The new wine of the elevation of city culture was poured into the old skins of the tiaglo [feudal dues or tax] organization of the posad commune.’ But that, of course, is precisely the point. The new wine could only be poured into the available skins, and the tiaglo relationship was both necessary and available. It was only in the latter decades of the eighteenth century that the government could begin to entertain the notion of altering the skins: but even that exercise, as it turned out, relied in practice as much on old materials as on new ones.” You get the point. Something that had once been useful in a pragmatic sense now was no longer functioning, and as they tried to alter society in the right direction, all they had was old wine skins, and a century and some years later, it lead to the destruction of Russian culture. We are in a world of old wine skins.

A few days before reading that, I read something which made me go back to this item, about a man from Stockton, apparently from a prominent family who has a home also in Tahoe City, in Lake Tahoe. He went up there to stain the exterior of his house. When he finished the job, he went to the roadway to a faucet to clean oil based stain and paint thinner from his brushes and paint pans with a garden hose. In all, Al Stesia{?} dealt with seven agencies in the ensuing excitement. Every kind of agency was kind because he was polluting the environment for washing his brushes. “We arrived to find a very large puddle of water with something on top,” reported a firefighter from the Meeks Bay Fire Department who responded. The Meeks Bay Fire Department, the Tahoe City Fire Department, the California Highway Patrol, the El Dorado County Sheriff’s Department, the El Dorado County Environmental Health Department, the El Honton{?} Regional Water Control Board, and the California Fish and Game Department were notified. The sheriff’s man said, “It was obnoxious smelling.” The fire Department immediately mopped up the spill using special oil-absorbing pads, some water ran into a neighboring yard, the fire department dug up and took to the station 120 pounds of contaminated dirt in plastic bags. Al Stesia agreed to pay the fire department $160 to cover their costs in responding to the incident. He also agreed to take the contaminated dirt to a waste disposal site in Sacramento. This saved him plenty because the tab to have the dirt picked up and disposed of would have been $2,000. Well, that’s an interesting account of the old wineskins as they are hardening and becoming more and more worthless in our society. With all the agencies that are involved for a couple of pans and brushes. It is amazing and yet revelatory of what we have become.

So, as we return to God’s law, and to Christ as king and judge, as priest and redeemer, the new wine of the faith will break again the old wineskins as it has so many times before, so we live in very exciting times. They will not be dull, but we know that the old wineskins as before will not survive. Let us pray.

Our Father, thy word is truth, and thy kingdom is alone the source of justice. Thy word establishes for us our priorities, tells us who is king of kings and what His law word is. Make us strong in thy service. Make us the new wine of thy kingdom, and give us ever-increasing faith and zeal in thy service. In Christ’s name, amen. Are there any questions now about our lesson? Yes?

[Audience] Usury is no longer against the law here. Usury in United States, as a concept, has vanished.

[Rushdoony] I didn’t quite get that.

[Audience] Usury.

[Rushdoony] Oh yes.

[Audience] Has vanished as a concept in the United States.

[Rushdoony] Yes, it has, and in the biblical form, usury it can be exacted in business loans, but the loan cannot be beyond seven years, six years. The seventh year is the year of termination, and we have a relic of that which was once law in our country in the bankruptcy laws, a modified relic but nonetheless a relic, and now we have a society which is entirely governed by the requirements of finance, not by any moral law. So there’s been a dramatic shift from a justice-oriented society to a financially-oriented one. Any other questions or comments? Yes?

[Audience] On the same token, that house can be invaded in order to take the pledge back.

[Rushdoony] The house can be invaded . . .

[Audience] People can enter homes and take back the pledge.

[Rushdoony] Yes. In a corrupt society, that’s commonplace, but what we need to recognize is when the law of God was observed, according to one archeological study, at that time, houses were made of stone except for the doors, and there was a drape hung over the doorway which could be pulled aside to let the air circulate freely. In other words, there was so high a level of honestly, at times when men were law-abiding, that a stone house would have a drapery door. Some of us can recall when people did not lock their doors, even in the cities here in California, and elsewhere in the country. Any other questions or comments? Well, if not, let us conclude with prayer.

Our Father, we thank thee that thy kingdom rules over all, that thy will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven. Grant, O Lord, a spirit of prayer, of appeal to thy judgment throne, that we as we see the evils around us, may not simply complain, that might cry out to thee for justice. O Lord, our God, we have too often been silent towards thee and vocal one to another. Grant us a spirit of prayer. And now go in peace. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you this day and always. Amen.

End of tape.