In the scroll of Deuteronomy, there are some ancient laws for ancient Israel about divorce

and remarriage.

And it's kind of hard for modern readers because they leave divorce entirely in the hands of men.

Women had no say whether or not they got divorced.

And if their husband left them and they go on to remarry, they're considered impure.

The language of a woman becoming impure because of the behavior and social power of these

men in this woman's life, she becomes this passive victim.

We're all of a sudden, what is she defiled as she like?

She has somehow lower value or dignity just because of what these men have done.

This feels uncomfortable for modern readers.

And it might be because we're taking our modern sentiment and trying to impose it back

into an ancient time.

Or perhaps this feels wrong and strange to us because, well, because it's supposed to.

We're followers of Jesus and part of why it feels wrong for how this woman is being

treated is precisely because we hold the values of Jesus from the ceremonial amount, which

is very much about elevating women and children and people because of life circumstances or

social location have real disadvantages in how our communities are structured.

Jesus really cared about those people and included them and brought them to a place of elevated

dignity in his communities of disciples.

So I just want to notice the reason why we're bothered by this law is because we've been

shaped by the ethic of Jesus, which is also in the Bible.

So we're bothered about one part of the Bible, not just because we're somehow more morally

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