Today, I am reading and commenting on  Deuteronomy 18-20.

Moses tells the Israelites that they must not imitate the detestable practices of the nations who in habit the land they are about to enter.  Then he lists some of the practices which they are not to imitate.  These practices are divination, sorcery, witchcraft, interpreting omens, consulting the dead, and sacrificing your children.  Moses told the Israelites that those practices were why God was going to drive those people out of the land before the Israelites.  I find the fact that this passage considers sacrificing children to be on par with divination and sorcery strange.  When I was young I was taught that divination, sorcery, interpreting omens, etc. were foolish and silly, but that sacrificing children was an horrific evil.  Perhaps the failure of the generation before me to recognize the evil of practicing divination led to so many in my generation, and younger, to no longer recognize the evil of sacrificing children.  Certainly, as sacrificing children has become more acceptable, so too has seeking to divine the future by various means and to cast spells has also become more acceptable.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Deuteronomy 18-20.

Moses warns the Israelites against imitating the detestable practices of the people who live in the land which God is giving them.  Then he lists at least some of the detestable ways they are not to imitate.

• sacrifice their child
• practice divination or sorcery
• interpret omens
• engage in witchcraft
• cast spells
• be a medium, or spiritist, or in any way consult the dead

I find that to be a very interesting list, because to me everything on that list is of a “kind”, except for the first one.  Everything on that list after the first item qualifies under what we today call “doing magic”.  Whenever I read this list I wonder what it is about practicing magic, which is what I classify most of this list as, which puts it in the same category as killing one’s child.  I think this list says something about how our society’s view of abortion influences its approach to rational thought.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Deuteronomy 18-20.

Moses warned the Israelites against imitating the “detestable ways” of the people already living there.  To make sure we would know what he meant describes those “detestable ways”.  First, he calls sacrificing their children detestable.  Then he lists a bunch of methods for either determining or controlling the future: divination, sorcery, interpreting omens, witchcraft, casting spells, consulting the dead.  We have long considered sacrificing children to be something horrific (although I would argue that many today no longer do so as long as the sacrifice takes place before birth), but dismissed the others as relatively minor misdeeds by the uneducated.  However, this is not the only place in the Bible where we are told such acts are serious sins, comparable to sacrificing a child.  We must place our faith in God.  When He desires for us to know more about the future than what He has revealed in the Bible He will raise up a prophet to give us His message.  We will know that such prophets are from God because the message they give us will be consistent with what He has already revealed and the predictions which they make will come to pass.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Deuteronomy 18-20.

Moses warned the people of Israel that they must not imitate the detestable practices of the people in the land they were entering.   He then lists some of the detestable practices they must not imitate.  The very first one he mentions is that they must not sacrifice any of their children.  It was because of these detestable practices that God drove those nations out of the land.  Related to that Moses warns the people against relying on those who practice sorcery or divination to plan.  Instead we should listen to the prophets whom God will raise up among us.  Further Moses tells us how to distinguish a prophet raised up by God from an imposter.  Those things which a true prophet predicts will happen or come true.  If the prophet’s predictions do not meet that criteria, they are a fraud.  We should apply this lesson to the many experts who today tell us how we should live our lives.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Deuteronomy 18-20.

Moses warned the Israelites against adopting the detestable practices of the people who already lived in the land they were entering.  The practices they were not to imitate were sacrificing their children, various forms of predicting the future, attempts to control the world around them using spells, and contacting the dead.  Moses then goes on to tell the people how to recognize a genuine prophet of God.  Anyone who claims to be a genuine prophet of God will make predictions about the future.  If those predictions fail to come true, the prophet is a fraud.  So, Moses links sacrificing children with soothsaying, witchcraft, and necromancy.  When I read the Old Testament prophecies against child sacrifice I find myself seeing abortion as a modern form of the same practices.  All of these linked practices represent attempts to gain control over the universe around us and cheat death, rather than turn to the One who does indeed control the universe around us and Who has power over death.