Offerings to God

One commentator refers to the rules found in today’s passage as “laws requiring respect for God’s holiness.” This is an apt designation, for to break any of the commandments in Exodus 22:28–31 was to call the Lord’s holy authority into question.

First, we read in Exodus 22:28 that we must not “revile God” or “curse a ruler.” Reviling the Lord is a clear violation of the third commandment, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain” (20:7), so it is easy to see how that is an affront to divine holiness. We can see that cursing a ruler, such as unduly slandering, is an attack on God’s holy authority when we remember that human authorities have been instituted by the Lord Himself (Rom. 13:1). This was particularly true in ancient Israel, where the king was the Lord’s vice-regent (see Ps. 2), but it is true in other contexts as well. God’s people are not to slander their leaders, and this is true even when earthly authorities are not fulfilling their vocations. This does not mean that we cannot petition secular rulers to do their jobs or bring our grievances to them; nevertheless, in so doing we are to respect their position of authority and remember that God put them there. To slander them is to call the Lord’s wisdom into question.

Exodus 22:29–30 focuses on the need of people to give immediately to God. As the sovereign, holy Creator, the Lord deserves our first and our best. This was represented in ancient Israel through the giving of produce and animals as offerings, and any delay in giving what was owed to God was a serious sin. Even the firstborn sons of the Israelites had to be sacrificed to the Lord, though they were not killed but redeemed by offering lambs in their place (13:13). A firstborn sheep or ox did not have to be given on the day of birth but was to be kept with its mother for seven days (22:30). Most likely this was because it would give the mother time to fully clean the animal after its birth and would prevent death or illness that might result from so quick a separation. A clean, evidently healthy animal had to be offered to God (e.g., see Lev. 3:1), and waiting to offer a firstborn animal until the eighth day helped ensure that the animal was fit to be sacrificed.

The Israelites were consecrated or set apart as holy to a holy God, so they could not eat flesh “torn by beasts in the field” (Ex. 22:31). In other words, Israelites could not eat carrion. To do so would make them ritually unclean and unfit to approach the perfectly clean—that is, holy—God (see Lev. 17:15).