Everybody Must Get Stoned
Leviticus 24: 10-23

Wow- an interesting yet quite troubling story. So you've got this Egyptian and Israelite who get into a fight. And apparently in the midst of it all, the Israelite emits a curse against God (blasphemed the Name with a curse). The needle drags across the record, the jukebox is quiet, all conversation stops- everyone knows something bad has just happened. So they get this guy in custody until God's will becomes clear to them. At this point, the story sounds pretty good- people of God waiting for a sign of what to do to this person who cursed.

Then the answer comes- Take him out of camp and stone him. Everyone who heard it puts their hand on his head (to hold him down?) and the whole assembly is to stone him to death. God tells Moses anyone who curses God is responsible and all who blaspheme the name of the LORD will be put to death. I think we've found a solution to our overpopualtion problems. As if the death itself weren't gruesome enough, the entire assembly does the stoning. So I hear the curse and now I'm legally obligated to be involved in physically killing someone. That'll ruin your day.

Interesting that after commanding taking part in putting someone to death for blasphemy, the next section talks about the death penalty for whoever takes the life of a human being. Doesn't that create an endless cycle? Kill John, he blasphemed. Kill Peter, he killed John... etc. Is this why the whole assembly is doing the stoning? We don't know which rock actually killed him so we don't know who actually did it... It seems like this could create a society of snitches looking for an excuse to throw a rock or two.

Killing an animal results in restitution. If you injure your neighbor- same thing happens is done to you. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. I know Gandhi's famous line, but I like a tooth for a tooth and we're all gumming applesauce. Notice that there's no mention of intent here. Sorry I ran over your mailbox... go ahead and back your car into mine. It's like a sort of mandated karma- except even that involves intent.

In both instances, the alien receives the same punishment as the native born.

So they take the blasphemer out and stone him.

This is troubling to me on two fronts. First... stoning? Killing someone for cursing? What does that entail exactly? Just saying "God" or "Yahweh"? Does the curse translate? I rarely say "Yahweh" at all, so am I safe on the name in vain front? Especially since "god" and "lord" are English words in different contexts, does that suggest that these English words don't qualify here? Regardless- seems a bit steep. And if we lived by this, how many of us would still be alive? The concept of God's people being violently engaged in frontier justice is hard for me to swallow. Maybe God was a little more blatantly involved in the prosecution process- but it seems like it would be a pretty easy thing to manipulate ala "The Crucible".

Second, maybe it's bad that hearing God's name as a curse doesn't put the sort of anger or rage in me that it seemed to in their context. Honestly, hearing God's name in vain does get under my skin (OMG, GD, etc.- you get the idea)- but certainly not to the point where I feel compelled to become a vigilante. I think it's important to point out that this "cursing" here is related to God's name exclusively and not cuss-words which seem to me to be highly cultural in both their existence and usage.

I'm not suggesting I should be wishing people dead whenever I hear God's name cursed, but maybe it should bother me more. Maybe it suggests a lack of sanctity for things holy- maybe it suggests a numbing of conscience, maybe it suggests yet another example of conflict avoidance in my life- but I don't have any desire to stone people to death for such usage any more than I wish to lay down on an altar for my slips.

This passage certainly paints a contrast between God's wrath and God's grace. Not quite the go your way and sin no more mentality I cling to in the NT. But in the midst of it all, maybe there's a lesson about the need for discipline in our attitude to God- if misusing His name resulted in death, maybe I should treat it holy too.