Proclaimer Blog
When is a cat not a cat?
When it's a dog, of course.
Sometimes, things are not always what they appear. For example, take the infamous "trial by ordeal" in Numbers 5.11-31. On a first reading it seems somewhat barbaric, a bit like one of those medieval witch hunts (you know, ducked under the water, drown: you're innocent; survive: you're guilty and are hanged). And there were plenty of such ordeals around in the ancient world. Contemporary records tell of hands being immersed into boiling water etc.
And, at first reading, it's easy to get hot under the collar about such a passage.
But a cat is not a cat if it is a dog.
And this is quite different from the trials by ordeal which saw you dead whether innocent or guilty. There are a number of differences (see below), but fundamentally what sets it apart is this – the whole process is SAFE. If the suspected woman is innocent she will suffer no harm. Only the guilty woman will suffer.
These are the sorts of passages where CAREFUL reading is required. For the record, these are some of the other things that set Number 5 apart from a "trial by ordeal":
- it is not meaningless magic, but performed in the Lord's presence and at his command/direction
- the water has a special significance as it is holy
- the process is strictly controlled – this is not, quite literally, a witch hunt
- it removes the vulnerable woman from the potential injustice of a male-dominated society
- it prevents punishment of a woman on the basis of suspicion alone