And when you have crossed the Jordan, set up these stones on Mount Ebal, as I command you today, and coat them with plaster. – Deuteronomy 27:4

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 20, 2018): Deuteronomy 27

Feuds can make us do some very foolish things. Sometimes we view events differently. Often we ascribe intentions to the one with whom we are fighting that just are not really there. It can even cause us to remember things differently as time passes, changing the facts of the situation.

There is a controversy over this passage that actually involves an ancient feud. And the problem originates a little earlier in the Book of Deuteronomy. Moses tells Israel “When the Lord your God has brought you into the land you are entering to possess, you are to proclaim on Mount Gerizim the blessings, and on Mount Ebal the curses” (Deuteronomy 11:29). The good, the blessings of God that will come to you, are to be proclaimed from Mount Gerizim. But if you fail to follow God, the curses that will follow you will be proclaimed from Mount Ebal. As a whole, the Law of God itself is thought to be a blessing. Consider these words from Psalm 1: “Blessed is the one … whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night” (Psalm 1:1-2). So the question becomes why would an altar containing a copy of the Law of God, a blessing to Israel, be placed on Mount Ebal or the mountain of curses. The Samaritan translation of the Torah reverses this passage and says that Moses commanded for this altar to be built on Mount Gerizim, not on Mount Ebal. And there is a logic to this altar being placed on Gerizim and not Ebal.

Which leaves us with another question. So why does the Jewish Torah specify that this altar is to be placed on Mount Ebal? The easiest answer is that it instructs this alter to be built on Mount Ebal because Moses, for whatever reason, commanded it to be built there. Moses’s command does not have to make sense to us. But there is an intriguing second possibility. And the second possibility involves a feud that exists between the Jews and the Samaritans. Rabbi Akiva, a prominent first-century Pharisee, argued that “the ten tribes [the Samaritans] will have no share in the life of the world to come.” The Samaritans, who are essentially the mixed-race descendants of the ten tribes, were to be totally excluded from all of the blessings of God.

The problem is that Mount Gerizim is considered to be a holy site by the Samaritans. So the argument is that some scribe moved the altar from one mountain to the other as a direct result of the Jewish – Samaritan feud. Is there any truth in the argument? No one knows. But Jesus had a ministry impact in Samaria, and would later argue that “a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain [Mount Gerazim] nor in Jerusalem ... A time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth” (John 4:21, 23-24). Our reality is that our blessings do not come from a mountain, but directly from the God that follow. 

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Deuteronomy 28