Ezra 9:1-2
"After these things had been done, the leaders came to me and said, "The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites. They have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, and have mingled the holy race with the peoples around them. And the leaders and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness."
Ezra 10:9-11,16-17
"Within the three days, all the men of Judah and Benjamin had gathered in Jerusalem. And on the twentieth day of the ninth month, all the people were sitting in the square before the house of God, greatly distressed by the occasion and because of the rain. Then Ezra the priest stood up and said to them, "You have been unfaithful; you have married foreign women, adding to Israel's guilt. Now make confession to the LORD, the God of your fathers, and do his will. Separate yourselves from the peoples around you and from your foreign wives." "So the exiles did as was proposed. Ezra the priest selected men who were family heads, one from each family division, and all of them designated by name. On the first day of the tenth month they sat down to investigate the cases, and by the first day of the first month they finished dealing with all the men who had married foreign women.
I've been in a kind of theme in my thought process as of late. But I thought that instead of saying what I think about this particular text. I would ask you the reader... If there is indeed a you the reader reading this, to please share a few of your idea's or conclusions concerning the following questions.
Why do you think it was necessary for the Jews to divorce or separate from their wives, and why did God condone it?
What application, if any, can we learn from this text?
I suggest that before you answer my question, you read all of chapters 9 and 10.
6 comments:
Thanks Harold... I would have personally gone a different way with this scripture.... but any feed back is much appreciated!
No one is interested in giving their opinion besides Harold!?!
Oh well that's alright. I'll switch back to my old format then.
You can’t blame a guy for trying.
Hey, I stumbled upon your blog tonight and your questions really caught my eye. Mostly because I guess I've never really thought about this passage much..... Hopefully you don't mind if I offer my opinion, although it holds no validity, just my own thoughts, but maybe they were allowed to seperate from their wives so that they could be seperate from their sins. You know, so that they didn't keep sinning just by living their lives. As for something that we could learn from that, I think it's important that we get rid of the sin in or lives on a daily basis, because if you don't get rid of it, over time it becomes easier to live with, take swearing for example, it's in all the movies, and coming from the mouth of every high school/college kid, and for the most part we have become comfortable with it, but we shouldn't be, it's still a sin....
Thank you very much Anonymous for responding. I don’t know why you said that your opinion holds no validity. I guess that depends on who you believe is judging your opinion, about whether it is to be valid or not.
You made some very good points and I think they are most certainly valid. In my next blog I hope to cover some of those points.
These blogs are an open forum and I would enjoy hearing your opinion again.
Sorry. I guess I don't feel my opinion holds value because all through high school I was the youngest in my class and when your the youngest your opinion doesn't really matter to others. Thank you for letting me know that you appreciate my opinion, I look forward to reading your next blog...
I think your opinion is valid too. However, I don't quite see what you are getting at by the "separate" thing... I agree with being different, or anti-societal values.
John, I really like your new template... how did you get that on there? Let me know because I'd like to add a tinge of creativity to my main page too!!
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