God's Justice for the Defiled

(michelango's judgement)


LEV 18:24 "'Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled.
LEV 18:25 Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants.
LEV 18:26 But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the aliens living among you must not do any of these detestable things,
LEV 18:27 for all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled.
LEV 18:28 And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you.

Sometimes I sit and think to myself- God must be really mean and ruthless to have ordered the ISraelites to destroy such a great number of tribes and races whilst they were wandering in the wilderness. Whhilst it is reported that the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land is a mere 7 day journey, they spent 40 years blundering around in the wilderness of Sinai, a rogue tribe with awkward practices and foreign customs- and they spent most of their time "cleansing" the land in mass cullings and raiding. And yet, it was the Lord who directed them to do so. The 21st century mind might raise his voice in contempt and scrutiny of the kind of God who would direct and permit (active and passive responsibility) such carnage and godlessness. However, if we consider the evils ways of these tribes, our conditioned minds may find them more barbaric than we realise.

THe 21st century mind is wired to civilisation, which in this author's opinion, takes its roots from Judaeo-Christian principles. After all, who wrote the TEn Commandments? And why have we internalised those commandments and enshrined them in our basic legislature. Furthermore, we all recognise that lying is wrong. But it's not a law. IT's an unspoken moral law. Why is this so, if not for God's laying it down clearly in Exodus? Furthermore, why would incest be wrong? Search your heart, dear reader, and tell me if you can conceive a better explanation than its God-formed, basic principles. Incest is wrong because God says so, nothing more. This is the character of God that we recognise through the Old Testament- a God of righteousness- a wellspring of truth and morality from whom all laws, justice and virtue pour forth.

Imagine a wife-beater or an incestrous molester who preys on his innocent children and grandchildren. Imagine a generation of such incestrous criminals and beasts who would betray their marriage vows to commit adultery with a close family member. Does not your heart beat faster with rage and anger that such a moral outrage is committed? Now imagine a society of such blatent sinfulness and disregard for righteouesness and virtue, consumed by physical gratification and evil pleasures. The bible says in Jeremiah that the heart is desperately wicked and deceitful above all things- it is capable of nobility, yes, but also of the worst kinds of depravity. Look inside your hearts, my brothers and do you not see the same sins and evils that we are so quick to point out and condemn?


It was this kind of a world that God chose to destroy with the Flood. It was this kind of a city that Sodom and Gomorrah were, prompting the GOd of all Justice to destroy all trace of it.In God's dialogue with Abraham- the famous bargaining scene, we know for a faact that in Sodom and Gomorrah, He could not even find 10 good men to save the city. It was these kinds of tribes that filled the desert region, an atrocity to a holy and moral God.