Crystal Writes A Blog

Cabernet and Cornbread

Grape Ice Cream by Flickr User Mi Mitrika, CC License = Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works
Click image to open a new tab/window to view the original image and to access the user’s full photo stream at Flickr where you can find a link to her blog with the recipe–but you’ll need to translate it.

Did you know that there is supposedly no such flavor as grape? I mean, we have what we consider to be grape flavoring, but an article I read said that no one can accurately duplicate the actual flavor of grapes the way they can other fruits. Even grape juice has added flavoring to make it taste like people think a grape should taste. Oh, and according to the article, the hardest ice cream flavor to find is also grape ice cream. I remember grape sherbet at the Thrifty Drug and Discount Store when I was a child, and it was good, but if you didn’t eat it fast, you turned purple.

In today’s reading from Deuteronomy 23:25 through Deuteronomy 24:4 (23:24-24:4 in versions other than CJB) we won’t read about grape flavoring, but we will read about grapes. Moses tells people that they may go into their neighbors vineyard and fields for food, but they may only take what they can eat at that time. They are not to put any of the produce that does not belong to them in a basket to take home with them. So, they can’t take grapes to make Cabernet, and they can’t take home ears of corn to grind into meal to make cornbread.

At the chapter change, Moses talks about marriage. If a man marries a woman and then finds her displeasing, he can divorce her and send her away. If her second husband also finds her displeasing, or if he dies, the first husband cannot take her back. By this point, she is considered to be defiled to her first husband, and his taking her back would be detestable to The Lord. Moses reminds them not to bring about sin in the land of their inheritance.

Since the Scriptures tonight are short, I took a look at some commentary on the above verses, and I learned a few interesting things. The fact that God said fields should be shared by those passing through them (whether they were traveling or were workers and the allowance was the same as not muzzling an ox) was a statement about how abundant their produce would be in the new land. They should be able to share with any who are hungry and not have any lack themselves. And apparently, the rule about not doing that on Sabbath or with unwashed hands was an added rule by the Pharisees.

As for the woman who was divorced, according to the commentary, she was free to get married again since the divorce decree set her free as if her husband had died. But, to keep Israel from copying the Egyptian practices of exchanging wives as they got bored with them, God declared that once a man put away his wife, he could not take her back. And, even without taking her back, we know that Yeshua further qualified these rulings by telling people that the idea of divorce was only given due to the hardness of men’s hearts except for matters of infidelity, but it has never been God’s intention. He wants us to be as willing to commit to seeing our relationships through as He is to seeing His relationship through with us even when we deserve for Him to drop us like a hot potato.

Sometimes, we look at all these instructions, and we see trouble in keeping them. But, like I said last night about exposure making you like something, the more I read God’s written word, the more attracted I am to seeking to please Him in what I do. I believe God wanted a set apart people who didn’t act like those around them with their worship if false gods and their pleasure-seeking ways. He was trying to set up a place for them that would be like Heaven, pure and inviting to Him, so He could spend time with those He loves. Though we are not in Heaven yet, we can work to cleanse ourselves and our lives to be more and more inviting to the presence of God. That will always be the closest we get to Heaven on Earth.

August 27, 2014 - Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) | Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | abundance, Bible Commentary, Bible study, Complete Jewish Bible, Deuteronomy, divorce, Israel, Moses, Scripture, sharing, Torah commentary, Torah Portions