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DEUTERONOMY — 4:6 proof

DEUT54 This brings to mind Isaiah 49:6, which speaks of Israel as being an or goyim, "a light of nations," whose good acts will bless and light the world. Why would Israelites expect Gentiles to be impressed by their laws, no matter how just, if these laws exclude them from equal expectations of justice? How impressed would contemporary Jews be with a society that legislated humane values, but did not apply them to Jews?

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DEUTERONOMY — 4:15 careful

DEUT100 Eating on Yom Kippur is prohibited only to those who are healthy, while the commandment to seriously ill people is to eat. Thus, a person who is supposed to eat on Yom Kippur, but doesn't, commits as much a violation of Jewish law as the person who is supposed to fast, but doesn't. As Rabbi Israel Salanter taught: "A sick person who is very ill is exempt from all the commandments except one, "And you shall be very careful with your lives'" [this verse].

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DEUTERONOMY — 10:18 giving

DEUT448 Deuteronomy 10:18-19 provides yet another indication that love in the Torah is defined primarily through actions. Verse nineteen commands the Israelites "to love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt," while verse eighteen teaches that God "loves the stranger, giving him food and clothing." The Torah's instruction to the Israelites to follow in God's ways (Deuteronomy 28:9), means that their love for the strangers should be expressed, as is God's, by providing them with food and clothing and taking care of their other needs. Also, the rationale for loving the stranger, "for you were strangers in the land of Egypt," makes no sense if it refers to emotions. Why should the fact that the Israelites were "strangers" in Egypt, in and of itself, cause them to feel love for other strangers? But it makes perfect sense if what is being commanded is loving behavior, so that Jews are instructed to treat the stranger "in the way Jews would have liked to have been treated when they were strangers in Egypt" (Professor Stephen Harvey) "Love," in Cohen and Mendes-Flohr, eds., Contemporary Jewish Religious Thought, 559). Professor Harvey points out that a while it is impossible to expect masses of people to feel the same "sincere and unbounded desire and concern for the well-being of others [as they have for themselves], what can be commanded is the performance of acts of love, treating others as one would if one truly cared about their well-being." (Ibid.)

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DEUTERONOMY — 12:20 meat

DEUT574 Until the messianic age, the Torah assumed that meat eating, although permitted, should be an occasional act, to be carried out only "if your soul craves to eat meat" [this verse]. The Talmud comments that this verse "teaches a rule of proper conduct, that a person should not eat meat unless he has a particular craving for it [and not as a regular regimen]" (Chullin 84a). The same page of the Talmud also teaches that "a parent should not accustom his son to meat and wine." In commenting on the biblical passage about a wayward, rebellious son, the Talmud and later commentators regard gluttonous consumption of meat and wine as an indicator of an adolescent's bad character (Mishnah Sanhedrin 8:2, Sanhedrin 70a, and Rashi on Deuteronomy 21:18).

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