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This week’s parasha is entitled Ki Teitzei, meaning, “When you go out” and covers Deuteronomy chapters 21 through 25. This portion of the Torah contains very little narrative, but instead outlines a number of assorted commands – 72 by Maimonides’ reckoning! But I have to tell you, this section of the Torah contains some things which atheists and skeptics love to seize upon, taking Scripture out of its historical and cultural context in order to set up straw men to ridicule.

For example, chapter 21 includes guidelines for times of war when captives have been taken, and an Israeli man sees a beautiful young woman and wants to have her. The scoffer says, “The Old Testament is repugnant – see how Israel’s God lets men treat women like property!” Now, if he would actually take the time to read the passage, he would learn otherwise. The man in question could not simply have her then and there. This commandment was for her protection. First of all, the young woman was to be accorded the dignity of a full month’s time to grieve the loss of her parents (who presumably were killed). During that time of mourning all her needs were to be met at the expense of the man who wanted her.

When you consider how, in the history of human warfare, women have routinely been raped and later cast off or sold as slaves, this commandment represents a startling contrast. By prohibiting sexual relations with her until after the young woman was accorded an extended period of time to grieve, including the shaving off of her hair and cutting of her nails, and by requiring that he assume financial responsibility for her, the sexual component is greatly diminished. During those weeks the young lady becomes three-dimensional in his eyes. He will inevitably begin to see her as a real person, not merely an object to be used for his momentary pleasure. These moral and financial obligations and the delay of gratification were designed to pour cold water, as it were, on a man’s sexual drive, and in the process provide safeguards for women – and we’re talking here about foreign women!

If after the month of support and allowance for grief the man still wanted to have her, there were additional limitations put upon him and additional rights guaranteed the woman. He could not treat her like a sexual object and then turn around and sell her into prostitution – something quite common in the cultures outside of Israel, and something going on even today in Islamic culture. In fact, if you were to look for a common theme woven through this parasha, I think it would be the necessity of law in order to constrain our sinful appetites.

So the claim that God’s Law is hostile to women is proven false. But have you noticed that these skeptics, who fancy themselves intellectually courageous, are strangely silent in view what ISIS is doing to young girls at this very hour? Nor have I heard any outcry from the National Organization of Women. In fact, kidnapping and selling a person is one of the offenses listed in this parasha as meriting the death penalty.

Skeptics also love to seize on the command in this chapter about putting rebellious children to death. They would say, “So if little Timmy doesn’t obey his dad, or talks back to him, according to your beliefs they can just put him to death?” Well, not so fast. In verse 20, the statement of the parents is “This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious… he is a glutton and a drunkard.” Does that sound like it’s describing an 8-year old? Hardly! This commandment clearly isn’t directed at youths. But again, we shouldn’t expect scoffers to exercise intellectual integrity.

Liberal theologians suggest these commandments are archaic and irrelevant today. I couldn’t disagree more! When in chapter 22, for example, we read that we are not to turn a blind eye to our neighbors’ trouble (or even that of his animal), and that we are to treat with dignity those who have fallen on hard times and are in our debt, that speaks to compassion. When we are commanded to return lost property to its rightful owner, and to always use equal weights and measures, that speaks ofintegrity. When we are commanded to promptly pay a day’s wages for a day’s work, and prohibited from taking advantage of a fellow Israeli’s financial hardship by charging interest on his loan, that speaks of fairness in our financial dealings. How are any of these things irrelevant?

Many aspects of parasha Kee Taytzay are saddening. Men with multiple wives were warned not to disregard the rights of a first-born son if that son was born him by an unloved wife. God may not have outright forbidden polygamy at that time, but on account of our hard hearts it was necessary to establish limits. It was, and is, necessary that our selfish, sinful nature be kept in check. Women were not to be seen as possessions to be acquired or disposed of at a man’s whim. If, for example, a husband accused his wife of not having been a virgin at the time of their wedding, and it was proven false, he would receive a stinging public rebuke and a considerable monetary fine.

Laws governing divorce lead off the list in chapter 24. The list of prohibitions in these chapters is a sad commentary on the sinfulness of mankind. We’re looking at everything from callous favoritism to defamation of character to the dissolution of one’s covenant vow of marriage. Transvestism (cross-dressing) was also prohibited, and God calls it an abomination.

These laws are not, as some suggest, the product of a backward civilization and therefore unnecessary for us today. They are still very much necessary as a means ofdeterring us from behaviors that destroy civilizations. Laws that protect us from ourselves should be seen as gifts from a loving and all-wise God, who knows full well the depths to which human beings are capable of sinking. Given the breakneck speed of our technological advancement, it’s frightening to see that mankind is still wallowing in moral filth. What will we do with that technology? We can split the atom; we can manipulate bacteria, we’ve make advancements in chemistry, and from one and the same technology we cure illnesses and create doomsday weapons.

Another theme tying together these many and varied statutes, is the need for compassion and justice – especially toward the weakest and most vulnerable members of society: orphans, widows, unmarried women, people in debt – those most likely to be taken advantage of. In fact, because protection of the weak and vulnerable is so much a theme here, it is thought that, for that reason, chapter 25 ends with a reminder about the Amalekites. When Israel had just come out of Egypt, and were weary and traveling through the wilderness, the Amalekites ambushed us (cf. Ex. 17:8-16). And we are told in chapter 25 that they attacked at the rear – targeting those among us who were struggling to keep up and therefore most vulnerable (the elderly, the infirm, also women with very young children).

That cruelty earned the Amalekites a perpetual curse from Adonai.

In closing, let’s consider Yeshua’s reply when asked what He thought was the greatest commandment. He said we are to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, and we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. If we would consistently live our lives according to the two, the other 611 would not need to have been written. But it is precisely our fallen, sinful nature that necessitates the written law, and that law condemns every one of us, for whoever keeps the whole law, but fails in one point, has become guilty of all (Jam. 2:10/Deut. 27:26).

This parasha also demonstrates the necessity of the New Birth. Legislation may constrain us, but by itself it can never transform us. But God mercifully promised through the prophet Jeremiah (31:31-34) a New Covenant. Unlike the covenant made at Sinai, which we callously disregarded and broke, the New Covenant, ushered in by Messiah, transforms the human heart, causing us to want to do the will of God. His instruction, His Law, is now written on our hearts!

So if we declare that Messiah has come, and His name is Yeshua, and that He has ushered in the New Covenant, and if skeptics and scoffers wonder why there is no peace in the world, it is because they themselves have refused this New Covenant. It is like refusing to listen to a good doctor: you are free to disbelieve his diagnosis and disregard his recommendations, but if you do, you are not free to be cured of your illness. The only cure for mankind’s terminal sinful condition is the atoning death and victorious resurrection of Messiah Yeshua and the New Birth He offers.