THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL MUST NOT GIVE THEIR CHILDREN TO MOLECH. THEY ARE COMMANDED TO KEEP THREE FEASTS TO THE LORD EVERY YEAR. THE MAN WHO BLASPHEMES IS STONED. THE SABBATH YEAR AND THE YEAR OF JUBILEE. GOD WILL BLESS THEM IF THEY SERVE HIM, BUT PUNISH THEM IF THEY DISOBEY HIM.
THE heathen nations among whom the children of Israel were going, worshipped an idol named Molech. We are told that this idol was made of brass, and had the face of a calf; and was very large, and hollow, so that a fire could be lighted inside of it. After it was heated very hot, those wicked people used to put their little children into its arms, where they were burned to death; while they were being burned, the people beat drums so that their cries could not be heard. They burned their children in this way to please the idol, and they called it giving their children to Molech. And God told Moses that if any man among the Israelites should give his children to Molech, he should be put to death; all the people should stone him with stones till he was dead. And if they should let him go without punishment, pretending not to know what he had done, God said that he himself would punish that man.
The Lord commanded the children of Israel to keep three feasts to him every year. The first was called the feast of the passover. We were told about this feast when they kept it for the first time, on the night that they came out of Egypt. And now, the Lord said, they should keep it once every year, eating of the lamb in the night, as they did then, and for seven days afterward eating of unleavened bread. Through all those seven days it was called the feast of the passover. While the people were keeping this feast, it would make them remember how God had punished Pharaoh for their sakes, and had set them free, when Pharaoh was determined not to let them go.
Seven weeks after the passover, they were to keep the feast of harvest. It was to last but one day, and was to come after the grain had been gathered into the barns. Then the people would thank God for sending the rain and the sunshine, which had made their seed grow out in the field, and bear food enough for another year. At this feast the Lord said they should be glad and rejoice; they, and their sons and their daughters, their men-servants and their maid-servants, and all the people who lived in the land.
At the end of the year, when all the grain had been gathered in from the fields, all the fruits taken off from the trees, and all the grapes picked from the vines, they were to keep the feast of tabernacles. It was to last seven days. Then, the Lord said, they should cut off branches from the trees, and make booths, or tents, of them; and they should come out of their houses, and live in those booths for the seven days of the feast, because the children of Israel had lived in tents, or booths, while they were journeying through the wilderness. And the Lord wanted them to remember that time, after they should come into Canaan and have houses there to live in. At each of these three feasts, every man among the children of Israel was to come to the tabernacle, and bring an offering to the Lord. And God told Moses to command the people, that they should bring olive-oil for the lamps in the tabernacle. Olives are a fruit that grows in Canaan. When they are bruised, or pressed, a very pure oil runs out of them. It was this oil the people were to bring, for the seven lamps that belonged to the golden candlestick. The Lord said that every day Aaron and his sons should trim the lamps, which were to burn all night in the tabernacle. None but the priests might trim them.
And God commanded Moses to take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes, or loaves of bread. These were to be placed on the golden table, which stood in the tabernacle near to the golden candlestick. He was to put them there on the sabbath day, and leave them a whole week, until the next sabbath. Then the priest was to take them away and put fresh loaves in their place. The priests were to do this every week. Aaron and his sons might eat of the old bread after it was taken away, but they might not carry it to their homes to eat it. They must eat it at the tabernacle, because it was holy bread; it had been set on the golden table before the Lord. These twelve loaves were called shew-bread.
Now there was, at this time, a man in the camp whose father was an Egyptian, but his mother was one of the children of Israel. He quarrelled with an Israelite, and being angry, he blasphemed God's name; that is, he spoke wickedly of God. And they brought him to Moses; then they put him in some place to keep him safe, until the Lord should tell Moses what his punishment must be. And the Lord spoke to Moses, and commanded him to take the man out of the camp, and let all the people stone him. The Lord said that whoever blasphemed his name, whether it were one of the children of Israel, or a stranger who had come to live among them, should surely be put to death; all the people should stone him till he was dead. And Moses told the people, and they took the man out of the camp, and stoned him as the Lord commanded.
God said, that after the children of Israel should come into the land of Canaan, they should plant seed out in the field, and when it had grown, should cut it down and take it into the barn. They should do this for six years, but when the seventh year came, they must not plant any seed at all, but must let the land alone. If any grain should grow by itself, without being planted, they must not cut it; or if any grapes should grow on the vines, they must not pick them, for this year, God said, should be a sabbath year, or year of rest, for the land. Every seventh year, he said, should be so. They were never to plant the seed, nor take the grain into the barns, nor gather the grapes from the vines, in the; seventh year. If any of the people were afraid they would not have food to eat, because they might not plant that year, the Lord told them that he would make enough grow the year before, to last until the sabbath year had past, and the time had come again for them to sow their seed and reap their grain. Once in fifty years was to come the year of jubilee. This was to be a glad and happy year; on the day that it began, trumpets were to be blown through all the land. The people were not to sow nor reap in this year; God promised that he would give them enough food the year before, to last through the year of jubilee. Then, if any man had been very poor, so that he was forced to sell the field which his father had left him, when the year of jubilee came, he was to have it back. The person who bought it must give it back to him, that it might be his own again; for the Lord said it must be given back to him. Or if any poor man among the children of Israel had been sold to be a servant, or a slave, when the year of jubilee came, he was to be a slave no longer; neither he nor his children, for the Lord said that then they should be free.
And God told the people that if they would obey his commandments, he would send rain on their land. Their grain should grow well, their trees should bear fruit, they should have plenty of bread to eat, and no man should hurt them. The Lord would destroy, or drive away from Canaan, the wild beasts that might do them harm; he himself would take care of them, and make all their enemies afraid of them.
But if they would not obey his commandments, God said they should have sickness and trouble. They would sow their grain, but it would do them no good, for when it had grown up, their enemies would come and take it from them. Wild beasts would carry off their children and kill their cattle; and in the streets and roads where there used to be a great many people, only a few would be left. The Lord would send famine upon them, so that they should have no food, and pestilence that they should die. Their enemies would make war on them also, and the children of Israel would be carried away from their own land to other lands, where the people would hate them. There many of them would perish. Yet if those who were left alive, should confess that they had been wicked, and that it was God who had punished them, he would punish them no more, but would be kind to them, and bring them back to the land which he had promised Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.