![]() Clearly, God was showing his people the greatness of his forgiveness and the implications of that forgiveness for their own behavior. Every seventh year the debts of all Israelites were to be canceled ( Deut 15:1-2 ). That is why I give you this command today" ( Deut 15:15 cf. "Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you. Israelites who sold themselves because of poverty were to be freed after six years and to be given a generous supply of food. The fourth commandment, for example, had reference not only to God's resting on the seventh day of creation ( Exod 20:8-11 ), but also to the liberation of Israel from the hands of Egypt ( Deut 5:12-15 ). It is not surprising that built into the very fabric of Israelite society was a constant reminder of God's deliverance and its significance. ![]() In other words, from the very beginning God's people were taught that the alternative to servitude was not freedom in some abstract sense, but rather freedom to serve the Lord. also Exod 20:2 as the introduction to the Ten Commandments ). It should be noted, moreover, that this liberation had as its purpose serving God and obeying his Law ( Exod 19:4-5 cf. That long period of Egyptian slavery became a powerful symbol of oppression, and so the deliverance of the Israelites through Moses spoke to them of freedom in a more profound sense indeed, of spiritual redemption. Already when establishing his covenant with Abraham, God had predicted the bondage and suffering of the Hebrews in a foreign land ( Gen 15:13 ). ![]() The theme of freedom rings loudly in one of the most crucial sections of Scripture, namely the narrative of the exodus.
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