It is one of those biblical commands that has always perplexed me. If it appeared just one time in Scripture I might be tempted to pass it by. But it appears no less than three times, in Exodus 23:19, Exodus 34:26, and Deuteronomy 14:21. The repetition tells me that God is quite concerned that his people pay attention to his command and obey it. The command is this: “You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.”
So why did God care how his Old Testament people cooked their goat? And is there any possible application to us today?
Not surprisingly, commentators are a bit divided on God’s intent in this injunction. There are broadly two different schools of thought. While some scholars choose one of the two options, a good number suggest both are relevant.
The first suggestion is that the Canaanites followed a religious ritual that involved this very thing—boiling a young goat in its mother’s milk. They would then take that milk and sprinkle it on their fields, hoping that the gods would respond by making the land fertile. This makes sense
To continue...read the full-length post originally published on this site.
