Divine Punishments - Bechukotai - Mythic Torah

Welcome back to Mythic Torah, my regular article investigating monsters, heroes and gods in the weekly Torah reading. This week's reading is Bechukotai, the 10th and final reading of the book of Leviticus, that focuses on the rewards and punishments associated with following or disobeying God's commandments.

I've been a bit sick this week so I'm afraid that Mythic Torah is shorter than usual. Hope to be back to normal by next week, when we begin Bamidbar, the book of Numbers.

Prometheus Bound

When the Greek gods decide to punish someone, they go about it with a certain zeal and creativity.

Think of Sisyphus, forever condemned to pushing the same rock up the same hill, as every time it reaches the top it falls all the way to the bottom.

Or Tantalus, eternally suffering with unquenchable thirst and insatiable hunger, with both food and drink just out of reach.

Or the Titan Prometheus, bound to a rock where an eagle eats his liver every day, only for it to grow back every night.

The Norse Gods too could be extremely creative in their punishments.

Like Loki, punished for his many crimes by being bound beneath the earth while a venomous serpent drips poison in his eyes, with his wife catching most of the poison in a bowl until the bowl is full and she has to turn aside to empty it out, leaving Loki to writhe in pain.

God, by contrast, seems to lack a certain amount of imagination.

In our parasha of Bechukotai, God promises great rewards to the people if they follow the laws, and great retribution if they don't. The punishments go on for far more verses than the rewards do, and include disease, defeat in battle, famine, wild beasts, desolation and death (Leviticus 26:14-46).

But there are other important differences too.

All three of the Greek characters we mentioned actually perform actions that might benefit mankind. Sisyphus tricks Thanatos, death itself, into chaining himself up, thus preventing all humans from dying until he himself is brought low.

Loki

Tantalus' crime is stealing the food of the gods, ambrosia and nectar, from Zeus' table and bringing it down to earth. While Prometheus stole fire from the gods, and gave it to human beings, thus beginning human culture and civilisation.

The sin of these characters is that they break down the boundary between gods and mortals, and they did so in favour of the human beings.

Loki too is not punished for any sin committed against human beings, but for creating chaos among the gods, and instigating the death of Odin's son Baldr.

The God of the Bible operates on a different moral plane than the Greek or Norse gods, and His concerns are for humanity and their place in the world. While we have seen the danger in coming too close to the divine realm, ultimately God's real punishments are reserved for failing to keep the ethical and ritual code as laid out in Leviticus.