“You are not to move your neighbor’s boundary marker from the place where people put it long ago, in the inheritance soon to be yours in the land Adonai your God is giving you to possess.”-Deuteronomy 19:14
After spending quite a bit of time discussing the GOEL (Blood Avenger) and the six cities of refuge, the content of Deuteronomy 19 now takes a sharp turn and begins addressing a totally different subject.
That of boundary markers.
From the very beginning, all ancient cultures utilized piles of stones to denote the boundary lines of real property.
Hence, it was always understood that for a person to just willy nilly go ahead and move the boundary markers of his neighbor’s property in order to expand his own property was always considered a big moral no-no.
In addition, here’s another thing to consider.
What do all of the following three things have in common?
-The Laws of the Sabbath Year
-The Laws of Jubilee
-The Laws of the Kinsman Redeemer
Here’s what they all have in common.
All of the above-mentioned laws were established to fulfill the objective that no matter what the land remained within an Israelite family, clan and tribe forever.
In other words, no matter what, it was of utmost importance that the land ultimately be returned to its original HEBREW owner.
Here’s another important point to consider.
For someone to take a portion of someone else’s land by moving boundary markers was more of a crime against the Lord than the land owner.
Why?
For two reasons.
First, it was God Himself who established the system of laws governing land inheritance.
Second, the real owner of the land was God Himself.
He was really just leasing the land to the Israelites, even though it is an eternal lease.
I’m done.
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