Curb the Contracts
“All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.” – Matthew 5:37 In Jesus’ time, there were no written contracts because the price of ink and paper was expensive. The excessive cost of writing things down demanded that there be another protocol for making legal agreements in the ancient East. In Jewish culture, the custom was that if a verbal consensus would be reached, the parties would shake hands, and then they would swear by the Name of God that they would keep their promise to each other. In essence, when they invoked the Lord in any agreement, they made it a verbal contract. This was an important part of the legal system of that day. Though I don’t know this for sure, I’m guessing that the ease of making such contracts caused the process to become a bit too common.
