We continue this evening to pursue our studies in the Book of the Covenant. As we have seen, this is a short account of how to be the people of God. It centers on the twin themes of justice toward man and piety toward God. Being a people in covenant with God requires both of these, both love for God and love for neighbor. One major way in which you love your neighbor is by having and enforcing a uniform code of justice. We saw last week one huge principle of justice is the law of talion, that is, the principle that the punishment must be directly proportional to the crime. This week, we will see another major principle of justice: Justice for property crimes is all about proportional restitution. We see a number of cases set out in the passage before us. What they all have in common is some kind of financial crime or loss — and in each case, the insistence that the crime is to be made good by financial restitution. God commands that we love our neighbor and justly require proportional restitution for all property crimes.