There is who you really are
And there is who you let yourself be
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 17:13-16
13 And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, which hunteth and catcheth any beast or fowl that may be eaten; he shall even pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust.
14 For it is the life of all flesh; the blood of it is for the life thereof: therefore I said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh: for the life of all flesh is the blood thereof: whosoever eateth it shall be cut off.
15 And every soul that eateth that which died of itself, or that which was torn with beasts, whether it be one of your own country, or a stranger, he shall both wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the even: then shall he be clean.
16 But if he wash them not, nor bathe his flesh; then he shall bear his iniquity.
These verses conclude the abolition of eating the blood of animals, stating that even when hunting one must drain the carcass of its blood and “cover it with dust.” This is clearly a burial action. Even though the animal may be retained for its hide or its meat, still the “life” of it that is within the blood must be shown reverence and laid to rest.
Then, in verse 15 we learn that if an animal died on its own, it was unclean to eat, no matter what species it was. Why would a slaughtered goat be clean to eat, but not one that fell to its death? There is no explicit explanation, but a thought that occurs to me is that an animal that is slaughtered for food, is killed to the purpose of eating by the butcher who slew it, whereas an animal that dies of natural causes, is killed by the world, and perhaps that means that the earth has rightful claim upon it. It is like how when a martyr dies for a worthy cause he dies to the Lord, whereas a man who succumbs to old age dies to this fallen world.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 17:10-12
10 And whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, that eateth any manner of blood; I will even set my face against that soul that eateth blood, and will cut him off from among his people.
11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.
12 Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood.
Today’s verses reiterate God’s prohibition against the eating of blood. It is worth noting that this prohibition is different from the other laws regarding what meat was clean or unclean to eat. Those laws were about defining what sorts of animals were good, based on their possessing positive symbolic traits. Thus, clean animals were able to be eaten because they represented what was good, and unclean animals were not because they represented what was bad. But as we see in today’s verses, the blood wasn’t prohibited because it was bad, but because it represented something too sacred: life itself. And it wasn’t just the blood of unclean animals that was prohibited, but even of otherwise clean ones.
The prohibition of blood is therefore a lesson to us that not only should man eschew evil, but he also must not claim that which is too holy for him. It is exactly this sort of thinking that led to the abolition of slavery, as it entailed the possessing of another’s life, which was something too sacred for any man to own. And this is a principle that extends even to God. For even though He may claim our very lives, yet our obedience and our free will He still leaves as our own.
Thus, there is the outer sanctity that all of us are commanded to walk in the paths of, but there is also the inner sanctity, the sovreign soul that lives inside each of us, that no one else may lay claim to.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 17:8-9
8 And thou shalt say unto them, Whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers which sojourn among you, that offereth a burnt offering or sacrifice,
9 And bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, to offer it unto the Lord; even that man shall be cut off from among his people.
These two verses make the point that it is not only the Israelites who were under the commandment to not make idolatrous offerings in their homes, but also the people who were not of their faith that lived among them. In tomorrow’s verses those not living under the Mosaic Law would again be forbidden from eating blood, the same as God’s covenant people.
This is, of course, a reminder that Israel was a Hebraic Nationalist State. They were not religiously neutral. Did they allow other people not of their faith to live among them? Yes. Did they allow those people to not hold to all the same faith practices? Yes. But were there certain religious laws underpinning their national infrastructure that all were required to observe? Also yes.
Today, in our Christian culture, we have made one of our great commandments the separation of Church and State. On the one hand, this has allowed religion to become more of a super-entity, one that supersedes the cultures and practices of any one nation. Though perhaps colored a bit differently from state to state, Christianity has been a great moving force in hundreds of kingdoms over thousands of years, even ones where it has no political identity. On the other hand, we do believe in an eventual return of Christ, which will herald a firm, Christian Nation that all the World will be subject to, essentially a return of the Hebraic National system, but applied to all the world.
What that means the role of religion in politics and national identity should be today, I do not know. I am aware that this is a debated topic of today, but I see no clear answer from these or other Biblical passages. Only a reminder of how things once were, and of how they will one day be again.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 17:1-7
1 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
2 Speak unto Aaron, and unto his sons, and unto all the children of Israel, and say unto them; This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded, saying,
3 What man soever there be of the house of Israel, that killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat, in the camp, or that killeth it out of the camp,
4 And bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, to offer an offering unto the Lord before the tabernacle of the Lord; blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood; and that man shall be cut off from among his people:
5 To the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they offer in the open field, even that they may bring them unto the Lord, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, unto the priest, and offer them for peace offerings unto the Lord.
6 And the priest shall sprinkle the blood upon the altar of the Lord at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and burn the fat for a sweet savour unto the Lord.
7 And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom they have gone a whoring. This shall be a statute for ever unto them throughout their generations.
The first few verses might seem a little strange. What does God mean that a man must not kill any of his livestock? Wasn’t one of the purposes of these animals for eating? As we get to verse 5 it starts to become clear. God is not forbidding the slaying of these animals in general, but specifically the sacrificing of them in any other place than the tabernacle and to any other subject than Him.
God is specifically calling out patterns of decentralized idolatry. Decentralized, because He is describing the people killing their sacrifices individually, and out “in the open field.” Centralized idolatry would be more like what we hear in the time of Ahab and Jezebel, where specially ordained priests of Baal would perform offerings unto the false state religion. Centralized idolatry was also abominable, of course, but it seems that at this point in time what the Israelites struggled with more was individuals trying to make bargains with idols on their own.
This feels particularly relevant to our society today, where faith has again become decentralized. People constantly speak of being “spiritual, not religious,” making up their own personal doctrines, and remaking God in their own image. People today believe in a false dichotomy. They are correct that part of our walk with God will always be individual, that our discipleship will be our own, but none of that is incompatible with also submitting to God’s centralized church authority. Belonging to a church, recognizing authority, participating in orthodoxy, and then also acting as an individual from our own conscience is the balance that God has always expected His people keep.
A Part of Yourself Unforged
To refuse to pass through a particular trial,
Is to leave a part of yourself unforged.
The One Thing You Hold Back
The one thing that you would hold back from God,
Is the one thing you must become willing to place upon the altar.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 16:29-34
29 And this shall be a statute for ever unto you: that in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, ye shall afflict your souls, and do no work at all, whether it be one of your own country, or a stranger that sojourneth among you:
30 For on that day shall the priest make an atonement for you, to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins before the Lord.
31 It shall be a sabbath of rest unto you, and ye shall afflict your souls, by a statute for ever.
32 And the priest, whom he shall anoint, and whom he shall consecrate to minister in the priest’s office in his father’s stead, shall make the atonement, and shall put on the linen clothes, even the holy garments:
33 And he shall make an atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the congregation, and for the altar, and he shall make an atonement for the priests, and for all the people of the congregation.
34 And this shall be an everlasting statute unto you, to make an atonement for the children of Israel for all their sins once a year. And he did as the Lord commanded Moses.
We have been told the details of this special ritual and here in the final verses it is explained that this is to be yet another yearly holy day for the people. In later passages we will hear it named as the Day of Atonement. This day has more in common with the Feast of Unleavened Bread, than the Feasts of Firstfruits, and Ingathering. Like the former, it was to be a special sabbath, in which no one would do any work, only devote themselves to the observances of that holy day. It was also like the Feast of Unleavened Bread in that it was set upon a specific day and month of the year.
Thus, on the same day each year, the people would consider the special ritual of the priest, and how he was making atonement for them all. As we read in verse 33, it was atonement for the sanctuary, for the tabernacle, for the altar, for the priests, and for all the congregation. All that Israel was and all that they had made was sanctified as one conduit to the Lord. This explains why Aaron would sprinkle the blood upon even the mercy seat. It was also the work of the Israelites, a vessel in the fallen world, and as such it was necessary to periodically recommit it to the Lord.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 16:23-24
23 And Aaron shall come into the tabernacle of the congregation, and shall put off the linen garments, which he put on when he went into the holy place, and shall leave them there:
24 And he shall wash his flesh with water in the holy place, and put on his garments, and come forth, and offer his burnt offering, and the burnt offering of the people, and make an atonement for himself, and for the people.
We had a great deal of detail for how the sin offerings were to be performed, but now just two verses describing how Aaron would then wash, change clothes, and perform the burnt offerings for both himself and the congregation, presumably just following the usual routine for that ritual.
This completes the tasks that the High Priest must perform on the Day of Atonement and provides us an excellent opportunity to look back at some of the more unique aspects in the earlier verses and what they likely represent.
The most unique part of the ritual was, of course, the selection of two goats, one to be chosen at random for the sacrifice, and one to be released as the scapegoat in the wild. This immediately brings to mind comparisons to Jesus and Barabbas, Jesus being the offering slain at the altar, Barabbas being the scapegoat set free into the wild. We are all of us that scapegoat, sinners set free because the Son of God was sacrificed instead. Even to the Ancient Israelite this symbolism applies: offerings were slain for their sins while they, themselves, were freed from condemnation.
So why, then, was the scapegoat released into the wild, and with the burden of Israel’s sins upon its head? For this we must recognize that simultaneous to the above-mentioned symbolism, the two goats also represent different aspects of the same ultimate sacrifice. Jesus is both the goat slain and the goat cast into exile. He was cast into exile when he left heaven to enter the mortal world and wear our sins on his head. He was slain for our sins upon the cross. To the Ancient Israelite, their sins were paid for by the slaughtered goat, and their evil predispositions carried away by the second goat so that they could live better.
These two goats can be seen as a symbol for the human condition. We are born as a wild goat astray in the fallen world, weighed down by our sin and shame, and it is our great mission in life to come back to the altar and let our old self be slain that we may be reborn as something new.
Here are three interpretations, I am sure that there are more. This is a very thought-provoking ritual, one that seems to be rich in meaning.
Scriptural Analysis- Leviticus 16:10, 20-22, 26
10 But the goat, on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat, shall be presented alive before the Lord, to make an atonement with him, and to let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness.
20 And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, he shall bring the live goat:
21 And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness:
22 And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited: and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness.
26 And he that let go the goat for the scapegoat shall wash his clothes, and bathe his flesh in water, and afterward come into the camp.
Today we learn about one of the most unique and interesting elements of the Old Testament sacrifice system, which is the scapegoat. In the last post we heard that on the Day of Atonement, two goats would be presented as potential sin offerings, but only one would be selected, at random, to fulfill that purpose. The other was the scapegoat, which we read today had all of the sins of Israel declared upon its head. Then it was led by the hand to the wilderness and there released.
Thus, the scapegoat had both a burden and a freedom not afforded to the other goat. The image of this goat is so intriguing that even today we use the term “scapegoat” to refer to someone assigned to take the blame for a group. As I said before, I am first detailing all of the ritual actions performed on the Day of Atonement, and only afterward will I delve into all of the symbolic meaning, but obviously this matter of the two goats is of prominent significance.
Spiritual Wanderings 