Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron, and to his sons, and to all the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘This is the thing which Yahweh has commanded: Whatever man there is of the house of Israel who kills a bull, or lamb, or goat in the camp, or who kills it outside the camp, and hasn’t brought it to the door of the Tent of Meeting to offer it as an offering to Yahweh before Yahweh’s tabernacle: blood shall be imputed to that man. He has shed blood. That man shall be cut off from among his people. This is to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field, that they may bring them to Yahweh, to the door of the Tent of Meeting, to the priest, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace offerings to Yahweh.
Show the surrounding paragraph
Leviticus 17:1-5 sits inside this longer paragraph.
Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron, and to his sons, and to all the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘This is the thing which Yahweh has commanded: Whatever man there is of the house of Israel who kills a bull, or lamb, or goat in the camp, or who kills it outside the camp, and hasn’t brought it to the door of the Tent of Meeting to offer it as an offering to Yahweh before Yahweh’s tabernacle: blood shall be imputed to that man. He has shed blood. That man shall be cut off from among his people. This is to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field, that they may bring them to Yahweh, to the door of the Tent of Meeting, to the priest, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace offerings to Yahweh. The priest shall sprinkle the blood on Yahweh’s altar at the door of the Tent of Meeting, and burn the fat for a pleasant aroma to Yahweh. They shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat idols, after which they play the prostitute. This shall be a statute forever to them throughout their generations.’
Parallel Translations
-
Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
“Speak to Aaron, and to his sons, and to all the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘This is the thing which Yahweh has commanded:
Whatever man there is of the house of Israel who kills a bull, or lamb, or goat in the camp, or who kills it outside the camp,
and hasn’t brought it to the door of the Tent of Meeting to offer it as an offering to Yahweh before Yahweh’s tabernacle: blood shall be imputed to that man. He has shed blood. That man shall be cut off from among his people.
This is to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field, that they may bring them to Yahweh, to the door of the Tent of Meeting, to the priest, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace offerings to Yahweh.
-
And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
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,
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,
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:
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.
Show all 3 translations
-
And the LORD spoke unto Moses, saying:
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:
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 without the camp,
and hath not brought it unto the door of the tent of meeting, to present it as 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.
To the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field, even that they may bring them unto the LORD, unto the door of the tent of meeting, unto the priest, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace-offerings unto the LORD.
Examined in Scripture Analysis
Contradictions (1)
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Commandments (1)
The laws of the Torah, each cited and shown as a primary source.
Cross-references (44)
- Genesis 17:14 (v4) The uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my…
- Deuteronomy 12:5-21 (v4) But to the place which Yahweh your God shall choose out of all your tribes, to put his name there, you shall seek his habitation, and you…
- Isaiah 66:3 (v4) He who kills an ox is as he who kills a man; he who sacrifices a lamb, as he who breaks a dog’s neck; he who offers an offering, as he who…
- Ezekiel 20:40 (v4) For in my holy mountain, in the mountain of the height of Israel,” says the Lord Yahweh, “there all the house of Israel, all of them, shall…
- John 10:7 (v4) Jesus therefore said to them again, “Most certainly, I tell you, I am the sheep’s door.
Show all 44 cross-references
- John 10:9 (v4) I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture.
- John 14:6 (v4) Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.
- Genesis 21:33 (v5) Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and called there on the name of Yahweh, the Everlasting God.
- Genesis 22:2 (v5) He said, “Now take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go into the land of Moriah. Offer him there as a burnt offering on…
- Genesis 22:13 (v5) Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and saw that behind him was a ram caught in the thicket by his horns. Abraham went and took the…
- Genesis 31:54 (v5) Jacob offered a sacrifice in the mountain, and called his relatives to eat bread. They ate bread, and stayed all night in the mountain.
- Exodus 12:15 (v4) “ ‘Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; even the first day you shall put away yeast out of your houses, for whoever eats leavened…
- Exodus 12:19 (v4) There shall be no yeast found in your houses for seven days, for whoever eats that which is leavened, that soul shall be cut off from the…
- Exodus 24:5 (v5) He sent young men of the children of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of cattle to Yahweh.
- Leviticus 1:3 (v4) “ ‘If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without defect. He shall offer it at the door of the Tent of…
- Leviticus 3:1-17 (v5) “ ‘If his offering is a sacrifice of peace offerings, if he offers it from the herd, whether male or female, he shall offer it without…
- Leviticus 7:11-21 (v5) “ ‘This is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which one shall offer to Yahweh: If he offers it for a thanksgiving, then he shall…
- Leviticus 7:18 (v4) If any of the meat of the sacrifice of his peace offerings is eaten on the third day, it will not be accepted, and it shall not be credited…
- Leviticus 17:8 (v3) “You shall say to them, ‘Any man there is of the house of Israel, or of the strangers who live as foreigners among them, who offers a burnt…
- Leviticus 17:10 (v4) “ ‘Any man of the house of Israel, or of the strangers who live as foreigners among them, who eats any kind of blood, I will set my face…
- Leviticus 17:12-13 (v3) Therefore I have said to the children of Israel, “No person among you may eat blood, nor may any stranger who lives as a foreigner among…
- Leviticus 17:14 (v4) For as to the life of all flesh, its blood is with its life. Therefore I said to the children of Israel, “You shall not eat the blood of…
- Leviticus 17:15 (v3) “ ‘Every person that eats what dies of itself, or that which is torn by animals, whether he is native-born or a foreigner, shall wash his…
- Leviticus 18:29 (v4) “ ‘For whoever shall do any of these abominations, even the souls that do them shall be cut off from among their people.
- Leviticus 20:3 (v4) I also will set my face against that person, and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given of his offspring to Molech,…
- Leviticus 20:16 (v4) “ ‘If a woman approaches any animal and lies with it, you shall kill the woman and the animal. They shall surely be put to death. Their…
- Leviticus 20:18 (v4) “ ‘If a man lies with a woman having her monthly period, and uncovers her nakedness, he has made her fountain naked, and she has uncovered…
- Numbers 15:30-31 (v4) “ ‘But the soul who does anything with a high hand, whether he is native-born or a foreigner, blasphemes Yahweh. That soul shall be cut off…
- Deuteronomy 12:2 (v5) You shall surely destroy all the places in which the nations that you shall dispossess served their gods: on the high mountains, and on the…
- Deuteronomy 12:5-7 (v3) But to the place which Yahweh your God shall choose out of all your tribes, to put his name there, you shall seek his habitation, and you…
- Deuteronomy 12:11-15 (v3) then it shall happen that to the place which Yahweh your God shall choose, to cause his name to dwell there, there you shall bring all that…
- Deuteronomy 12:20-22 (v3) When Yahweh your God enlarges your border, as he has promised you, and you say, “I want to eat meat,” because your soul desires to eat…
- Deuteronomy 12:26-27 (v3) Only your holy things which you have, and your vows, you shall take and go to the place which Yahweh shall choose. You shall offer your…
- 1 Kings 14:23 (v5) For they also built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.
- 2 Kings 16:4 (v5) He sacrificed and burned incense in the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.
- 2 Kings 17:10 (v5) and they set up for themselves pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill, and under every green tree;
- 2 Chronicles 28:4 (v5) He sacrificed and burned incense in the high places, and on the hills, and under every green tree.
- Psalms 32:2 (v4) Blessed is the man to whom Yahweh doesn’t impute iniquity, in whose spirit there is no deceit.
- Ezekiel 20:28 (v5) For when I had brought them into the land which I swore to give to them, then they saw every high hill, and every thick tree, and they…
- Ezekiel 22:9 (v5) Slanderous men have been in you to shed blood. In you they have eaten on the mountains. They have committed lewdness among you.
- Romans 4:6 (v4) Even as David also pronounces blessing on the man to whom God counts righteousness apart from works,
- Romans 5:13 (v4) For until the law, sin was in the world; but sin is not charged when there is no law.
- Romans 5:20 (v4) The law came in that the trespass might abound; but where sin abounded, grace abounded more exceedingly;
- Philemon 1:18-19 (v4) But if he has wronged you at all or owes you anything, put that to my account. I, Paul, write this with my own hand: I will repay it (not…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (25 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Private notes
Saved on this device only — never synced or sent anywhere.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv2–5 Lest they should practice that idolatry, which they had…
Lest they should practice that idolatry, which they had learned among the Egyptians.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv2–5 Lev 17:2 Speak unto Aaron, and unto his sons,…
Lev 17:2 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,
Ver. 2. This is the thing which the Lord.] Who must be readily obeyed without evasion, or questioning.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv3–5 That killeth, not for common use or eating, for…
That killeth, not for common use or eating, for such beasts might be killed by any person or in any place, but for sacrifice, as manifestly appears both from Lev 17:4, where that is expressed, and from the reason of this law, which is peculiar to sacrifices, Lev 17:5, and from Deu 12:5,15,21. in the camp, or out of the camp: in Canaan, the city answered to the camp, and so it forbids any man doing this either in the city or in the country.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v1 This statute obliged all the people of Israel to…
This statute obliged all the people of Israel to bring all their sacrifices to God's altar, to be offered there. And as to this matter we must consider,
I. How it stood before. 1. It was allowed to all people to build altars, and offer sacrifices to God, where they pleased. Wherever Abraham had a tent he built an altar, and every master of a family was a priest to his own family, as Job 1:5. 2. This liberty had been an occasion of idolatry. When every man was his own priest, and had an altar of his own, by degrees, as they became vain in their imaginations, they invented gods of their own, and offered their sacrifices unto demons, Lev 17:7. The word signifies rough or hairy goats, because it is probable that in the shape the evil spirits often appeared to them, to invite their sacrifices and to signify their acceptance of them. For the devil, ever since he became a revolter from God and a rebel against him, has set up for a rival with him, and coveted to have divine honours paid him: he had the impudence to solicit our blessed Saviour to fall down and worship him. The Israelites themselves had learned in Egypt to sacrifice to demons. And some of them, it should seem, practised it even since the God of Israel had so gloriously appeared for them, and with them. They are said to go a whoring after these demons; for it was such a breach of their covenant with God as adultery is of the marriage covenant: and they were as strongly addicted to their idolatrous worships, and as hard to be reclaimed from them, as those that have given themselves over to fornication, to work all uncleanness with greediness; and therefore it is with reference to this that God calls himself a jealous God.
Read full note →
II. How this law settled it. 1. Some think that the children of Israel were by this law forbidden, while they were in the wilderness, to kill any beef, or mutton, or veal, or lamb, or goat, even for their common eating, but at the door of the tabernacle, where the blood and the fat were to be offered to God upon the altar, and the flesh to be returned back to the offerer to be eaten as a peace-offering, according to the law. And the statute is so worded (Lev 17:3, Lev 17:4) as to favour this opinion, for it speaks generally of killing any ox, or lamb, or goat. The learned Dr. Cudworth puts this sense upon it, and thinks that while they had their tabernacle so near them in the midst of their camp they ate no flesh but what had first been offered to God, but that when they were entering Canaan this constitution was altered (Deu 12:21), and they were allowed to kill their beasts of the flock and herd at home, as well as the roebuck and the hart; only thrice a year they were to see God at his tabernacle, and to eat and drink before him there. And it is probable that in the wilderness they did not eat much flesh but that of their peace-offerings, preserving what cattle they had, for breed, against they came to Canaan; therefore they murmured for flesh, being weary of manna; and Moses on that occasion speaks as if they were very sparing of the flocks and the herds, Num 11:4, Num 11:22. Yet it is hard to construe this as a temporary law, when it is expressly said to be a statute for ever (Lev 17:7); and therefore, 2. It should seem rather to forbid only the killing of beasts for sacrifice any where but at God's altar. They must not offer sacrifice, as they had done, in the open field (Lev 17:5), no, not to the true God, but it must be brought to the priest, to be offered on the altar of the Lord: and the solemnity they had lately witnessed, of consecrating both the priests and the altar, would serve for a good reason why they should confine themselves to both these that God had so signally appointed and owned. This law obliged not only the Israelites themselves, but the proselytes or strangers that were circumcised and sojourned among them, who were in danger of retaining an affection to their old ways of worship. If any should transgress this law, and offer sacrifice any where but at the tabernacle, (1.) The guilt was great: Blood shall be imputed to that man; he hath shed blood, Lev 17:4. Though it was but a beast he had killed, yet, killing it otherwise than God had appointed, he was looked upon as a murderer. It is by the divine grant that we have the liberty to kill the inferior creatures, to the benefit of which we are not entitled, unless we submit to the limitations of it, which are that it be not done either with cruelty or with superstition, Gen 9:3, Gen 9:4. Nor was there ever any greater abuse done to the inferior creatures than when they were made either false gods or sacrifices to false gods, to which the apostle perhaps has special reference when he speaks of the vanity and bondage of corruption to which the creature was made subject, Rom 8:20, Rom 8:21, and compare Rom 1:23, Rom 1:25. Idolatrous sacrifices were looked upon, not only as adultery, but as murder: he that offereth them is as if he slew a man, Isa 66:3. (2.) The punishment should be severe: That man shall be cut off from among his people. Either the magistrate must do it if it were manifest and notorious, or, if not, God would take the work into his own hands, and the offender should be cut off by some immediate stroke of divine justice. The reasons why God thus strictly ordered all their sacrifices to be offered at one place were, [1.] For the preventing of idolatry and superstition. That sacrifices might be offered to God, and according to the rule, and without innovations, they must always be offered by the hands of the priests, who were servants in God's house, and under the eye of the high priest, who was ruler of the house, and took care to see every thing done according to God's ordinance. [2.] For the securing of the honour of God's temple and altar, the peculiar dignity of which would be endangered if they might offer their sacrifices any where else as well as there. [3.] For the preserving of unity and brotherly love among the Israelites, that meeting all at one altar, as all the children of the family meet daily at one table, they might live and love as brethren, and be as one man, of one mind in the Lord.
III. How this law was observed. 1. While the Israelites kept their integrity they had a tender and very jealous regard to this law, as appears by their zeal against the altar which was erected by the two tribes and a half, which they would by no means have left standing if they had not been satisfied that it was never designed, nor should ever be used, for sacrifice or offering, Jos 22:12, etc. 2. The breach of this law was for many ages the scandalous and incurable corruption of the Jewish church, witness that complaint which so often occurs in the history even of the good kings, Howbeit the high places were not taken away; and it was an inlet to the grossest idolatries. 3. Yet this law was, in extraordinary cases, dispensed with. Gideon's sacrifice (Jdg 6:26), Manoah's (Jdg 13:19), Samuel's (Sa1 7:9; Sa1 9:13; Sa1 11:15), David's (Sa2 24:18), and Elijah's (Kg1 18:23), were accepted, though not offered at the usual place: but these were all either ordered by angels or offered by prophets; and some think that after the desolation of Shiloh, and before the building of the temple, while the ark and altar were unsettled, it was more allowable to offer sacrifice elsewhere.
IV. How the matter stands now, and what use we are to make of this law. 1. It is certain that the spiritual sacrifices we are now to offer are not confined to any one place. Our Saviour has made this clear (Joh 4:21), and the apostle (Ti1 2:8), according to the prophecy, that in every place incense should be offered, Mal 1:11. We have now no temple nor altar that sanctifies the gift, nor does the gospel unity lie in one place, but in one heart, and the unity of the spirit. 2. Christ is our altar, and the true tabernacle (Heb 8:2; Heb 13:10); in him God dwells among us, and it is in him that our sacrifices are acceptable to God, and in him only, Pe1 2:5. To set up other mediators, or other altars, or other expiatory sacrifices, is, in effect, to set up other gods. He is the centre of unity, in whom all God's Israel meet. 3. Yet we are to have respect to the public worship of God, not forsaking the assemblies of his people, Heb 10:25. The Lord loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob, and so should we; see Eze 20:40. Though God will graciously accept our family offerings, we must not therefore neglect the door of the tabernacle.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–5 And the Lord spake unto Moses,.... After he had…
And the Lord spake unto Moses,.... After he had given him the law about the day of atonement, and the rites belonging to it:
saying; as follows.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5 Two prohibitions,
Two prohibitions,
1. That no sacrifice be offered by any but the priests, nor any where but at the door of the tabernacle, ver. 1-9.
Read full note →
2. That no blood be eaten, ver. 10-16.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 4 The people are commanded to bring all the cattle…
CHAPTER XVII
The people are commanded to bring all the cattle they intend to
Read full note →
kill to the door of the tabernacle, where they are to be made
an offering to the Lord; and those who disobey are to be cut
off, 1-5.
The priest is to sprinkle the blood, 6.
They are forbidden to offer sacrifices to devils, 7.
The injunction to bring their offerings to the door of the
tabernacle is repeated, 8, 9.
The eating of blood is solemnly forbidden, 10.
It is the life of the beast, and is given to make an atonement
for their souls, 11, 12.
If a bird or beast be taken in hunting, its blood must be
poured out and covered with dust, for the reasons before
assigned, 13, 14.
None shall eat an animal that dies of itself, or is torn by
beasts; if any act otherwise he must bathe his clothes and his
flesh, or bear his iniquity, 15, 16.
NOTES ON CHAP. XVII.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv3–5 Lev 17:3. That killeth — Not for common use,…
Lev 17:3. That killeth — Not for common use, for such beasts might be killed by any person or in any place, (Deu 12:5-14; Deu 12:26-27,) but for sacrifice, as the sense is limited, Lev 17:5, where the reason of the injunction is given. It is true, some suppose that the Israelites were forbidden by this law, while they were in the wilderness, to kill, even for food, any of the animals that were wont to be sacrificed, elsewhere than in the door of the tabernacle, where the blood and the fat were to be offered to God upon the altar, and the flesh returned to the offerer to be eaten as a peace-offering according to the law. And the statute is so worded in Lev 17:3-4, as to favour this opinion. The learned Dr. Cudworth understands if in this sense, and thinks that while they had their tabernacle so near them, in the midst of their camp, they ate no flesh but what had first been offered to God; but that when they were about to enter Canaan, this constitution was altered, and they were allowed to kill their beasts of the flock and herd at home, as well as the roe-buck and the hart, (Deu 12:21,) only that thrice a year they were to see God at his tabernacle, and to eat and drink before him. It is indeed probable, that in the wilderness they did not eat much flesh but that of their peace- offerings, preserving what cattle they had for breed, against they came to Canaan. And yet it is hard to construe into a mere temporary law, what is expressly said to be a statute for ever, Lev 17:7. And, therefore, it seems rather to forbid only the killing beasts for sacrifice anywhere but at God’s altar. They must not offer a sacrifice as they had done in the open field, (Lev 17:5,) no, not to the true God; but their sacrifices must be brought to the priest, to be offered on the altar of the Lord. And the mighty solemnity they had lately seen of consecrating both the priests and the altar, would serve for a good reason why they should confine themselves to both these which God had so signally appointed and owned.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1, 3 This chapter, in its immediate bearing on the daily…
This chapter, in its immediate bearing on the daily life of the Israelites, stands as the first of four Lev. 17–20 which set forth practical duties, directing the Israelites to walk, not in the way of the pagan, but according to the ordinances of Yahweh.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv3, 5 If he kill, &c. That is, in order to…
If he kill, &c. That is, in order to sacrifice. The law of God forbids sacrifices to be offered in any other place but at the tabernacle or temple of the Lord: to signify that no sacrifice would be acceptable to God, out of his true temple, the one, holy, Catholic Apostolic Church. (Challoner) --- On other occasions, many believe that the blood of oxen, sheep, and goats, was to be poured out in honour of God by the priest, who received a part of each. (Deuteronomy xviii. 3; xii. 15, 22.; Theodoret, q. 23.) Perhaps this law regards the time when the Hebrews sojourned in the desert; and that of Deuteronomy has a reference to those times when they should obtain possession of Chanaan. (Calmet) --- We read of some private people like Manue and Elias, who offered sacrifice at a distance from the tabernacle. But this was done by a particular inspiration of God, who dispensed with his own law. (St. Augustine, q. 56.; 3 Kings xviii. 23; Judges xiii. 19.) (Menochius) See Josue viii. 31.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 Leviticus 17-26
BOOK II
OF CONTINUANCE IN COMMUNION WITH GOD
Read full note →
Leviticus 17-26
_______________________________
“The keeping holy of the consecrated relations of the life of Israel, of the whole round of sacrifice, and of the round of typical holiness, by the putting aside of the sins of obduracy (Cherem). Chaps. 17–27”—Lange.
PART I. HOLINESS ON THE PART OF THE PEOPLE
Leviticus 17-20
______________
FIRST SECTION
“The keeping holy of all animal slaughter as the basis of all sacrifice, of the blood as the soul of all sacrifice, and of animal food as the foundation of all food, of all feasting.”—Lange.
Holiness in Regard to Food
Lev_17:1-16
1And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 2Speak 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, 3What man soever there be of the house of Israel1 that killeth an ox, or lamb [sheep2], or goat, in the camp, or that killeth it out of the camp, 4and bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the [om. the] congregation, to offer an offering unto the Lord before the tabernacle [the dwelling place3] of the Lord;4 blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood; and that man shall be cut off from among his people: 5to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they offer [sacrifice5] in the open field, even that they may bring them unto the Lord, unto the door of the tabernacle of the [om. the] congregation, unto the priest, and offer them for peace offerings unto the Lord. 6And the priest shall sprinkle the blood upon the altar of the Lord at the door of the tabernacle of the [om. the] congregation, and burn the fat for a sweet savour unto the Lord. 7And they shall no more offer [sacrifice5] their sacrifices unto devils [demons6], after whom they have gone a whoring. This shall be a statute for ever unto them throughout their generations.
8And 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, 9and bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the [om. the] congregation to offer it unto the Lord; even that man shall be cut off from among his people.
10And 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. 11For the life [soul7] 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 [by means of8] the soul. 12Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood.
13And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, which hunteth and catcheth any beast9 or foul that may be 14eaten; he shall even pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust. For it is the life [of it is the soul8] of all flesh: the blood of it is for the life [soul7] thereof: therefore I said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh: for the life [soul10] of all flesh is the blood thereof: whosoever eateth it shall be cut off.
15And 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. 16But if he wash them not, nor bathe his flesh; then he shall bear his iniquity.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
Lev_17:3. The LXX. here, as in the text in Lev_17:8; Lev_17:10, inserts the clause or of the strangers which sojourn among you.
Lev_17:3. כֶּשֶׂב. See Textual Note5 on Lev_3:7.
Lev_17:4. מִשְׁכַּן. See Textual Note8 on Lev_15:31. There is especial reason for a change in the rendering here as the אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד has just occurred in the previous clause.
Lev_17:4. This ver. is largely interpolated in the Sam. and LXX. “to offer a burnt offering or a peace offering [for your atonement Sam.] acceptable unto the Lord for an odor of a sweet savor. And whosoever shall kill without, and shall not bring it to the door of the tabernacle of testimony, that he may offer an offering to the Lord before the tabernacle of the Lord; blood shall be,” etc. The purpose of this interpolation is supposed to be to bring this passage into harmony with Deu_12:25; but the difficulty, if any can be considered to exist, is not avoided by this repetition.
Lev_17:5. זִבְחֵיהֶם אֲשֶׁר הִם זֹבְחִים. The same word occurring twice in the same clause should surely have the same translation. זָבַח is the technical word for killing in sacrifice, and although in the later books it is rarely used for slaughtering in the more general sense, it is never applied in the Pentateuch to anything else than sacrifice. See preliminary note on sacrifice. It cannot, therefore (with Clark) be here taken of simply slaughtering for food.
Lev_17:7. לַשְּׂעִירִם lit. to buck-goats. See Exeg. The A. V. has, however, undoubtedly expressed the sense, except that here, as frequently in the New Testament and sometimes in the Old (as in the translation of the same word in 2Ch_11:15). it uses the plural devils; but one διάβολος is recognized in Scripture, and evil spirits in the plural are expressed by δαιμονες or δαιμόνια. It is better therefore to substitute demons. Vulg. dæmones, LXX. ματαίοι. In the A. V. in Isa_13:21; Isa_34:14 it is rendered Satyrs.
Lev_17:11; Lev_17:14. נֶפֶשׁ is here equivalent to ψυχή and is so rendered in the LXX. In English the life of the A. V. may be understood in the same way, but so also may soul, and it is better in this very important passage to keep a uniform rendering of the Heb. word. All the ancient versions retain the same rendering throughout, so do several modern versions and almost all recent expositors.
Lev_17:11. בַּנֶּפֶשׁ יְכַפֵר = maketh an atonement by means of the soul. “בְּ with כִּפֶּר has only a local or instrumental signification (Lev_6:23; Lev_16:17; Lev_16:27; also Lev_7:7; Exo_29:33; Num_5:8). Accordingly, it was not the blood as such, but the blood as the vehicle of the soul, which possessed expiatory virtue.” Keil, following Knobel. Similarly Bähr, Kurtz, and others. So also Von Gerlach and Clark. The A. V. is singularly infelicitous in that it refers the final נֶפֶשׁ to the soul of man, instead of to the soul of the victim; nevertheless, it follows the LXX., the Targums, and the Vulg.; and so also Luther.
Lev_17:13. See note1 on Lev_11:2.
Lev_17:14. Comp. Lev_17:11. נֶפֶשׁ occurs three times in this verse, each time rendered in the A. V. life, but the uniform translation soul is better. In the expression the blood of it is the soul thereof, “בְּנַפשׁוֹ is to be taken as a predicate in its meaning, introduced with beth essentiale. It is only as so understood that the clause supplies a reason at all in harmony with the context.” Keil. With this most modern commentators concur, as well as the ancient and several recent versions.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
The whole of Lange’s “Exegetical” is here given. “1. With our chapter begins the second half of the Book of Leviticus. The book as a whole treats of the priestly presentation of the typical holiness of Israel, of the people of the holy Jehovah. In the first part, Leviticus 1-16, the various forms of the purification or sanctification of the impure and unholy people are set forth; in the second part, from Leviticus 17 to the end, the various ways of keeping holy the people and their common life are now prescribed, and that too by the punishment of Cherem, as far as the profanations are wittingly committed (with uplifted hand). Profanations from impulse on the other hand, must place the backsliding Israelite under the law of purification, which has found its culmination in the holiness of Israel through the great sacrifice of atonement.
“How much this organic completeness of the whole book can be mistaken, Knobel shows most remarkably when he says: ‘The section has, in its expression, much in common with the Elohist, but yet it cannot have come from him, since (a) he would have attached it to Leviticus 1-7, where it fits best (!); or, on account of Lev_17:15, at least to Leviticus 11-15; but would not have placed it here, beyond the law of the Day of Atonement, etc.’ ”
[This chapter, like all the Divine communications in the remainder of Leviticus, is addressed to Moses; indeed this is the case throughout the whole book, except when Moses and Aaron are addressed together in regard to acts which depended upon an exercise of priestly judgment, and also except the single instance (Lev_10:8-11) in which the prohibition of the priestly use of strong drink is addressed to Aaron alone. Still, several of these communications to Moses are to be immediate y communicated by him, as in the present chapter, unto Aaron, and unto his sons, and unto all the children of Israel, as alike binding upon them all. A slight difference in the arrangement of this portion of Leviticus is occasioned by treating the concluding chapter (27) as an appendix, which seems to be required by the formula of conclusion at the end of Leviticus 26. The other ten chapters are arranged as follows: 17–20, holiness in matters which concern the people generally, the last chapter (20) being occupied chiefly with the punishments for the violation of this holiness; 21, 22, holiness in matters concerning the priests and offerings; 23–25, sanctification of the various feasts, including also that of the holy lamps and shew-bread (Lev_24:1-9), and a short historical section giving the account of the punishment of a blasphemer (Lev_24:10-23); 26 forms the conclusion of the whole book, consisting of promises and threats; and to this is added an appendix (27) on vows. This portion of the law of Leviticus is arranged, therefore, in the same systematic way as the former portion, and the two parts stand also in systematic relation to one another. “As the former part relates to the birth of the nation as a spiritual commonwealth, so the present part relates to the progress of their social life as the people of God.” Murphy. Necessarily there are details common to both portions, and this sometimes occasions certain slight repetitions; but such repetitions were unavoidable if the systematic character of the legislation above pointed out was to be preserved. Thus the present chapter, on a superficial view, might seem as Knobel has suggested, to be connected with the law of sacrifice; but on examination it will be at once seen that the subject here is the sanctification of animal food, and to this sacrifice, although generally necessary, is only incidental. Or, as Knobel also suggests, it might seem to be connected with the laws of clean and unclean food of Leviticus 11; but the purpose is wholly different,—there the question is what may be eaten; here, how it shall be eaten. In both cases, the former chapters have for their main point, the laying down of the conditions under which Israel may enter into communion with God; these that follow deal with the conduct of the daily life, by means of which they may continue in that communion. The eating of animal food naturally comes first into consideration, as the act which must be continually repeated and continually thrust upon the attention.—F. G.].
“2. Our section begins with the most intimately connected ways of preserving holiness: (a) of the slaying, (b) of the blood, (c) of the use of the flesh.
“3. Every slaying of a clean animal designed for food must take place before the door of the tabernacle of congregation quite without exception, whether the slayer was within or without the camp. That is every slaying of an animal was put in relation with the peace offering, and thus also was a sort of sacrifice.” [It does not appear from the text that the slaying itself took place at the door of the tabernacle, but only the offering, as in the case of all other sacrifices. The animal was probably slain where the other victims were slain, this being passed over in the text as already provided for in the law of sacrifice. These slayings for food were in every particular, not merely like, but actual peace offerings, unless a distinction should be sought in the fact that there is here no especial provision forgiving a portion to the priests; but that, like the place of slaying, has already been provided for in the law of sacrifice. That the meaning of this passage is, that all sacrificial animals killed for food must first be offered as victims in sacrifice, is plain from the removal of the restriction in Deu_12:15; Deu_12:20-21. It is also shown by the use of שָׁחַט instead of זָבַח in Lev_17:3, a distinction carefully observed in the killeth of the A. V. From S. Augustine and Theodoret down, however, there has always been a difference of opinion upon this point among interpreters; most modern commentators, however (as Rosenmüller, Knobel, Keil, Kalisch, Clark, etc.) agree that the law must relate to all killing of animals for food. Not much animal food was used in the wilderness, as is evidenced by the various murmurings of the people, the manna forming their chief support. It is to be remembered that this part of the law, as far as Lev_17:7, is made obligatory only upon the Israelites, and even for them was in force only during the life in the wilderness; while the rest of the chapter includes also “the stranger” in its requirements.—F. G.]. “The offering, indeed, consisted in this, that the animal was brought to the Tabernacle of congregation, and placed before the priest, and that the priest sprinkled the blood of the same on the altar, and burned the fat for a sweet savour. The same rule was obligatory for the strangers not of Israel, if they wished not only to slay, but with their slaying to bring also a burnt or peace offering—they might offer only before the door of the tabernacle of congregation; for the public worship of false gods was forbidden in Israel (Exo_23:32-33).” [This law, in regard to sacrificing, is made obligatory upon the strangers, as well as upon the house of Israel in Lev_17:8-9; but the previous part of the law (Lev_17:1-7) applies only to the Israelites. Both were restrained from offering sacrifices elsewhere; but only the latter were obliged to make offerings of all animals slain for food.—F. G.]. “The opposite, which was at the same time to be avoided by the Israelites, reads thus: they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the he-goats (Luther: the field-devils), as to those which they who are in the snare whore after. Thus we understand the expression in reference to this, not as a reproach: which they whore after hitherto, or are inclined to whore after.” [The Heb. is אֲשֶׁר הֵם זֹנִים אַחֲרֵיהֶם, which seems sufficiently well expressed in the A. V., and this is sustained (either in the present or the past tense) by all the ancient versions.—F. G.]. “Rightly the Egyptian worship of the he goat was remembered, which was a deification of the generative desire, and consequently of sensuality, and the biblical expression to whore after applies in this connection with double force. It can thus be perceived that the offering of the slain flesh, besides the religious idea, had also the moral purpose of hindering unrestrained luxury. But with the sacrifice of the slain animal, the fact was at the same time declared, that in truth every animal enjoyed in the fear of God was offered to the Lord; that the man who must offer himself to Jehovah must also place his slaying of an animal under the aspect of giving it up to Jehovah, if he wished to keep it holy. Therefore also the transgression is treated as a blood-guiltiness, and would be visited upon them by Jehovah as a murder. Since man has the right to shed the blood of an animal only from Jehovah, and in relation to Jehovah (to whom everything, with this, must revert as a sacrifice), a reckless slaying of an animal appears in the text as the beginning of a criminal blood-shedding, which on a descending path, may end in the murder of man.” [Lev_17:1-7. Lev_17:4. Blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood. This does not mean that murder is to be imputed to the offender, but that the blood of the animal which he has actually shed is to be reckoned to his charge. The reason of both this precept and that against the eating of blood is given in Lev_17:11 : Blood had been divinely appointed as a means of atonement. If now the animal slain was one allowable for sacrifice, and its blood was not used for atonement, the offender was guilty of a misuse of that which God had appointed for this purpose, and he must be held responsible for the wasted blood. By analogy, the blood of animals that were not sacrificial (Lev_17:13-14) must also be treated with respect. It is important to note this meaning of the passage, for nowhere in Scripture is anything ever said to be imputed to a man by God which does not really belong to him.—That man shall be cut off from among his people.—The slighting of the Divinely appointed means of atonement was a sin which struck so deeply at the root of the theocratic and typical law that it was inconsistent with membership among the holy people. The offender must be excommunicated. Lev_17:5. A further reason is here given for the law of Lev_17:4. It is only applied to peace offerings, for this was the only kind of sacrifice that could be used by the people for food, the subject of this paragraph. This reason is further developed in Lev_17:7. It would seem that the Israelites, very lately come out of Egypt, were more or less in the habit, so common among all nations of antiquity (comp. 1 Corinthians 8; 1Co_10:25-28), of consecrating all animal food by first offering the animal to the Deity; and this custom, if allowed to be carried out by the people at their own pleasure, would become, and indeed had already become (Lev_17:7) a fruitful source of idolatry. Entirely to cut off this, it is provided that all such offerings must be brought first unto the door of the tabernacle, the place of the sole worship of Jehovah; and second, unto the priest, as His representative, and the mediator between Him and the people. The custom of sacrificing in the open field also prevailed among the nations of classic antiquity, and was so inveterate among the Israelites as to be spoken of by both Hosea (Hos_12:11) and Jeremiah (Jer_13:27). Jer_17:7. Unto demons.—The Hebrew word, as noted under Textual, is the same as that for he-goats,שְׁעירִים. Onkelos has שֵׁידִין, the same word as is used in Deu_32:17, meaning demons. It is doubtful whether the word is used of an actual worship of a false god under the form of a goat, or only figuratively. Certainly at a later date there was in Thmuis, the capital of the Mendesian nome in lower Egypt, and therefore near the residence of the Israelites, a horrible and licentious worship of the fertilizing principle in nature, represented by a he-goat (Joseph. c. Ap. ii. 7; Herod. ii. 42, 46; Diod. Sic. i. 18; Strabo, lib. xvii. c. 19, 802; c. 40, 813); it may be doubted whether this, in its full development, existed as early as the time of Moses; but very likely it may have already been known in its germ, and have been communicated to the Israelites (comp. Hengstenberg Eg. and the Books of Moses, Am. Ed., p. 216). The strong tendency of the Israelites to adopt idolatrous forms of worship borrowed from Egypt had already been shown in the instance of the golden calf; and we find again (2Ch_11:15) this very worship of the he-goat (A. V. devils) mentioned along with the calves of Jeroboam, who had sojourned so long in Egypt before ascending his throne.—This shall be a statute forever does not refer to the sacrificing of animals designed for food, which was revoked with the termination of the life in the wilderness; but to the worship of demons, which is the immediate subject.—F. G.]
“Knobel thinks this statute forever was abolished later, when the animals were no longer brought to the Tabernacle or to the Temple; but the principal thought is the consecration to Jehovah, the religious slaying, and in this the statute (the husk of an idea) remains among the Jews continually, even to this day. But the idea itself remains continually in the Christian community. From this type it follows also that that use of animal food was sacrilegious in which the distinction between the nature of man and of animals was obliterated.”
“4. Most solemnly is the use of blood forbidden. There follows immediately the menace of punishment in the strongest terms for the stranger as well as for the Israelite: I will even set my face against that soul that eateth blood, and will cut him off from among his people [Lev_17:10]. The reason is this: the soul or life of the flesh, its soul-like life-principle, is in the blood. But the blood belongs, as does all life, to Jehovah, and He has given it to the Israelites only for a definite purpose, that they may with it atone for, or cover, their souls. The blood is the atonement for the life, since in the blood the life is given over to the judgment of Jehovah for deliverance and for pardon. Therefore the prohibition is here repeated, as it has also been already expressed. Even to the blood of beasts that man slays in the chase, to the very birds, this prohibition applies, although this blood was not offered; it was to be poured out and covered with earth—it was to be buried. The burial is generally analogous to the sprinkling of the blood upon the altar, as the earth is an altar in the widest sense—it is a symbol of the atonement of the life, which lies in the resignation of the life. As physiology confirms the proposition that the blood is the especial source of life in living creatures, so do justice and the philosophy of religion confirm the proposition that death atones for the guilt of life—so far as it is on this side of death (Rom_6:7). And the use of blood must appear wicked as long as blood was the means of atonement. But the analogue for this guilt, for all times, is the making common of life, of death, of blood, the self-willed invasion of the destiny of man.” [Lev_17:10-14. Lange has not here called attention especially to Lev_17:8-9, which show that the stranger was allowed to offer both the burnt offering and the sacrifice (i.e. the peace offering); only in so doing he must conform to the law in offering it at the door of the tabernacle. This command is given here because the previous statute being only applicable to the Israelite, and the stranger not being required to offer as sacrifices the animals he might kill for food, he might have claimed the liberty also of offering sacrifices at his own pleasure. The penalty of Lev_17:9, since it applies equally to the stranger, cannot be restricted to excommunication, but must be understood either of banishment from the land or else of the punishment of death. The object, as already noticed, and as is evident from the amplification of the law in Deuteronomy 12, was at once to prevent idolatrous sacrifices, and also to keep up the idea of the sacrifice as having only a typical and not an intrinsic efficacy, since it could only be allowed at all when its blood was sprinkled on the altar by the appointed priest. The other injunctions that follow in this chapter, equally with the present one, are applicable to strangers as well as Israelites. In Lev_17:10 the expression set my face against means that God will take the punishment of the offence into His own hands; He will oppose and reject the offender. In Lev_17:11 the vicarious character of the atonement effected by means of the sacrifices is very clearly brought out; the soul, the ψυχή, the principle of animal life, is in the blood, and for that reason the “soul” of animals was given to man to make an atonement for his own “soul;” by the giving up of the life of the animal the life of man was spared. Nothing is said here of the higher spiritual principle in man, because—even if the people could have understood such a distinction—there was nothing answering to this in the brute. Nothing in the victim could be a vicarious substitute for this; that want could be met only by the sacrifice of Calvary. Meantime, however, this was symbolized and set forth, as far as the nature of the case allowed, by the substitution of the animal life of the victim for the animal life of man. The blood, therefore, maketh an atonement by means of the soul which is in it. See Textual note 8. The statement is not here, that the blood makes atonement for the soul, as in the A. V.; this idea has already been expressed in the previous clause, and now is added the statement of how this is effected, lest there should seem to be a virtue in the mere blood itself as such. With this exposition of the meaning of the passage itself must be connected the whole typical significance of sacrifice; and in view of this there is truth in the explanation of Theodoret, of the Jewish expositors, and of the great mass of commentators, that the animal life of the victims was accepted in place of the rational soul of man; the former died that the latter might live. But that this sense can only be held in view of the connection of the type with the Antitype was long ago seen by St. Augustine (Quæst. 57 in Hept.). In Lev_17:13 the particular is put for the general; as during the life of the wilderness most animals used for food which were not sacrificial were taken in the chase, this stands for all such animals. But afterward (Deu_12:15-16; Deu_12:22-24) the same direction of pouring out the blood upon the earth is applied to all animals slain for food. The object of the command to cover the blood was probably double; first, simply to prevent the desecration of the blood as the vehicle of the animal soul; second, to avoid any abuse of it to superstitious and idolatrous uses. Lev_17:14 once more repeats with emphasis the prohibition of the eating of the blood, and for the same reason—because the blood is the soul, i.e., the vehicle of the animal life.—F. G.]
5. “The use of unclean flesh (Lev_17:15) could not be placed on an equality with the foregoing sins, since it might take place through many forms of thoughtlessness; but nevertheless it was prevented through the natural loathing. Hence the offender, in the first instance, fell only into the first grade of the law of purification; but if he neglected this, he had to make expiation for his misdeed.
“Keil (following Baumgarten) entitles the section chap. 17–20 the holiness of the daily life of the Israelites, and chap. 17 particularly the holiness of food. Certainly the sanctification of the eating of flesh leads to the sanctification of food generally. On ‘the oneness of soul and blood,’ see Keil, p. 126.” [Trans. pp. 409–10. See also Clark’s note II. at the end of this chapter. The prohibition of flesh that had not been properly slaughtered evidently rests on the fact that its blood had not been poured out. Still, as even in this case most of the blood would be collected in the larger vessels of the body, and would not appear as blood in the flesh that was eaten, there is less stringency in the prohibition. The defilement, however, was still considerable, and involved alike for the Israelite and the stranger, the washing of the clothes and the bathing of the person, and remaining unclean until the evening (Lev_17:15). That which died of itself, or that which was torn, are here classed together, as also in Lev_22:8. In Exo_22:31 the latter is commanded to be given to the dogs, and in Deu_14:21 the former is allowed to be given to the stranger, or sold to an alien. There appears to have been a certain degree of distinction between the two, although both are forbidden to the Israelite. That which died of itself was also forbidden to the stranger during the intimate association of Israelite and stranger in the camp life of the wilderness, but this law was relaxed in Deuteronomy in view of the better separated life in the land of Canaan. Such food, however, was always considered polluting to the Israelite (Eze_4:14; Eze_44:31), and its touch, as has already been seen (Lev_11:39) communicated defilement. At the council of Jerusalem (Act_15:29) the prohibition of “things strangled” is still continued in connection with the prohibition of blood.—F. G.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
I. The command that all sacrifices should be offered in one place was plainly a part of that educational law which had been added because of transgressions. There had been no such restriction laid upon the patriarchs; and under the law itself, it was often dispensed with by Divine command, or with the Divine approval, as in the case of Samuel, of David, of Solomon, an 1 of Elijah. Its purpose was to teach symbolically the Divine unity, and to prevent the worship of false gods. When this lesson had been sufficiently taught came the hour “when neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem,” men should “worship the Father” (Joh_4:21).
II. When the Israelites sacrificed otherwise than at the tabernacle, though the idols to which they professed to offer might be nothing yet really they sacrificed to demons. So St. Paul teaches it was with the sacrifices of the heathen in his time (1Co_10:19-20), and he warns Christians that by partaking of those sacrifices they came into fellowship with demons, and this was incompatible with partaking of “the cup of the Lord.” The same consequences must in all ages attend the offering of the homage of the heart elsewhere than to God.
III. This unfaithfulness to God is represented here, as so constantly in the later Scriptures, by conjugal infidelity. As husband and wife are no longer twain, but one flesh, so are the faithful united to their Head in one body, and any giving of superior allegiance to another is as the sin of marriage unfaithfulness.
IV. The blood and the soul, or animal life (נֶפֶשׁ), are here connected together, and the same word is used of the sacrifice of Christ, Isa_53:10, and the corresponding Greek word (ψυχή) repeatedly by our Lord Himself (Mat_20:28; Joh_10:11, etc.). He gave His life (ψυχή) for us. In view of the connection established in this chapter between this and the blood, a fresh significance attaches to His words of institution of the Lord’s Supper (Mat_26:27-28). The drinking of the cup which He gave, is the communion in His sacrifice for the remission of sins.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Lange: “That animal food as used by man, was to be kept holy by a religious consecration and slaying, excludes the use of flesh that is unhallowed or has been offered to demons. Man was to have a feeling for the suffering of the animal, for the sacrificial particular of the act of slaying, for the religio-moral duty of thankful and moderate use of flesh. Hence there is an element of truth also in the dogma of the vegetarians. But all blood must be reserved as an offering to Jehovah; for Jehovah alone is the Author of life, the God of all souls, and it is a crime to encroach greedily upon His domain. But how does the eating of blood in Christendom agree with this, as the council of the Apostles (Acts 15) have forbidden it, and as it is still forbidden in the Oriental Church? The New Testament thought is the holiness and inviolability of everything living in itself, since a creative breath of life dwells in it. If man, without an object, sheds blood or destroys life, he destroys the sanctuary of Divine goodness. The outline of the legal prescription disappears behind these thoughts. Men may be very careful, as in Byzantium and in Russia, to avoid the eating of blood, and still be in many ways criminally careless with life, even with the life of man. Connected with the eating of flesh, the eating of the flesh of an animal that has died of itself, or been torn by wild beasts, is also forbidden, even if in a slighter degree. In the fact that such a use of flesh has in itself something savage, and is a source of many sicknesses, lies the permanent thought of this legal command.”
Calvin notes that the command to sacrifice in one place was to avoid corruption of the sacrifices, and the direction to bring the offering to the priest was to direct the people to the One Mediator to come. Thus everywhere the law is our school-master to point us to Christ. No offering acceptable to God can be offered except through Him, and all enjoyment of daily life must be made holy through His mediation.
God does not impute to man the fault which is not his; but the fault which is really his may be far more serious than he supposes. The killing of an animal otherwise than God allowed, was the shedding of blood—of blood which had been given for man’s atonement; and so now, many sins which seem upon the surface mere sins of frivolity and thoughtlessness, will prove on closer examination to be deep offences against the love of Him who shed His blood for us on the cross.
Any offering of sacrifice otherwise than in the way of God’s appointment, became to the Israelites a sacrificing to demons; so any giving to other objects of the supreme affection He requires for Himself, becomes to us idolatry. Comp. Eph_5:5; Col_3:5.
Strangers must in many respects come under the laws given to the people of God. Men do not escape the responsibility of obedience by refusing to acknowledge allegiance, and to be numbered with His people.
In the treatment of the blood of the wild animal is taught the general principle of congruity in matters which are not the subject of direct precepts. Man should order all his ways in harmony with the conduct which in certain things is directly commanded. Especially under the Christian dispensation is this principle of wide application. Here principles are given rather than detailed precepts, to guide our conduct, and we must largely be governed by the congruity and fitness of things, and their harmony with what which is commanded.
Footnotes:
[1]Lev_17:3. The LXX. here, as in the text in Lev_17:8; Lev_17:10, inserts the clause or of the strangers which sojourn among you.
[2]Lev_17:3. כֶּשֶׂב. See Textual Note5 on Lev_3:7.
[3]Lev_17:4. מִשְׁכַּן. See Textual Note8 on Lev_15:31. There is especial reason for a change in the rendering here as the אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד has just occurred in the previous clause.
[4]Lev_17:4. This ver. is largely interpolated in the Sam. and LXX. “to offer a burnt offering or a peace offering [for your atonement Sam.] acceptable unto the Lord for an odor of a sweet savor. And whosoever shall kill without, and shall not bring it to the door of the tabernacle of testimony, that he may offer an offering to the Lord before the tabernacle of the Lord; blood shall be,” etc. The purpose of this interpolation is supposed to be to bring this passage into harmony with Deu_12:25; but the difficulty, if any can be considered to exist, is not avoided by this repetition.
[5]Lev_17:5. זִבְחֵיהֶם אֲשֶׁר הִם זֹבְחִים. The same word occurring twice in the same clause should surely have the same translation. זָבַח is the technical word for killing in sacrifice, and although in the later books it is rarely used for slaughtering in the more general sense, it is never applied in the Pentateuch to anything else than sacrifice. See preliminary note on sacrifice. It cannot, therefore (with Clark) be here taken of simply slaughtering for food.
[6]Lev_17:7. לַשְּׂעִירִם lit. to buck-goats. See Exeg. The A. V. has, however, undoubtedly expressed the sense, except that here, as frequently in the New Testament and sometimes in the Old (as in the translation of the same word in 2Ch_11:15). it uses the plural devils; but one διάβολος is recognized in Scripture, and evil spirits in the plural are expressed by δαιμονες or δαιμόνια. It is better therefore to substitute demons. Vulg. dæmones, LXX. ματαίοι. In the A. V. in Isa_13:21; Isa_34:14 it is rendered Satyrs.
[7]Lev_17:11; Lev_17:14. נֶפֶשׁ is here equivalent to ψυχή and is so rendered in the LXX. In English the life of the A. V. may be understood in the same way, but so also may soul, and it is better in this very important passage to keep a uniform rendering of the Heb. word. All the ancient versions retain the same rendering throughout, so do several modern versions and almost all recent expositors.
[8]Lev_17:11. בַּנֶּפֶשׁ יְכַפֵר = maketh an atonement by means of the soul. “בְּ with כִּפֶּר has only a local or instrumental signification (Lev_6:23; Lev_16:17; Lev_16:27; also Lev_7:7; Exo_29:33; Num_5:8). Accordingly, it was not the blood as such, but the blood as the vehicle of the soul, which possessed expiatory virtue.” Keil, following Knobel. Similarly Bähr, Kurtz, and others. So also Von Gerlach and Clark. The A. V. is singularly infelicitous in that it refers the final נֶפֶשׁ to the soul of man, instead of to the soul of the victim; nevertheless, it follows the LXX., the Targums, and the Vulg.; and so also Luther.
[9]Lev_17:13. See note1 on Lev_11:2.
[10]Lev_17:14. Comp. Lev_17:11. נֶפֶשׁ occurs three times in this verse, each time rendered in the A. V. life, but the uniform translation soul is better. In the expression the blood of it is the soul thereof, “בְּנַפשׁוֹ is to be taken as a predicate in its meaning, introduced with beth essentiale. It is only as so understood that the clause supplies a reason at all in harmony with the context.” Keil. With this most modern commentators concur, as well as the ancient and several recent versions.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On v5 To the end that the children of Israel may…
To the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they offer in the open field--"They" is supposed by some commentators to refer to the Egyptians, so that the verse will stand thus: "the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices which they (the Egyptians) offer in the open field." The law is thought to have been directed against those whose Egyptian habits led them to imitate this idolatrous practice.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 5 THE PLACE OF SLAYING DOMESTIC ANIMALS FOR FOOD, Lev_17:1-6.
THE PLACE OF SLAYING DOMESTIC ANIMALS FOR FOOD, Lev_17:1-6.
3. In the camp — In addition to the ceremonial, there were doubtless sanitary grounds for the requirement that all slaughter in the camp be in one place, where there was doubtless some way of disposing of the blood without endangering the public health. See Introduction, (6.) The private slaughter of domestic animals was doubtless forbidden as a safeguard against the propensity to idol offerings, which the people brought with them out of Egypt. The suggestion has weight, that since the herds were scanty, the requirement to bring animals for slaughter to the tabernacle was also designed to act as a check against too great a reduction of their number. Only the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half of Manasseh seem to have had what might be called large herds. Numbers 32. There can be little doubt, that during the forty years in the wilderness oxen and sheep were rarely used as food, whence it was flesh that Israel so greatly lusted after.
Read full note →
Out of the camp — The inconvenience of this requirement, when Israel was widely scattered in the wilderness for pasturage, is greatly mitigated by the fact that they were miraculously fed with manna. Their disgust for this, and clamour for animal food, (Num_11:6,) indicates that they rarely slew any animal of their flocks for food. But when the manna had ceased, and the tabernacle was fixed in one place, this prohibition was repealed in advance by Moses, (Deu_12:13-15,) so far as animals intended for food are concerned, and the people were permitted to kill and eat in all their gates.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv3–5 3. killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat] The…
3. killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat] The animals mentioned are those which are suitable for sacrifice, ‘of which men offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord’ (Lev_7:25), and the verb, though used of sacrificial slaughter (Lev_1:5, Lev_9:8, etc.), also has the sense of ordinary killing for food. This is its meaning here. The act of killing a beast included in the category of those admissible for sacrifice must be accompanied by certain other religious rites, viz. (1) bringing it before the Lord, (2) bringing it to one special place.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–5 (1) And the Lord spake unto Moses.—The Day of…
XVII.
(1) And the Lord spake unto Moses.—The Day of Atonement was instituted to purge, in an especial manner, the whole community from all their sins, and present them a holy nation before the Lord once a year. Hence it is now followed by regulations concerning every-day life, the observance of which is to foster the holiness secured on that particular day.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. H. Mackintosh 1880 · Public Domain On v1 Leviticus 17
Leviticus 17
In this chapter the reader will find two special points, namely - first, that life belongs to Jehovah; and, secondly, that the power of atonement is in the blood. The Lord attached peculiar importance to both these things. He would have them impressed upon every member of the congregation.
Read full note →
"And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 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, 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, 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." This was a most solemn matter; and we may ask what was involved in offering a sacrifice otherwise than in the manner here prescribed? It was nothing less than robbing Jehovah of His rights, and presenting to Satan that which was due to God. A man might say, "Can I not offer a sacrifice in one place as well as another?" The answer is, "Life belongs to God, and His claim thereto must be recognised in the place which He has appointed - before the tabernacle of the Lord." That was the only meeting place between God and man. To offer elsewhere proved that the heart did not want God.
The moral of this is plain. There is one place where God has appointed to meet the sinner, and that is the cross - the antitype of the brazen altar. There and there alone has God’s claim upon the life been duly recognised. To reject this meeting-place is to bring down judgement upon oneself - it is to trample under foot the just claims of God, and to arrogate to oneself a right to life which all have forfeited. It is important to see this.
"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." The blood and the fat belonged to God. The blessed Jesus fully recognised this. He surrendered His life to God, and all his hidden enemies were devoted to Him likewise. He voluntarily walked to the altar and there gave up His precious life; and the fragrant odour of His intrinsic excellency ascended to the throne of God. Blessed Jesus! it is sweet, at every step of our way, to be reminded of Thee.
The second point above referred to is clearly stated in verse 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." The connection between the two points is deeply interesting. When man duly takes his place as one possessing no title whatsoever to life - when he fully recognises God’s claims upon him, then the divine record is, "I have given you the life to make an atonement for your soul." Yes; atonement is God’s gift to man; and, be it carefully noted, that this atonement is in the blood, and only in the blood. "It is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul." It is not the blood and something else. The word is most explicit. It attributes atonement exclusively to the blood. "Without shedding of blood there is no remission." (Heb. 9: 22) It was the death of Christ that rent the veil. It is "by the blood of Jesus" we have "boldness to enter into the holiest." "We have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins." (Eph. 1: 7; Col. 1: 14) "Having made peace by the blood of his cross." "Ye who were afar off are made nigh by the blood of his cross." "The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin." (1 John 1: 7) "They washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." (Rev. 7) "They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb." (Rev. 12)
I would desire to call my reader’s earnest attention to the precious and vital doctrine of the blood. I am anxious that he should see its true place. The blood of Christ is the foundation of everything. It is the ground of God’s righteousness in justifying an ungodly sinner that believes on the name of the Son of God; and it is the ground of the sinner’s confidence in drawing nigh to a holy God who is of purer eyes than to behold evil. God would be just in the condemnation of the sinner; but, through the death of Christ, He can be just And the justifier of him that believeth - a just God and a Saviour. The righteousness of God is His consistency with Himself - His acting in harmony with His revealed character. Hence, were it not for the cross, His consistency with Himself would, of necessity, demand the death and judgement of the sinner; but in the cross that death and judgement were borne by the sinner’s Surety, so that the same divine consistency is perfectly maintained while a holy God justifies an ungodly sinner through faith. It is all through the blood of Jesus - nothing less - nothing more - nothing different. "It is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. This is conclusive. This is God’s simple plan of justification. Man’s plan is much more cumbrous, much more roundabout. And not only is it cumbrous and roundabout, but it attributes righteousness to something quite different from what I find in the word. If I look from Genesis 3 down to the close of Revelation, I find the blood of Christ put forward as the alone ground of righteousness. We get pardon, peace, life, righteousness, all by the blood, and nothing but the blood. The entire book of Leviticus, and particularly the chapter upon which we have just been meditating, is a commentary upon the doctrine of the blood. It seems strange to have to insist upon a fact so obvious to every dispassionate teachable student of holy Scripture. Yet so it is. Our minds are prone to slip away from the plain testimony of the word. We are ready to adopt opinions without ever calmly investigating them in the light of the divine testimonies. In this way we get into confusion, darkness, and error.
May we all learn to give the blood of Christ its due Place! It is so precious in God’s sight that He will not suffer ought else to be added to or mingled with it. "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."
C. H. Mackintosh, Notes on the Pentateuch — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5 This chapter finds its natural place here as the…
This chapter finds its natural place here as the supplement of all that has gone before. The first part of the book contains the institution or regulation of the sacrificial system (chapters 1-7). This chapter, therefore, which gives injunctions as to the place where all sacrifices are to be offered, might well, as Knobel has remarked, have taken its place as chapter 8. The second part contains the institution of the hereditary priesthood (chapters 8-10). This chapter, therefore, which forbids for the future all offering of sacrifices in the open fields, and commands that they shall be brought "unto the priest, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, would still more fitly find its place after chapter 10. But the first two sections of the third part (chapters 11-16) contain the laws and rules respecting cleansing from ceremonial defilement, and this cleansing is to be mainly effected by the means of sacrifice. Therefore the rule as to the place where sacrifice shall be offered is most naturally given here, where it is found (chapter 17), forming a close not only to Parts I and II, but also to the two sections of Part III, which contain the regulations as to purification by sacrifice. It is altogether a mistake to make a Second Book begin with chapter 17, as is clone by Lange and Keil.
The first injunction contained in the chapter (verses 2-7) is very generally understood to mean that while the Israelites lived in the wilderness, all animals fit for sacrifices which were slain for food should be so far regarded as sacrifices that they should be brought to the door of the tabernacle and slain in the court, an offering of the blood and fat being made to the Lord. Thus the ordinary slaughtering of domestic animals, it is said, became sanctified, and the dignity of life made clear: God is the Lord of life; he gave it, and it must not be taken away unless the blood, which is the vehicle of life, be offered to him by being presented sacrificially on his altar, or, where this is not possible, as in the case of wild animals, by being reverently covered with earth. Such a rule as this respecting the slaughtering of domestic animals, difficult to carry out in any case, would become impossible to obey after the camp had been expanded into a nation, and it is therefore supposed that it is by anticipation repealed in Deu_12:15 ("Notwithstanding thou mayest kill and eat flesh in all thy gates, whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which he hath given thee"), while the regulations as to restricting the offering of sacrifice to the court of the temple, and as to pouring blood on the earth, are there emphatically enforced. This view of the text is erroneous, and must be rejected. The injunction dues not refer to the ordinary slaughter of domestic animals for food, but only to sacrifices. Hitherto it had been the right and the duty of the head of each family to offer sacrifice for his household, and this he did wherever he thought proper, according to the ancient patriarchal practice, and most naturally in the open fields. This duty and liberty is now abolished. The Aaronic priesthood has superseded the older priestly system, and henceforth every sacrifice is to be offered in the court of the tabernacle, and by the hand of Aaron"s sons. The change was most momentous, but it could not but be made after the consecration of Aaron and his sons for a hereditary priesthood. A second reason for the change being made was the immediate danger to which a rude and superstitious people was exposed, of offering the parts which they were bound to set aside for the altar of God to some other deity, if God"s priests and altar were not at hand. The imaginations of the Israelites, corrupted by their stay in Egypt, peopled the fields with beings answering to the Pan and the satyrs of the Greeks; and to these the sacred portions of the animals slaughtered elsewhere than at the tabernacle were offered.
Read full note →
Vers. 1-9. Sacrifice is not in itself enough;
there must be uniformity in the manner in which it is offered, and identity of place in which it is made. The seven first chapters of the Book of Leviticus have given a minute statement of the ceremonies which are always to be unfailingly observed. Incidentally, it had been taught in these chapters that the place of sacrifice was the court of the tabernacle, but now every other place of sacrifice is stringently forbidden.
I THE TABERNACLE AND AFTERWARDS THE TEMPLE WERE THE CENTRE OF THE JEWISH CHURCH, AND THEREFORE OF THE JEWISH STATE. Every community which is to be permanent must have a central idea, and that idea must be embodied in some formula, or still better in some institution. The tabernacle or the temple was such an institution to the Jew. It summed up in itself, and was the symbol to the Jew of all that he valued. It was the rallying point of the nation, the thing that each citizen was willing to live for and die for, whatever other differences might divide him from his fellows. This gave a strength and unity to the different tribes, which would otherwise have probably all fallen apart, and though it was not strong enough to prevent the great schism, Jeroboam"s plan of supplying its place by an unreal substitute showed its force; it survived the destruction of the material temple by Nebuchadnezzar, preserved the exiled fragments of the nation during the Captivity, and inspired courage to return to Jerusalem and rebuild what they had lost. Nay, even now its memory keeps together the scattered members of a dispersed nation, and forms them into one people.
II THE TABERNACLE OR TEMPLE WAS THE EFFECTIVE SIGN OF UNITY TO THE JEWS BECAUSE IT CONTAINED THE ARK. The ark was the visible symbol of the presence of God among his chosen people. Therefore the hearts of the people went out towards the sanctuary with adoration and love. Therefore all the sacrificial rites had to be performed before the door of the sanctuary, not only while they lived in the wilderness, but when they were settled in Canaan. The journeys up to Jerusalem at the three great festivals intensified their love for the temple, and made them feel their union and communion with one another and with God. Nor did the institution of synagogues throughout the land interfere with this feeling, as the worship conducted in them was recognized as being of an inferior description to that which could be celebrated at the temple alone. The temple was, in the estimation of the Jew, the local abiding-place of God upon earth. Even when the ark and the mercy-seat were gone, it retained this character above every other spot.
III THE IDEA OF A LOCAL PRESENCE OF GOD IN ANY GIVEN PLACE ON EARTH IS ABOLISHED. "Believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.... the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth". (Joh_4:21-24) "For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my Name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my Name, and a pure offering: for my Name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts". (Mal_1:11) There is no local or material centre to the Christian Church; no one city holy because it contains the temple; no one temple holy because it contains the visible presence of God; no one high priest on earth holy because alone privileged to enter into that presence. The spiritual has superseded the material.
IV THE UNITY OF THE CHRISTIAN BODY IS TO BE OTHERWISE MAINTAINED. Its unity is commanded and prayed for by Christ: "Holy Father, keep through thine own Name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are." "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us:... that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one". (Joh_17:11, Joh_17:20-23) And it is enjoined by the apostle, "Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace". (Eph_4:3) So far and at such times as Judaical and materializing views have prevailed in the Church, attempts have been made to preserve this unity in the Jewish manner, by making an earthly head of the Church, round which the members might gather.
V THE TRUE BONDS OF UNITY IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.
1. The common possession of the "one Spirit", (Eph_4:4) who unites all the members by the internal cohesion of unanimity and love.
2. The common possession of the "one Lord", (Eph_4:5) the invisible Head of the body, from whom there flows down into the members a life shared by all alike.
3. The common possession of the "one God and Father of all", (Eph_4:6) whose Fatherhood makes us all brethren.
4. The common possession of "one faith", (Eph_4:5) "once (for all) delivered to the saints". (Jud_1:3)
5. The common possession of" one hope" (Eph_4:4) of eternal life.
6. The common possession of "one baptism", (Eph_4:5) by which we were made members of the "one body". (Eph_4:4)
7. The common possession of the other sacrament appointed to continue "till he come". (1Co_11:26)
8. The common possession of the ministry instituted "for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:... that we may grow up into him in all things, which is the bead, even Christ". (Eph_4:12-15)
VI THE NATIONALITY AND INDEPENDENCE OF CHURCHES NOT INCOMPATIBLE WITH CATHOLIC UNITY. if there were one visible head of the Church on earth, or one divinely constituted earthly centre of Christendom, there could be no such thing as an independent or a National Church. But this conception of the Church Catholic, partly Judaical, partly feudal, is wholly false. The possession of the above-named qualifications makes a particular Church partaker in Catholic unity, the ideal Christian Church consisting of a federal union of such Churches in union and communion one with another, agreeing in their belief, but not necessarily uniform in their ceremonies and rites (Art. 34).
HOMILIES BY R.M. EDGAR Chapter 17Grace before meat.
Cf. 1Co_10:31. From the perfect atonement God provides, we are invited next to turn to the morality he requires. And no better beginning can be made than the acknowledgment of God in connection with our food. The beautiful way the Lord secured his own recognition as the bountiful Giver was by enacting that blood, since it is the means used in atonement, must be devoted to no meaner use. Hence it was to be carefully put away, either by the priest at the tabernacle, or by the huntsman in the dust of the wilderness, and the animal used as a peace offering before God (verse 5). What we have consequently in this chapter is the religious use of food, or, as we have put it, "Grace before meat." In this connection let us observe
I THAT GOD HAS IMPLANTED SOME MEMENTO OF HIMSELF IN ALL OUR FOOD. Vegetable as well as animal life, of which we are reminded at every meal, is the sign manual of the living God. It is worse than stupidity not to recognize in the food we eat the gifts of his bounteous hand. "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning". (Jam_1:17) Why personify nature into a giver as a mere subterfuge for gross ingratitude? The Divine hand is behind the whole, and an honest heart can see it and will bless it as the source of all!
II GOD REMINDS US AT EVERY MEAL OF ATONEMENT AS THE PRELIMINARY TO PEACE AND FELLOWSHIP, For all our food once thrilled with organic life. There is literally the sacrifice of life, vegetable and animal, in every meal. Vegetarians sacrifice microscopic life, after all their efforts to sacrifice nothing but vegetable life. Thus our race is reminded of the first principle of atonement, every time we sit down at the table which a bounteous providence has spread. In fact, it is our own fault if every feast be not in a certain sense sacramental. The Supper of the New Testament, as well as the Passover of the Old, embodies the sacrifice of life in order to the support of man. It is on this principle that the world is constituted. If, then, we listened to the voice of Nature as we ought to do, we would hear her calling in every feast for the grateful recognition of that principle in atonement to which we have referred. Peace and communion arc really based in the order of nature upon the sacrifice of life. "Vicarious sacrifice" is a principle of vast range, and the atonement of Jesus is but a single application of it.
III THE RECOGNITION OF GOD IN EVERY PLEASURE WILL MAKE IT DOUBLY DELIGHTFUL.
It is evident that God contemplated hunting as something which might be enjoyed religiously. The blood of the animal was to be carefully covered with dust in the hunting-field. Such a recognition of God may be carried into all legitimate enjoyment. As Charles Lamb suggests saying grace before entering upon new books, as something more fitting than a formal grace before gluttony, let us by all means carry the good custom into everything. We may develop our muscular powers in a religious spirit. Let us have religion in bodily exercise, religion in our social enjoyments, religion in business, religion in politics, religion in all things. "Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." We should recognize a "muscular Christianity," and a mercantile Christianity, and a Christianity "which doth not behave itself unseemly" in society; in a word, the adaptability of the religious spirit to all lawful relations. The sooner we recognize and realize this, the better. R.M.E.
HOMILIES BY J.A. MACDONALD Vers. 1-16. Statutes concerning blood.
The sacredness of blood is everywhere marked in Scripture. The chapter before us contains some of the more important statutes concerning it.
I IN RESPECT TO THE BLOOD OF SACRIFICE.
1. It must be brought to the door of the tabernacle.
(1) This requisition does not apply to animals ordinarily killed for food. (comp. Deu_12:15, Deu_12:21)
(2) It applies to the blood of sacrifices.
(a) To the blood of those offered at the door of the tabernacle. As a matter of course, the bleed of such sacrifices would be sprinkled and poured out at the altar.
(b) To the blood of those also offered outside the camp (verses 3, 5). Sacrifices were formerly offered wherever the providence of God might indicate. (Gen_12:8 Job_1:5) God still reserved to himself the right to sanction the offering of sacrifices where he pleased. (see Jud_1:6:26 13:19 1Sa_7:9 2Sa_24:18 1Ki_18:23) Without such sanction, the altar of the tabernacle is the one place appointed for the shedding of sacrificial blood.
(3) Public worship is encouraged by this law. (Heb_10:25)
2. The penalty of disobedience is excision.
(1) The statute was enacted to prevent idolatry. Sacrificing elsewhere, they might be tempted to sacrifice to devils (verse 7). The heathen thought the spirit of their god resided in his idol; such spirits are here called "devils." All idolatry is from Satan, and is devilish. (1Co_10:20) The word ( here translated "devils" is elsewhere rendered "goats." Perhaps the idols in which these spirits of devils were supposed to reside were of the goat-like form. Goats were worshipped in Egypt, and probably also in Canaan.
(2) Blood is imputed to him that sheds blood in sacrifice elsewhere than at the altar of the tabernacle (verse 4). To bring the blood to the door of the tabernacle taught the worshipper to discern Christ, through whose blood we enter heaven. To miss this lesson was to degenerate into abominable and fatal idolatry. (see Isa_66:3) This law applied to proselytes as well as to native Israelites (verses 8, 9). There is but one way to God for the Jew and Greek. (Rom_3:30) "He that believeth not shall be damned" (see verse 4).
II IN RESPECT TO FOOD.
1. Blood as food is absolutely forbidden.
(1) The prohibition is among the Noachian precepts. He who reserved the tree of knowledge of good and evil in his grant of vegetables to man for food, reserved blood in his grant of animals. (Gen_9:4, Gen_9:5) Being a Noachian precept, this law is obligatory upon the human family at large.
(2) The prohibition of blood was formally incorporated into the Levitical code. (see verse 10; also Lev_3:17 Lev_7:26 Deu_12:25) The abrogation of the Levitical Law, however, does not repeal the Noachian precept. Unless, therefore, it can be shown that the Noachian precept is abrogated, it is still unlawful both to Jew and Gentile to eat blood.
(3) So far from being repealed, this precept is re-enforced under the gospel. (Act_15:28, Act_15:29) This "burden" our Lord still lays upon the Churches, even after the destruction of Jerusalem. (see Rev_2:14-24) The significance of this term "burden" must not be overlooked. (comp. Act_15:28 with Rev_2:24)
2. Two reasons for the prohibition are assigned. These are:
(1) That "the life of the flesh is in the blood." This is philosophically true. Cut a nerve, you paralyze a member, but it lives; cut off the blood, the member mortifies. Blood flows to a wound, becomes vascular there, knits the living parts, and it heals. The vitality of the blood is seen in its power of maintaining its temperature against the extremes of heat and cold. The lesson of this reason is to teach us the value of life. Hence in connection with the Noachian precept prohibiting the eating of blood, we have also the law guarding the life of man by the penalty of death to the murderer.
(2) That "it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul" (verse 11). That should not be treated as a common thing which is the principle of atonement, and the type of the precious blood of Christ.
(3) For these reasons also things strangled are forbidden, things which died alone, or were torn; things not so killed as to let the blood properly flow from them. Thus the slaying of every animal used for food in the sacrificial way would remind the eater of the necessity of sacrifice for sin. (see 1Co_10:31)
3. The penalty here also is excision
(1) If things strangled were eaten, the transgressor became unclean. (see 1Sa_14:32, 1Sa_14:33) He must wash his clothes, for his profession hath been polluted. He must wash his flesh, for his person is defiled. If he neglect this repentance and purification, he shall bear his iniquity; he is obnoxious to excision. (verse 16; Lev_5:17 Num_9:13)
(2) What, then, can be said for a Church which professes literally to drink the blood of Christ in the cup of the Mass? Is not that Church thereby guilty of outraging the law of all the dispensations? It would evade this impeachment by impudently authorizing the eating of blood. But no impudence can evade the penalty: "But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood of your lives will I require." Does not this plainly say that God will require the blood of the life of the blood-eater.9 David abhors the practice of the Syrians, who made libations of blood to their gods, and prophetically denounces and rejects our antichristian idolaters. (see Psa_16:4) Drunk as she is with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Jesus, God will give her blood to drink, for she is worthy. J.A.M.
HOMILIES BY S.R. ALDRIDGE Vers. 1-7. One place of sacrifice.
It is of the essence of law to be impartial. Its precepts apply to all without distinction. "Aaron and his sons and all the children of Israel" are here included in the scope of the Divine commands. Let none deem himself too humble or too exalted to incur displeasure by infraction of the Law.
I. We see that A LAWFUL ACTION MAY BE UNLAWFULLY PERFORMED. A wrong time or place may vitiate a deed otherwise permissible. Animals were given to man as food, and to slaughter and eat them was not in itself sin, but after the issue of this prohibition it became sin to do so without presenting them at the tabernacle. "Blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood." So the homicide justifiable in war becomes murder, and the intercourse of matrimony fornication, and the "word spoken in season" a casting of pearls before swine, by reason of impropriety of person or season.
II THE PEOPLE OF GOD MUST EXPECT RESTRICTIONS TO BE PLACED UPON THEIR LIBERTY. The nations may follow their own devices and desires, the chosen people are under a covenant to obey the commands of the Legislator. They are assured that his wisdom and kindness will prevent the adoption of unnecessary and inequitable prohibitions. For all his precepts there are the best possible reasons, and therefore obedience is cheerfully rendered. Note the noble reply which Milton puts into the mouth of the seraph Abdiel, to the taunts of Satan ("Paradise Lost," book 6:170-181). Whilst the Israelites were in the wilderness, and the tabernacle abode in the midst of the camp, no hardship was involved in attending to this injunction, and it restrained them from evil practices, disciplining them against the time that they should enter the land of promise and have the injunction removed. Besides, animal food was scarce in the wilderness, as we learn from the complaints of the people.
III TO RECOGNIZE GOD IN OUR COMMON ACTIONS AND ENJOYMENTS HALLOWS LIFE MAKES IT A RELIGIOUS SERVICE. The slain animal is consecrated as a peace offering, its blood being sprinkled on the altar, the fat burnt for a "sweet savour unto the Lord," and the remainder partaken of with gratitude and joy. God is honoured and man profited. Alas! that so many can continually receive God"s mercies without acknowledgment, no blessing invoked, and no emotion of holy gladness sweetening the repast! The Christian ideal is to do all in the Name of Jesus and to the glory of God.
IV TO REFUSE TO GOD HIS RIGHTS IS TO COMMIT IDOLATRY. The Israelites were certain to turn the slaughter of an animal into a festival, and the question was, to whom should the feast be dedicated? Homage to the demons of the field could not be sanctioned, it was a breach at once of the first and seventh commandments. It is frequently forgotten that a neutral attitude in respect of God is impossible; we are either on his side or against him. Intellectualism, materialism, scientificism, agnosticism, it matters not by what name our rejection of the claims of religion is covered, it really designates the setting up of an idol upon the throne of the heart, and we adore the enemy of God.
V THE PROBATIONARY CHARACTER OF MANY OF GOD"S REQUIREMENTS IS HERE MADE VISIBLE. In Deuteronomy 12 the precept of the text is repealed as relating to the settled condition of life in Palestine, when it would manifestly be difficult to comply with the law. By that period the precept had served its purpose in training the Israelites to abstain from evil practices, and to honour Jehovah with all their substance. And we today have our wilderness system of probation and training, many rules designed to meeten us for the society of just men made perfect. The injunction of the text pointed to the transitory nature of the Law as a whole. It has been abrogated by the gospel, the dispensation of promise, the land of liberty and rest. Yet, as in their residence in Palestine, the Israelites continued to observe the spirit of the repealed Law, so do we, under the gospel, retain the principles that underlay the Mosaic legislation. To acknowledge God in every meal and mercy, to hallow the secular and to promote it to the sacred, this, as it is the object of Christian endeavour, is the spirit of the command we have been considering in Leviticus. And equally so, the principles and spirit of our Christian earthly life will be recognizable in the higher worship and service of heaven. The accident changes, the essence alters not. S.R.A.
HOMILIES BY W. CLARKSON Vers. 1-7. Features of Christian service.
It is open to question whether the prohibition (verses 3, 4) extends to all animals killed for feed, or only to those slain in sacrifice. The former view is, in my judgment, the correct one; for
(1) the instruction is explicit enough (verses 3, 4), and without qualification;
(2) the limitation is afterwards allowed in consideration of the change of circumstance; (Deu_12:20, Deu_12:21) and
(3) the difficulty in the case is less on consideration than it at first appears. It is objected that this would be a burdensome prohibition; but
(a) it only lasted (see above) while they were in the camp, near to one another, and all near to the tabernacle; and
(b) much less flesh was eaten there and then than is eaten here and now. A more largely vegetable diet would probably be wholesome for us; it was undoubtedly so in the desert of Arabia. When we more carefully consider this precept, we see its beneficent character; we perceive
I A FATAL EVIL, FROM WHICH IT WAS DESIGNED TO SAVE THEM. The practices of Egypt clung to them; among these was demon-worship (verse 7). They had gone after those demons, and offered sacrifices to them. If any animal might be killed anywhere for food, and the blood of it might not be eaten, (Lev_3:17 Lev_7:26) there would be a strong temptation to the superstitious to pour it out in sacrifice to those demons of whose malignant interposition they were afraid. This temptation must, at all cost, be guarded against. It would introduce or foster that idolatrous usage from which it was the supreme object of all these statutes to keep Israel free. And if no animal might be slain save at the tabernacle door, there would be no danger of this disastrous lapse into Egyptian superstition.
II THE GOOD IT WAS DESIGNED TO DO THEM. It would confer a threefold boon upon them.
1. It would bring them often to the tabernacle, and so to the near presence and worship of God; it would multiply their sacrifices (verses 5, 6).
2. It would lead them to associate their material blessings with the Divine hand; presenting them unto the Lord, they could not fail to be reminded that they were his gifts.
3. It would help them to look on Jehovah as their Divine Friend. These became peace offerings (verse 5), and the essential thought of such offering was human fellowship with God.
We detect here some useful suggestions as to the true character of Christian service.
1. We must not make our Christian worship too deprecatory in its character. There is something painfully and dangerously like demon-worship in the devotion of some men; they seldom rise above the deprecatory in their thought, as if God were a being so stern and so reluctant to forgive that his people should spend all their devotional breath in deprecating his wrath. Surely to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ we should bring, beside this, our adoration, praise, gratitude, trust, love, consecration, etc.
2. We must learn to connect daily blessings with the Divine hand. We should, in thought though not in act, bring everything we have to "the door of the tabernacle," trace each good thing we enjoy to the generous Giver of all, to his heart of love as well as to his hand of bounty.
3. We should bless God for revealing himself to us as our Divine Friend, in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has taught us to think and feel that we are the friends and guests of God. C. (Joh_15:14, 15 14:23 Rev_3:20)
HOMILIES BY R.A. REDFORD Vers. 1-9. Sanctity of animal life.
All God"s people commanded to observe restrictions as to the shedding of blood. Door of the tabernacle connected with the sphere of common life; thus religion and its duty threw sacredness over all things.
I THE DOMINION OF MAN OVER THE LOWER CREATION.
1. Appointed by God. (see Gen_1:26 and Ps 8)
2. Limited in its extent, by necessity, humanity of feeling, provision for the higher purposes of human life.
3. Capable of being blended with the Law of the sanctuary. We should afford all creatures dependent on us, as much as possible our own sabbath of bodily rest. We should make it a religious duty to protect them from injury and suffering. In so far as we use them for food, an offering of them should not be to the god of sensuality, but to him whose Law requires temperance, self-restraint, and reverence for the lower nature, that it may support the higher. All with thanksgiving.
II POWER OF LIFE AND DEATH IS IN AND FROM GOD. As entrusted to man, whether over the lower animals or over his fellows, it is a power to be exercised as in the sight of God and at the door of his house.
1. Shedding of blood a solemn responsibility. In common life, lest we be guilty of cruelty and destruction of a true and valuable element in the world"s welfare. In execution of law, lest we give to that which represents the Divine will the appearance of injustice and wantonness. Even in healthy sport, care must be taken lest there be an overbalance of the mind towards shedding of blood or disregard of suffering. In all questions of difficulty, bring the matter to the door of the tabernacle.
2. The sacredness of blood points to atonement. The devoted and slaughtered animal was received back again as a Divine gift for the use of the offerer, thus lifting up death into life. Sacrifice is not God"s delight in death, but his promise of salvation. The sanctity attached to the blood of victims prepared the way to the higher sanctity attached to the blood of Christ. The Old and New Testaments explain one another.
III PRESERVATION FROM IDOLATRY AND FALSE WORSHIP IN THE POSITIVE REGULATIONS OF THE LAW. Mistake of supposing that mere negative religion will purify men from corruption. Against the worship of devils we are never sate except as we are engaged in the worship of the true God. R.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v2 This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded.
Lev_17:2-16
This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded.
Read full note →
Laws for holy living
From chap. 17. to chap. 23, everything relates to the duties, qualities, and associations of individuals in private life. This fact, coming as it does right after the great Day of Atonement, is very suggestive. It indicates that God contemplates much more respecting us than the mere pardon of our sins; that justification is not the whole intent of the Saviours redemptive services; and that there is to be a personal righteousness and purification which rests upon our own exertions. In Him was life, and His life is the light of men. Without some degree of conformity to Him, our religion is but a shadow and a name. For so it is written, If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. Let me invite attention, then, more specifically to the means and elements of a good and holy life, as they are shadowed forth in the chapters before us.
I. The principal, and, perhaps, the only permanent provision contained in this chapter, is that which respects the manner of treating blood. NO matter how or from what animal it came, it was always to be looked upon with consideration. The use of blood was not forbidden because it was unclean, but because it was sacred. It represents life. It is that by which life was redeemed. Now, it is easy to see how a law of this sort would work to solemnise, restrain, and soften the heart of a conscientious Jew. It would keep the solemn atonement before him whithersoever he went. The very huntsman would be met by it in the deep recesses of the forest. And if we desire to learn what constitutes the deepest essence of a Christian life, we here have it most beautifully typified. We must keep in view the blood of atonement. It is our clear and continual recognition of what Jesus has done for us that weakens temptation, disposes to duty, and prompts to the deeds of righteousness. I remember to have met with an affecting little incident in Roman history connected with the death of Manlius Capitolinus, a renowned consul and general, who was once proudly hailed as the saviour of Rome. It happened one night when the Gauls threatened to overwhelm the Capitol, that he bravely took his stand upon the wall where they came on with their attack, and there fought singly and alone until he had repelled them, and so saved the city from destruction. It so occurred that this distinguished man was afterwards accused of some great public fault, and put upon trial for his life. But just as the judges were about to pass sentence upon him, he looked up at the walls of the Capitol, which towered in view, and with tears in his eyes pointed to where he had fought for his accusers, and perilled his life for their safety. The people remembered the heroic achievement, and wept. No one had the heart to say aught against him, and the judges were compelled to forbear. Again he was tried, and with the same result. Nor could he be convicted until his trial was removed to some low and distant point, from which the Capitol was invisible. And so, while Calvary is in full view, in vain will earth and hell seek to bring the Christian into condemnation. One serious look at the Cross, and at the love which there, unaided and alone, when all was dark and lost, interposed for our salvation, is enough to break the power of passion at once, and to strike dead every guilty proceeding.
II. Passing to chap. 18., we find sundry laws, but all bearing upon two general points. The first relates to the customs of the egyptians, from among whom the jews came, and of the canaanites, whose land they were to inherit. Israel was to be a holy nation, and therefore was not to follow the ways of the unclean. The greatest danger of a purified man arises from his old habits and associations. It is not easy to turn a stream quite out of the channel in which it has been flowing for ages. It is a mighty work to revolutionise a character which has been forming for years, or to tear quite away from a long-continued routine which includes all our recollections of infancy, and in which our life took its chief attractions. The sow that has been washed, still has strong affections for the mire. The second grand element of a good Christian life, therefore, is a complete and thorough reformation with regard to old habits. If we have been in close intimacy with the vile, we must withdraw from their communion, and keep aloof from their wicked ways. If we have been giving way to bad passions, we must cut ourselves off from the occasions of our transgressions, and beware of putting ourselves into circumstances which invite temptation.
III. The other specifications of chap. 18. all relate to sexual purity. They typically refer to the necessity of a proper government of the affections. We may love, but we must love virtuously. We may cherish the most tender regards, but they must not rest upon criminal hopes. Our warmest feelings may be enlisted and indulged, but we must be cautious that they do not betray us into sin and shame. Even the secret thought of unchasteness, the hidden incontinent wish, the impure desire, the cherished hope of unclean gratifications, must be spurned and crucified as criminal before God, and crushed as an enemy to the peace and good of society. The heart must be kept with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. It is God who saith, Defile not yourselves in any of these things.
IV. We come now to chap. 19. Here we have quite a list of moral precepts, setting forth an extensive code of christian righteousness. The provisions of the preceding chapter were negative; these are mostly positive. In the one God shows us how we are to cease to do evil; in the other He instructs us how to do well.
V. A remark or two, now, upon chap. 20. We have been contemplating the laws of holy living. In this chapter we have Gods threatenings against those who violate them. It is a chapter of penalties. God is not only our adviser, but our Lord and Judge. His commands are not only gracious counsels, but authoritative laws. The gospel is indeed glad tidings--glad tidings of great joy. It is a call of mercy from the heavens to the suffering and the lost. But it is a call to holiness. And whilst it is a glorious savour of life unto life to them that yield to it, and walk in its light, it is a fearful savour of death unto death to those who despise or disobey it. (J. A. Seiss, D. D.)
Various regulations in chaps. 17-22.
First, in regard to those passages which caution the people against vices of special enormity, we must remember that they were about to be settled in dangerous proximity to peoples who were thoroughly corrupted by these very vices, and therefore the cautions were not by any means unnecessary. Accustomed as most of us are to the pure air of Christian society, in which, notwithstanding all the selfishness and sin that still abound, vices such as these are not so much as named, and the very possibility of them seems out of the question, it is difficult for us to imagine how different was the condition of society before these purifying influences were brought to bear on it, which issued from Mount Sinai first, and afterwards from Gennesarets shore and the place called Calvary. And when we find such warnings in the Book of Leviticus, we ought in the first place to feel humbled by the thought of the fearful lengths to which sin unrestrained by Divine grace will carry its wretched victim; and, in the second place, to lift up our hearts in gratitude to God, that in these latter days, though evil still abounds, we are nevertheless protected from such outrages to our moral and spiritual nature as those to which even the chosen people were exposed in the ancient times. On the other hand, it is pleasant to find in these chapters the evidence that the Mosaic Law came in many respects nearer to the morality of the New Testament than most people are willing to admit (see Lev_19:9-10; Lev_19:32-34). Finally, it is interesting to notice in these regulations, and throughout the entire law, the care which is taken to keep religion and morality closely wedded and welded together. I am the Lord your God is continually put forth, not as a creed article, but as an unanswerable argument for strictest obedience and the most scrupulous integrity. The relations of privilege which the people enjoyed are continually set forth as increasing their responsibility. To whom much is given, of them much shall be required, is a principle taken for granted all through. (J. M. Gibson, D. D.)
Before the Tabernacle of the Lord.
The grand principle of right action--God in everything
The principle which underlies this stringent law, as also the reason which is given for it, is of constant application in modern life. There was nothing wrong in itself in slaying an animal in one place more than another. It was abstractedly possible--as, likely enough, many an Israelite may have said to himself--that a man could just as really eat unto the Lord if he slaughtered and ate his animal in the field, as anywhere else. Nevertheless this was forbidden under the heaviest penalties. It teaches us that he who will be holy must not only abstain from that which is in itself always wrong, but must carefully keep himself from doing even lawful or necessary things in such a way, or under such associations and circumstances, as may outwardly compromise his Christian standing, or which may be proved by experience to have an almost unavoidable tendency toward sin. The laxity in such matters which prevails in the so-called Christian world argues little for the tone of spiritual life in our day in those who indulge in it, or allow it, or apologise for it it may be true enough, in a sense, that, as many say, there is no harm in this or that. Perhaps not; but what if experience have shown that, though in itself not sinful, a certain association or amusement almost always tends to worldliness, which is a form of idolatry? Or--to use the apostles illustration--what if one be seen, though with no intention of wrong, sitting at meat in an idols temple, and he whose conscience is weak be thereby emboldened to do what to him is sin? There is only one safe principle, now as in the days of Moses: everything must be brought before the Lord--used as from Him and for Him, and therefore used under such limitations and restrictions as His wise and holy law imposes. Only so shall we be safe; only so abide in living fellowship with God. (S. H. Kellogg, D. D.)
Peace-offerings unto the Lord.--
Dedication of food to God
Very beautiful and instructive was the direction that the Israelite, in the cases specified, should make his daily food a peace-offering. This involved a dedication of the daily food to the Lord; and in his receiving it back again then from the hand of God, the truth was visibly represented that our daily food is from God; while also, in the sacrificial acts which preceded the eating, the Israelite was continually reminded that it was upon the ground of an accepted atonement that even these everyday mercies were received. Such also should be, in spirit, the often neglected prayer before each of our daily meals. It should be ever offered with the remembrance of the precious blood which has purchased for us even the most common mercies; and should thus sincerely recognise What, in the confusing complexity of the second causes through which we receive our daily food, we so easily forget that the Lords Prayer is not a mere form of words when we say, Give us this day our daily bread; but that working behind, and in, and with, all these second causes, is the kindly providence of God, who, opening His hand, supplies the want of every living thing. And so, eating in grateful, loving fellowship with our Heavenly Father that which His bounty gives us, to His glory, every meal shall become, as it were, a sacramental remembrance of the Lord. We may have wondered at what we have read of the worldwide custom of the Mohammedan, who, whenever the knife of slaughter is lifted against a beast for food, utters his Bism Allah (In the name of the most merciful God); and not otherwise will regard his food as being made halal or lawful; and no doubt in all this, as in many a Christians prayer, there may often be little heart. But the thought in this ceremony is even this of Leviticus, and we do well to make it our own, eating even our daily food in the name of the most merciful God, and with uplifting of the heart in thankful worship toward Him. (S. H. Kellogg. D. D.)
For the life of the flesh is in the blood.--
The Scriptural doctrine of blood
Blood is one of the characteristic, regent words of Scripture, occurring in it more than four hundred times. A word so recurrent must mean something fundamental. In fact, it is the blood of Christ which is the basis of Christianity, the very pivot of the Christian religion.
I. First of all, let us ponder what in light of modern physiology is certainly a remarkable Scripture. Moses, in forbidding the eating of blood, assigns for his prohibition the following reason: 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 (Lev_17:11).
1. The fact asserted: The life (soul) of the flesh is in the blood.
(1) This is, in fact, one of the instinctive beliefs of humanity; and instinct is often prophetic, holding latent history. How thoroughly the idea that blood is the seat of life has taken possession of the race is evident from such instinctive idioms as these: shedder of blood, man of blood, imbrue in blood, bloody-minded, blood-thirsty, avenger of blood, blood-guiltiness, cold-blooded, prince of the blood royal, blooded-stock, blood-relation, next of blood, consanguinity, sanguine of success, sanguine temperament, &c., &c. So that marvellous diviner and formulator of human instincts, Shakespeare--the word blood occurs seven hundred and thirty-one times in his plays--for example:--
Will all great Neptunes ocean wash this blood
Clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red.
(Macbeth, II:2.)
Again--
Sluicd out his innocent soul through streams of blood:
Which blood, like sacrificing Abels, cries,
Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth,
To me, for justice and rough chastisement.
(King Richard II., I:1.)
So Englands poet-laureate--
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood.
(In Memoriam, 53.)
Again
Through all the years of April blood.
(In Memoriam, 108.)
So Virgil--
His purple life (purpuream animam) he poureth forth.
(AEneid, 9:349.)
So Homer, and very frequently, thus--
The soul comes floating in a tide of gore.
(Iliad, 4.537.)
Again--
He sobs his soul out in the gush of blood.
(Iliad, 16.419.)
Once more--
And the soul issued in the purple flood.
(Iliad, 16.624.)
So the Scriptural writers; for example: The voice of thy brothers blood crieth unto Me from the ground; Earth, cover not thou my blood; Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God; Precious shall their blood be in His sight; All the righteous blood shed upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zachariah the son of Barachiah; I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost Thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? The blood being thus instinctively conceived as the seat of life, and so the representative of the soul or person, no wonder that blood has ever been regarded as a sacred thing. Here is the secret of the Mosaic prohibition to eat blood, a prohibition frequently repeated, and in Lev_17:10-14 with solemn minuteness of detail. The blood being regarded as the symbol and home of the personality, to eat it was to be guilty of sacrilegious cannibalism. Here is the key to that chivalrous, pathetic incident in Davids life: Be it far from me, O Lord, that I should do this; is not this the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their lives? (2Sa_23:15-17). But the Divine prohibition was not peculiar to the Jews. A millennium before Moses, when the new stock of humanity, just escaped the Deluge, was still young, God commanded Noah, saying, Every moving thing that liveth shall be food for you . . . But flesh with the life (soul) thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat (Gen_9:1-4). As the prohibition antedated the Mosaic Dispensation, so it postdated it. A score of years after Christ was crucified, a controversy arose in the Church at Antioch respecting the subjection of Gentile converts to circumcision and the Mosaic institutions generally (Act_15:1-35). So much for the instinctive belief that the life, or soul, of the flesh is in the blood.
(2) And modern science remarkably confirms this instinctive belief. The blood, in respect to its composition, consists of two principal parts: a liquid plasma, and countless microscopic corpuscles, or blood-discs, floating in it, by far the larger part of which are red, and the rest colourless. The office of the colourless corpuscles, called Leucocytes, is not yet distinctly understood. This thing, however, must be said about them, When blood is taken from the living system, these leucocytes, or white corpuscles, if kept at something like their normal temperature, present for some time remarkable life-like phenomena; they protrude and retract numerous arms or processes, and even move about from place to place, as though things of life; in fact, so much do the motions of these corpuscles resemble the protean changes in figure and motions of the microscopic Rhizopod called Amoeba, that they have received the name, amoeboid movements. The red corpuscles constitute nearly one half of the mass of the blood, tinging it so thoroughly as to give it its red colour. The office of these red globules, or blood discs, is, in the main, to serve as carriers of oxygen. To use the words of Prof. Flint, the red corpuscles are respiratory organs; taking up the greater part of the oxygen which is absorbed by the blood in its passage through the lungs, and conveying it to the tissues, where it is given up, and its place supplied by carbonic acid. One more remark must be made about these red blood discs. Although the diagnosis of blood stains is not yet sufficiently advanced to enable us in all cases to discriminate with absolute certainty between the blood corpuscles of man and those of all mammals, yet it is far enough advanced to enable the microscopical expert to pronounce, in certain eases, with accuracy on the character of blood stains in murder trials; thus converting these tiny globules, having a diameter of only 1/3200 of an inch, into solemn, resistless witnesses. The melancholy Dane is right:
Murder, though it have no tongue, will speak,
With most miraculous organ.
(Hamlet, II:2.)
Ay, blood will tell. Thus the blood is in an eminent sense the seat and organ of life. The language of Hervey, the demonstrator at least, if not the discoverer, of the circulation of the blood, is striking: The blood is the primigenial and principal part, because that in it and from it the fountain of motion and pulsation is derived; also because the animal heat or vital spirit is first radicated and implanted, and the soul takes up her mansion in it The blood is the genital part, the fountain of life, primum vivens, ultimum moriens. It is a solemn thing to observe the rhythmical systole and diastole of the heart, especially as recorded by that delicate instrument, the sphygmograph. The blood is a very river of life, the arterial and venous systems of circulation constituting an intricate network of canals, making the body a corporeal Amsterdam or human Venice. Each corpuscle is a barge, moving with various rates of speed in different parts of the body, toiling through the capillaries at the rate of two inches a minute, rushing through the arteries at the rate of from twelve to twenty feet a second, ceaselessly carrying on the organic functions of the body by perpetually exchanging freight, depositing at the depot of this and that tissue oxygen, and taking up carbonic acid. What money is to society, that blood is to the bodily system; it is the means of exchange, or the circulating medium. The scientific accuracy of the assertion, the life of the flesh is in the blood, is strikingly shown in such facts as blood-letting, strangling, fainting, pyoemia, or blood-poisoning, and especially transfusion--a sometimes beneficent surgical operation, in which blood from a strong and healthy person, or from one of the lower animals, is injected into the veins of a feeble or anaemic patient. The life or soul of the flesh is in the blood. Thus the Bible of Scripture and the Bible of Nature is one; Scripture announcing a truth, Nature echoing it.
2. The rite appointed: And I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls.
(1) I have given it to you upon the altar. Blood is emphatically the characteristic thing in the Levitical ritual, the very basis of the old sacrificial economy. Particularly is this true of the eminently sacred rites of the paschal lamb, the sin-offering, the day of atonement, and the mercy-seat; all the significance of these elaborate ceremonies turned on the element of blood. Indeed, the writer of the letter to the Hebrews, summing up the Old Covenant in respect to ritual, expressly says, Almost all things are by the law purified with blood; and without shedding of blood there is no remission (Heb_9:22). The Old Testament is in very truth a scarlet dispensation.
(2) To atone for your souls. To atone; literally, to cover, hide, shelter. But in what sense to atone? Certainly not in the heathen sense of placating as with presents, or expiating as by offering a quid pro quo; but in the gracious sense of reconciling by sacrificial, vicarious interception.
3. The reason assigned: For it is the blood that maketh atonement--i.e., by the life thereof, in virtue of the soul in it.
(1) It is the blood that maketh an atonement. It atones not, of course, absolutely; for it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away the consciousness of sins. But the blood atones, so to speak, constructively, pictorially, prophetically.
(2) For the life (or soul) of the flesh is in the blood. And this on the principle that the blood, as being the seat of the life, is the representative of the person. Life for life, soul for soul; this is the meaning of the old sacrificial ritual. And it is all based on the admitted physiological principle--the life of the flesh is in the blood.
II. And now we have the key to the Scriptural doctrine of blood.
1. The blood of Jesus Christ it is which is the antitype or fulfilment of the blood of the Levitical victims. To prove this forms a great part of the argument of the Epistle to the Hebrews. Take chap. 9., Lev_9:13-14, as a typical specimen of the argument.
2. The blood of Jesus Christ is the antitypal, real atonement for our souls on the same principle which held under the Old Dispensation--the principle of vicarious representation. That is to say, Christs blood, as being the vehicle and representative of His own personality, was vicariously shed; and in this way He became the propitiation for the sins of the whole world. This, then, is the Scriptural doctrine of blood. It is based on the ancient Mosaic affirmation and on the modern scientific observation--The life of the flesh is in the blood. How significant now the New Testament allusions to the efficacy of Christs blood. For example: Purchased with His own blood; Set forth as a propitiation through faith in His blood; Justified by His blood; Redemption through His blood; Made peace through the blood of His Cross; Boldness to enter into the holiest through the blood of Jesus; The blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that of Abel; The blood of the everlasting Covenant; The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin; Washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, &c. Thus blood is the scarlet thread winding through both the Covenants, their crimson rubric. This, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter--blood is the natural, physiological basis of the Scriptural doctrine of the Atonement. Science inexorably holds us to orthodoxy in the prime, pivotal article of the Christian religion. (G. D. Boardman, D. D.)
Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh.--
Restrictions respecting the use of blood
The moral and spiritual purpose of this law concerning the use of blood was apparently twofold. In the first place, it was intended to educate the people to a reverence for life, and purify them from that tendency to bloodthirstiness which has so often distinguished heathen nations, and especially those with whom Israel was to be brought in closest contact. But, secondly, and chiefly, it was intended everywhere and always to keep before the mind the sacredness of the blood as being the appointed means for the expiation of sin, given by God upon the altar to make atonement for the soul of the sinner, by reason of the life or soul with which it stood in such immediate relation. Not only were they, therefore, to abstain from the blood of such animals as could be offered on the altar, but even from that of those which could not be offered. Thus the blood was to remind them, every time they ate flesh, of the very solemn truth that without shedding of blood there was no remission of sin. The Israelite must never forget this, even in the heat and excitement of the chase; he must pause and carefully drain the blood from the creature he had slain, and reverently cover it with dust: a symbolic act which should ever put him in mind of the Divine ordinance--that the blood, the life, of a guiltless victim must be given in order to the forgiveness of sin. A lesson lies here for us regarding the sacredness of all that is associated with sacred things. All that is connected with God, and with His worship, especially all that is connected with His revelation of Himself for our salvation, is to be treated with the most profound reverence. (S. H. Kellogg, D. D.)
.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1 WITH this chapter begins another subdivision of the law.…
HOLINESS IN EATING
Lev_17:1-16
Read full note →
WITH this chapter begins another subdivision of the law. Hitherto we have had before us only sacrificial worship and matters of merely ceremonial law. The law of holy living contained in the following chapters (17-22), on the other hand, has to do for the most part with matters rather ethical than ceremonial, and consists chiefly of precepts designed to regulate morally the ordinary engagements and relationships of everyday life. The fundamental thought of the four chapters is that which is expressed, e.g., in Lev_18:3 : Israel, redeemed by Jehovah, is called to be a holy people; and this holiness is to be manifested in a total separation from the ways of the heathen. This principle is enforced by various specific commands and prohibitions, which naturally have particular regard to the special conditions under which Israel was placed, as a holy nation consecrated to Jehovah, the one, true God, but living in the midst of nations of idolaters.
The whole of chapter 17, with the exception of Lev_16:8-9, has to do with the application of this law of holy living to the use even of lawful food. At first thought, the injunctions of the chapter might seem to belong rather to ceremonial than to moral law; but closer observation will show that all the injunctions here given have direct reference to the avoidance of idolatry, especially as connected with the preparation and use of food.
It was not enough that the true Israelite should abstain from food prohibited by God, as in chapter 12; he must also use that which was permitted in a way well pleasing to God, carefully shunning even the appearance of any complicity with surrounding idolatry, or fellowship with the heathen in their unholy fashions and customs. Even so for the Christian: it is not enough that he abstain from what is expressly forbidden; even in his use of lawful food, he must so use it that it shall be to him a means of grace, in helping him to maintain an uninterrupted walk with God.
In Lev_17:1-7 is given the law to regulate the use of such clean animals for food as could be offered to God in sacrifice; in Lev_17:10-16, of such as, although permitted for food, were not allowed for sacrifice.
The directions regarding the first class may be summed up in this: all such animals were to be treated as peace offerings. No private person in Israel was to slaughter any such animal anywhere in the camp or out of it, except at the door of the tent of meeting. Thither they were to be brought "unto the priest," and offered for peace offerings (Lev_17:5); the blood must be sprinkled on the altar of burnt offering; the fat parts burnt "for a sweet savour unto the Lord" (Lev_17:6); and then only the priest having first taken his appointed portions, the remainder might now be eaten by the Israelite, as given back to him by God, in peaceful fellowship with Him.
The law could not have been burdensome, as some might hastily imagine. Even when obtainable, meat was probably not used as food by them so freely as with us; and in the wilderness the lack of flesh, it will be remembered, was so great as to have occasioned at one time a rebellion among the people, who fretfully complained: {Num_11:4} "Who shall give us flesh to eat?"
Even the uncritical reader must be able to see how manifest is the Mosaic date of this part of Leviticus. The terms of this law suppose a camp life; indeed, the camp is explicitly named (Lev_17:3). That which was enjoined was quite practicable under the conditions of life in the wilderness, when, at the best, flesh was scarce, and the people dwelt compactly together; but would have been utterly inapplicable and impracticable at a later date, after they were settled throughout the land of Canaan, when to have slaughtered all beasts used for food at the central sanctuary would have been impossible. Hence we find that, as we should expect, the modified law of Deuteronomy, {Deu_12:15-16; Deu_12:20-24} assuming the previous existence of this earlier law, explicitly repeals it. To suppose that forgers of a later day, as, for instance, of the time of Josiah, or after the Babylonian exile, should have needlessly invented a law of this kind, is a hypothesis which is rightly characterised by Dillmann as "simply absurd."
This regulation for the wilderness days is said (Lev_17:5, Lev_17:7) to have been made "to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field unto the Lord, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace offerings unto the Lord And they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices unto the he-goats, after whom they go a whoring,"
There can be no doubt that in the last sentence, "he-goats," as in the Revised Version, instead of "devils," as in the Authorised, is the right rendering. The worship referred to was still in existence in the days of the monarchy; for it is included in the charges against "Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin," {2Ch_11:15} that "he appointed him priests; for the he-goats, and for the calves which he had made." Nor can here we agree with Dillmann that in this worship of he-goats here referred to, there is "no occasion to think of the goat worship of Egypt." For inasmuch as we know that the worship of the sacred bull and that of the he-goat prevailed in Egypt in those days, and inasmuch as in Eze_20:6-7; Eze_20:15-18, repeated reference is made to Israels having worshipped "the idols of Egypt," one can hardly avoid combining these two facts, and thus connecting the goat worship to which allusion is here made, with that which prevailed at Mendes, in Lower Egypt. This cult at that place was accompanied with nameless revolting rites, such as give special significance to the description of this worship (Lev_17:7) as "a whoring" after the goats; and abundantly explain and justify the severity of the penalty attached to the violation of this law (Lev_17:4) in cutting off the offender from this people; all the more when we observe the fearful persistency of this horrible goat worship in Israel, breaking out anew, as just remarked, some five hundred years later, in the reign of Jeroboam.
The words imply that the ordinary slaughter of animals for food was often connected with some idolatrous ceremony related to this goat worship. What precisely it may have been, we know not; but of such customs, connecting the preparation of the daily food with idolatry, we have abundant illustration in the usages of the ancient Persians, the Hindoos, and the heathen Arabs of the days before Mohammed. The law was thus intended to cut out this everyday idolatry by the root. With these "field devils," as Luther renders the word, the holy people of the Lord were to have nothing to do.
Very naturally, the requirement to present all slaughtered animals as peace offerings to Jehovah gives occasion to turn aside for a little from the matter of food, which is the chief subject of the chapter, in order to extend this principle beyond animals slaughtered for food, and insist particularly that all burnt offerings and sacrifices of every kind should be sacrificed at the door of the tent of meeting, and nowhere else. This law, we are told (Lev_17:8), was to be applied, not only to the Israelites themselves, but also to "strangers" among them; such as, e.g., were the Gibeonites. No idolatry, nor anything likely to be associated with it, was to be tolerated from anyone in the holy camp.
The principle which underlies this stringent law, as also the reason which is given for it, is of constant application in modern life. There was nothing wrong in itself in slaying an animal in one place more than another. It was abstractly possible-as, likely enough, many an Israelite may have said to himself-that a man could just as really "eat unto the Lord" if he slaughtered and ate his animal in the field, as anywhere else. Nevertheless this was forbidden under the heaviest penalties. It teaches us that he who will be holy must not only abstain from that which is in itself always wrong, but must carefully keep himself from doing even lawful or necessary things in such a way, or under such associations and circumstances, as may outwardly compromise his Christian standing, or which may be proved by experience to have an almost unavoidable tendency toward sin. The laxity in such matters which prevails in the so-called "Christian world" argues little for the tone of spiritual life in our day in those who indulge in it, or allow it, or apologise for it. It may be true enough, in a sense, that as many say, there is no harm in this or that. Perhaps not; but what if experience have shown that, though in itself not sinful, a certain association or amusement almost always tends to worldliness, which is a form of idolatry? Or-to use the apostles illustration-what if one be seen, though with no intention of wrong, "sitting at meat in an idols temple," and he whose conscience is weak be thereby emboldened to do what to him is sin? There is only one safe principle, now as in the days of Moses: everything must be brought "before the Lord"; used as from Him and for Him, and therefore used under such limitations and restrictions as His wise and holy law imposes. Only so shall we be safe; only so abide in living fellowship with God.
Very beautiful and instructive, again, was the direction that the Israelite, in the cases specified, should make his daily food a peace offering. This involved a dedication of the daily food to the Lord; and in his receiving it back again then from the hand of God, the truth was visibly represented that our daily food is from God; while also, in the sacrificial acts which preceded the eating, the Israelite was continually reminded that it was upon the ground of an accepted atonement that even these everyday mercies were received. Such also should be, in spirit, the often neglected prayer before each of our daily meals. It should be ever offered with the remembrance of the precious blood which has purchased for us even the most common mercies; and should thus sincerely recognise what, in the confusing complexity of the second causes through which we receive our daily food, we so easily forget: that the Lords prayer is not a mere form of words when we say, "Give us this day our daily bread"; but that working behind, and in, and with, all these second causes, is the kindly Providence of God, who, opening His hand, supplies the want of every living thing.
And so, eating in grateful, loving fellowship with our Heavenly Father that which His bounty gives us, to His glory, every meal shall become, as it were, a sacramental remembrance of the Lord. We may have wondered at what we have read of the world wide custom of the Mohammedan, who, whenever the knife of slaughter is lifted against a beast for food, utters his "Bism allah," "In the name of the most merciful God"; and not otherwise will regard his food as being made halal, or "lawful"; and, no doubt, in all this, as in many a Christians prayer, there may often be little heart. But the thought in this ceremony is even this of Leviticus, and we do well to make it our own, eating even our daily food "in the name of the most merciful God," and with uplifting of the heart in thankful worship toward Him.
But there were many beasts which, although they might not be offered to the Lord in sacrifice, were yet "clean," and permitted to the Israelites as food. Such, in particular, were clean animals that are taken in the hunt or chase. In Lev_17:10-16 the law is given for the use of these. It is prefaced by a very full and explicit prohibition of the eating of blood; for while, as regards the animals to be offered to the Lord, provision was made with respect to the blood, that it was to be sprinkled around the altar, there was the danger that in other cases, where this was not permissible, the blood might be used for food. Hence the prohibition against eating "any manner of blood," on a twofold ground: first (Lev_17:11, Lev_17:14), that the life of the flesh is the blood; and second (Lev_17:11), that, for this reason, God had chosen the blood to be the symbol of life substituted for the life of the guilty in atoning sacrifice: "I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls." Hence, in order that this relation of the blood to the forgiveness of sins might be constantly kept before the mind, it was ordained that never should the Israelite eat of flesh except the blood should first have been carefully drained out. And it was to be treated with reverence, as having thus a certain sanctity; when the beast was taken in hunting, the Israelite must (Lev_17:13) "pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust";-an act by which the blood, the life, was symbolically returned to Him who in the beginning said, {Gen_1:24} "Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind." And because, in the case of "that which dieth of itself," or is "torn of beasts," the blood would not be thus carefully drained off, all such animals (Lev_17:15) are prohibited as food.
It is profoundly instructive to observe that here, again, we come upon declarations and a command, the deep truth and fitness of which is only becoming clear now after three thousand years. For, as the result of our modern discoveries with regard to the constitution of the blood, and the exact nature of its functions, we in this day are able to say that it is not far from a scientific statement of the facts, when we read (Lev_17:14), "As to the life of all flesh, the blood thereof is all one with the life thereof." For it is in just this respect that the blood is most distinct from all other parts of the body; that, whereas it conveys and mediates nourishment to all, it is itself nourished by none; but by its myriad cells brought immediately in contact with the digested food, directly and immediately assimilates it to itself. We are compelled to say that as regards the physical life of man-which alone is signified by the original term here-it is certainly true of the blood, as of no other part of the organism, that "the life of all flesh is the blood thereof."
And while it is true that, according to the text, a spiritual and moral reason is given for the prohibition of the use of blood as food, yet it is well worth noting that, as has been already remarked in another connection, the prohibition, as we are now beginning to see, had also a hygienic reason. For Dr. de Mussy, in his paper before the French Academy of Medicine already referred to, calls attention to the fact that, not only did the Mosaic laws exclude from the Hebrew dietary animals "particularly liable to parasites"; but also that "it is in the blood," so rigidly prohibited by Moses as food, "that the germs or spores of infections disease circulate." Surely no one need fear, with some expositors, lest this recognition of a sanitary intent in these laws shall hinder the recognition of their moral and spiritual purport, which in this chapter is so expressly taught. Rather should this cause us the more to wonder and admire the unity which thus appears between the demands and necessities of the physical and the moral and spiritual life; and, in the discovery of the marvellous adaptation of these ancient laws to the needs of both, to find a new confirmation of our faith in God and in His revealed Word. For thus do they appear to be laws so far beyond the wisdom of that time, and so surely beneficent in their working, that in view of this it should be easy to believe that it must indeed have been the Lord God, the Maker and Preserver of all flesh, who spake all these laws unto His servant Moses.
The moral and spiritual purpose of this law concerning the use of blood was apparently twofold. In the first place, it was intended to educate the people to a reverence for life, and purify them from that tendency to bloodthirstiness which has so often distinguished heathen nations, and especially those with whom Israel was to be brought in closest contact. But secondly, and chiefly, it was intended, as in the former part of the chapter, everywhere and always to keep before the mind the sacredness of the blood as being the appointed means for the expiation of sin; given by God upon the altar to make atonement for the soul of the sinner, "by reason of the life" or soul with which it stood in such immediate relation. Not only were they therefore to abstain from the blood of such animals as could be offered on the altar, but even from that of those which could not be offered. Thus the blood was to remind them, every time that they ate flesh, of the very solemn truth that without shedding of blood there was no remission of sin. The Israelite must never forget this; even in the heat and excitement of the chase, he must pause and carefully drain the blood from the creature he had slain, and reverently cover it with dust; -a symbolic act which should ever put him in mind of the Divine ordinance that the blood, the life, of a guiltless victim must be given, in order to the forgiveness of sin.
A lesson lies here for us regarding the sacredness of all that is associated with sacred things. All that is connected with God, and with His worship, especially all that is connected with His revelation of Himself for our salvation, is to be treated with the most profound reverence. Even though the blood of the deer killed in the chase could not be used in sacrifice, yet, because it was blood, was in its essential nature like unto that which was so used, therefore it must be treated with a certain respect, and be always covered with earth. It is the fashion of our age-and one which is increasing in an alarming degree-to speak lightly of things which are closely connected with the revelation and worship of the holy God. Against everything of this kind the spirit of this law warns us. Nothing which is associated in any way with what is sacred is to be spoken of or treated irreverently, lest we thus come to think lightly of the sacred things themselves. This irreverent treatment of holy things is a crying evil in many parts of the English-speaking world, as also in continental Christendom. We need to beware of it. After irreverence, too often, by no obscure law, comes open denial of the Holy One and of His Holy Son, our Lord and Saviour. The blood of Christ, which represented that holy life which was given on the cross for our sins, is holy-an infinitely holy thing! And what is Gods estimate of its sanctity we may perhaps learn-looking through the symbol to that which was symbolised-from this law; which required that all blood, because outwardly resembling the holy blood of sacrifice, and, like it, the seat and vehicle of life, should be treated with most careful reverence. And it is safe to say that just those most need the lesson taught by this command who find it the hardest to appreciate it, and to whom its injunctions still seem regulations puerile and unworthy, according to their fancy, of the dignity and majesty of God.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 The Sanctity of the Blood
The Sanctity of the Blood
SUGGESTIVE READINGS
Read full note →
Lev_17:4.—And bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle. A captious mind will ask. Why is not sacrifice acceptable to God wherever offered? Surely it is in the spirit of the offerer, rather than in the circumstances of the offering, that piety consists. Wherefore, then, this insistance on mere conditions, and importance attached to the place of sacrifice? But God meets such contention of thought with absolute interdict; He is the authority in human life and sacred regulations; and “who art thou that repliest against God?” Even when “your ways are not my ways” (Isa_55:8), the LORD must be obeyed, and His terms of dealing with sinful creatures be observed as absolute Yet more. There was wisdom in those requirements; for the Israelites had been so trained to superstitious and heathenish ideas in Egypt as to need this fencing about in order to restrain them from lapsing, all but unconsciously, into the snares of familiar idolatrous practices. Our God is gracious in all His ways; His commandments are not grievous; but, knowing our tendencies to err, He arrests us at the first symptoms of erring, and shows us the path of safety, the plan of acceptance.
Lev_17:5.—The sacrifices which they offer in the open field. [See Addenda to chap., Sacrifices unto devils.] They had learned this from the Egyptians, who peopled the scenes of nature with deities (Lev_17:7), and Israel continually fell into this old habit, and sacrificed in groves and on high places; it was the snare of their whole after history. We may be redeemed from our spiritual bondage, and become pilgrims to Canaan, yet all the journey through the power of old habits pursues us, and would reassert itself upon us. Therefore the urgency with which God’s Word prohibits any and every concession to “the former lusts in our ignorance.” We must shun lurking perils.
Lev_17:8.—Whatsoever men there be. It was an inflexible regulation, binding upon “the house of Israel,” and also upon “strangers that sojourn among you.” For evil may be introduced by the society we entertain, the guests who visit us. And hospitality was to be restricted by divine laws. How ensnaring often becomes the courtesy which we think due to “strangers”! There is a tendency to relax from steadfast principles of righteousness and lofty habits of piety at such times as guests are staying in our homes. This is to lower God’s standard in accommodation to men. It must not be; strangers in godly homes must conform to the godly laws which are there supreme; the children of God must never yield to unhallowed customs of their guests; hospitality must be no excuse for impiety.
Lev_17:10.—I will set my face against that soul that eateth blood. God claimed the blood as being “the life” of the creature. He has ownership in all His creatures, and we should acknowledge Him therein. But this law has emphasized the value of blood as the symbol also of atonement (Lev_17:11). And He would have every act, even of eating and drinking, testify of the atonement required by sinners. The table could not be spread for “strangers” (Lev_17:12), nor could any one, Israelite or stranger, seek recreation and pleasure in “hunting” even, but the significance and sacredness of “the blood” must be recognised. We have reason, indeed, to regard as most suggestive and precious the blood of atonement. It leads our thoughts to Him whose death has gathered into itself all virtue for redemption. How dreadful the consequences of counting that “blood of the covenant an unholy thing!” (Heb_10:29).
SECTIONAL HOMILIES
Topic: THE SOLEMNITY OF SACRIFICE PUBLICLY RECOGNISED (Lev_17:1-10)
Jehovah’s concern for solemnity and purity in apparently trifling things revealed His intense hatred for sin, His supreme love for holiness. The demand for purity extended to private individual acts no less than to public national observances. The blood of all beasts slain for food or sacrifice was to be presented at the door of the tabernacle, to check the people from wanton destruction of animal life; to remind them that all life is from the Lord; its destruction under His cognizance. This injunction would—
I. PREVENT IDOLATRY. The idolatrous practices of the Egyptians, among whom Israel had lived, would have implanted a tendency in the people to relapse into heathenish superstitions during their encampment in the wilderness. The Egyptians sacrificed to the goats, or field devils—supposed to inhabit the wilderness—to avert their wrath, and secure their favour. To ensure that no idolatrous sacrifice should be offered in the camp the blood of every slain animal was to be presented before the Lord, as an acknowledgement that Jehovah was the sovereign King in Israel. God is the proprietor of all life, to Him all ought to be solemnly dedicated.
II. STIMULATE OBEDIENCE. Probably the Hebrews could not see the reason for so rigid a command, it was for them to render unquestioning obedience believing in the wisdom of their great Lawgiver, in the righteousness of His precepts. When enactments seemed meaningless, and ceremonies superfluous, the human was always and in every case to be subordinated to the divine will. Thus the discipline of the Jewish economy educated loyal and implicit surrender of all the faculties of heart and mind. Under the gospel dispensation we are saved by faith, which is the gift of God; yet, “faith without works is dead.” Faith and love must prove their existence and genuineness by obedience to the commands of Christ.
III. PERPETUATE ALLEGIANCE. These arrangements were to continue in force through succeeding generations. In coming constantly to the door of the tabernacle, and making its services the constant theme of attention, the Israelites would be carrying out the first great injunction of the decalogue, “Thou shalt have none other gods but me.” Identifying the tabernacle with the domestic acts of life, with acts performed to provide material food, would tend to keep in vivid remembrance the fact that everything was to be done to the glory of God. It is still so; every meal should become a sacrament, all we do should be done devoutly and heartily as unto the Lord.
IV. AWAKEN GRATITUDE. Coming so frequently to the door of the tabernacle with the blood of animals slain for food or sacrifice would remind the Hebrews how constantly they were indebted to Jehovah for all the temporal and spiritual blessings they enjoyed. They would thus trace their mercies to the Source from which all good and perfect gifts flow to man.
V. PROMOTE HOLINESS. Such constant reference to the tabernacle would keep the Lord perpetually before the people, and act as a solemn restraint upon their conduct. In common as well as sacred meals, in the tent as well as in the tabernacle, “Holiness to the Lord” was to be inscribed above all. As the Israelites presented the blood at the door of the tabernacle they would be reminded of the sacredness of life; have suggested to their minds the necessity of complete self-surrender to Jehovah The New Testament has no diviner injunction than this, “Be ye holy, for I am holy.”
VI. BEGET REVERENCE. As the people drew nigh to the door of the tabernacle they would be reminded of the august authority of God in demanding such obedience and annexing such penalties to disobedience The justice and jealousy of God would fill every devout worshipper with profound religious awe. In all Christian worship godly fear should have its place, “for our God is a consuming fire.”
VII. INDICATE RECONCILIATION. The fact that the people were permitted thus frequently to approach the tabernacle proved that Jehovah was propitious, and delighted in mercy. He had come to dwell with men because He delighted in their company and fellowship. If those who drew near to God only fulfilled the conditions He saw fit to lay down, there was no need for slavish fear or apprehensions of disapproval. That God expects us to live in His favour and fear denotes the fact that He is reconciled to us, and that the only thing that hinders our bliss here and hereafter is unwillingness to be reconciled to Him.—F. W. B.
Topic: THE PLACE OF SACRIFICE (Lev_17:8-9)
1. God has a right to say where and how He will be worshipped, and He has exercised the right. He has told us the way in which He will be approached.
2. The way to life may be narrow, but there is no one, with the Word of Truth in his hand, who may not discover it and follow it.
3. Of old God gave minute and ample instruction to His people; they were to approach Him by sacrifice, and that sacrifice was to be offered on the altar of burnt offering: “there shalt thou offer” (Deu_12:13-14). It mattered not in what the offering consisted, expiatory or eucharistic, the requirements as to the place of presentation was the same—the place which the Lord had chosen and made His habitation.
“Even those animals which were slain for food in the wilderness were brought to the door of the tabernacle, and there killed, and their blood sprinkled on the altar. If an Israelite did not bring the animal which he intended for food to the door of the tabernacle, but killed it elsewhere, God declared that blood should be imputed to him” (Bonar on Leviticus, chap 17).
A. WHAT ADMONITORY PURPOSE WAS THEREBY SERVED.
1. The people were indellibly impressed with their need of atonement. Every time an intelligent Israelite took away life he must have felt his own life was forfeited to God, and that by the blood of sacrifice only could it be redeemed. The very preparation of his food impressed him with the truth that life is the gift of God. But if this is Old Testament truth, it is New Testament truth also (see Joh_6:51; Joh_3:36).
ii. Idolatry was the root sin of the ancient nations; and the head of every family, as priest in his own house, might sacrifice to whatever god he pleased. To correct this in Israel was one of the admonitory purposes of this enactment that all sacrifices should be offered at the house of God.
B. WHAT SACRED AND EVANGELICAL DOCTRINE UNDERLAYS THIS REGULATION.
i. The tabernacle was a type of the Lord Jesus; and just as the Israelite could only worship God by sacrifice at His own dwelling, so we can only present our offerings to Him through Christ. “By Him, therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise continually,” etc. (Heb_13:15; Col_3:17).
ii. The altar of brass was the place of sacrifice (Lev_17:6), on which burned the inextinguishable fire, symbol of divine holiness and endless propitiation. It stood between the door of the tabernacle and the Skekinah within the veil. An interposing sacrificial altar, the Cross of Jesus stands between the human offerer and the Holy God. Had not Christ, our Atonement, put Himself between us and what we deserved wrath had fallen upon us.
C. WHAT PRACTICAL OBLIGATION THIS RESTRICTED SCENE OF SACRIFICE ENJOINS ON US NOW.
i. The altar was the one way of approach; even so, Christ is the one way to the Father (Joh_14:6).
ii. Excellencies in the offerer or the offering could not neutralize the necessity for coming in this only way to God. The Jew’s sacrifice might be, in itself, all that was required, but offered elsewhere than at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation it was refused. Though we be generous in disposition, upright in walk, reverent in manner, not for these, but for Christ’s sake, can we be accepted.
iii. But contact with that altar imparted sanctity. Whatsoever toucheth the altar shall be holy (Exo_29:37). The first touch of Christ by faith delivers from guilt.
iv. At the cross God is to be found and enjoyed. Only at the cross will He be merciful to our unrighteousness, and only in Christ meet us in grace. [Comp., The Gospel in Leviticus.—J. FLEMING, D.D.].
Topic: BLOOD PROHIBITED AS FOOD (Lev_17:10-12)
This divine enactment forbidding blood as food was much older than the tabernacle ordinances: was given to Noah directly after the flood (Gen_9:4). Reiterated now to the Israelites (Lev_3:17; Lev_7:26); and the reason for the statute is now assigned: “the blood is the life of the flesh, and is given to man to make an atonement for his soul.” [See Addenda to chap., Life in the Blood.]
I. BLOOD SACREDNESS: solemnly appointed by God for a most gracious purpose. Instances from the Old Testament:
Abel’s offering of “the firstlings of his flock” (Gen_4:3-5), securing emphatic approbation over Cain’s fruits of the ground.
Noah’s altar sacrifices after the flood (Gen_8:20-21).
Job’s patriarchial offerings of sacrifices for propitiation and thanksgiving (Job_1:5).
Moses’ entire system was atoning and sacrificial by means of blood. “No remission of sins without the shedding of blood.”
The blood was to be used for no other purpose.
The New Testament testimony.
Prophecy had foretold that Messiah would “redeem Israel” (Psa_130:8), and “make an end of sins” (Dan_9:24); and it should be done by blood: “wounded for our transgressions” (Isa_53:5; Isa_53:10).
At the Eucharistic Supper Jesus took the cup and said, “This is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mat_26:28).
The apostles testify to the same truth: “We have redemption through his blood” (Col_1:14; Col_1:20).
The cry of the Church on earth and in heaven tells the sacred truth, “Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood” (Rev_1:5; Rev_5:9).
God has “given to us the blood for the atonement of the soul.”
II. BLOOD APPROPRIATION: emphatically restricted by God for this one sacred purpose.
It is refused for food, and its mal-appropriation protected by penalties of a very appalling nature.
1. It would lower the dignity and defile the sanctity of blood if allowed for common uses. All serious regard for the “atonement” virtue which lay in the blood would have left their minds had it not been thus exclusively reserved. There is no less danger of irreverent minds “counting the blood of the covenant an unholy thing and doing despite to the Spirit of grace” (Heb_10:29). In this prohibition of a familiar use of solemn things God sought to fence His people from a sin easily besetting them. God would have us touch sanctities with awe.
2. It would perpetuate in their thoughts their need of “atonement” to have blood thus interdicted for all other purposes. “Atonement” would confront them as their daily necessity, even at their meals. And it should be “ever before us” that we are sinners needing the atonement of Christ; it is gracious for God to make us daily see and realise our case and the urgency of our need of that “precious blood of Christ.”
3. It would lead on their hopes to the effectual and final sacrifice which Messiah would present. The very weariness of this continual presentation of blood in sacrifice would deepen the longing for Messiah’s sacrifice; which should end all provisional offerings. A tired traveller hails sight of each sign-post as it tells him home is near.
All the ancient types pointed men onwards: God would concentrate human desire on the promised Saviour.
Now He makes all teaching and experience of man point human hope and faith backwards, on the finished work of redemption, on the One Sacrifice of Jesus—“Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation for sin through faith in his blood” (Rom_3:25).
A WARNING: Christ must be used as an Atonement. His “blood” must be recognised as of infinite urgency and value for sinful men. Whoso dares take Christ as his food, refusing His sacrificial work, seeking to appropriate and enjoy Jesus as a Teacher, Example, Friend, but repudiating him as a Sin Offering, a Redeemer of the ruined soul, he falls under the menaces of these words of God, Christ’s blood must be realised as a supreme necessity for man, as an “atonement for his soul.”
Topic: HOLY BLOOD (Lev_17:10-11)
With stern command God sets a fence around all blood. All reverence enshrines it. An awful sanctity exempts it from the food of man.
What if offence occur, if rash hands bring it to the board for food? Then penalty frowns terribly, wrath darkens, excluding judgments follow.
But why is blood thus sanctified?
I. IS NOT BLOOD THE ALTAR’S FOOD?
Yes: there is its constant flow: it is the stream from expiring victims. It reminds of death as the desert of sin, and bears witness that remission of sin is prepared. Then it is linked with expiating grace. Thus:
II. IT POINTS TO CALVARY’S CROSS
It shadows forth the wrath-sustaining death of God’s co-equal Son. It introduces Jesus bleeding that souls may live. It is the symbol of redemption’s price; emblem of the one atoning Lamb.
Hence till Jesus came the same forbidding voice was heard: Touch not the blood! It is devoted to God. It is most holy unto Him. It pictures out redeeming suffering. It is “atonement for the soul.”
We live in gospel light; the wondrous death is no more veiled in mystic types. We gaze with open vision on the blood-stained cross; may approach the fountain opened in the Saviour’s side; may there wash our every sin away.
Shall we, thus privileged, fall short in reverence? Think of the grand antitype, Christ’s blood; ponder its worth, its use, its mighty power, its unspeakable results.
i. Its glorious worth. Enter the Garden. The Sufferer seems a lowly man. Man verily He is, or He could possess no human blood. But in that lowly body Deity dwells. He is the Mighty God. It is the “blood of God” (Act_20:28).
ii. Its gracious use. The sinner is justly sentenced to woe. Nothing but boundless substitution can release. Jesus is God, and He brings blood divinely efficacious. He is an able Saviour, for blood flows in the channel of omnipotence.
iii. Its effectual power. It is the ransom price of all the saved Their number baffles number. Each was defiled with darkest stains of guilt. But now behold them. Robes white; not one stain spoils; penalties all paid. The blood has saved.
iv. Its precious results.
1. It is the peace of all believing souls. The day of awakened conscience was one of bitter woe. The thundering law denounced, the wrath of God menaced. But the Spirit led the trembler to the cross. Faith heard the assurance, “Though your sins,” etc. (Isa_1:18); faith gazed, and found full repose.
2. It is the source of sanctifying grace. He must flee sin whose eye is fixed on the blood. Can he love that which gave those wounds to Christ? The sight of calvary slays the love of sin.
(a) Make it your study. For every thought here is food. Angels gaze and they adore. But they glean no advantage from it. To you it is salvation’s price; the gate of heaven.
(b) Love it. It is proof of God’s love, that Jesus loves you better than Himself. That mind is rock which is not melted by such flame.
(c) Praise it. All lips commend the charms of beauty and heroic deeds. But what so beauteous as grace leading Jesus to the cross? Where is noble act like His surrender of Himself for you?
(d) Use it. Every hour, when temptation’s darts are flying round; it will “quench the fiery darts.” When you seek light from scripture’s pages; those lines are brightest in which blood is seen. Use it in prayer; it is the plea of pleas. In sanctuary rites: the service is cast out which is not hallowed with blood. Use it in all holy work for God: it consecrates the motive, way, end; and harvests grow from seeds sown in blood. And when death draws near use it: it ensures heaven, where it may be the eternal theme.—DEAN LAW.
Topic: A DIVINE PROHIBITION (Lev_17:10-16)
Of all the sacrifices offered in the Tabernacle, the expiatory were the most important; that offered on the Day of Atonement the climax of all. The virtue and worth of the offering were symbolised in the blood of the victims; to it, therefore, peculiar solemnity and sanctity were attached. Noah and his descendants were forbidden to partake of flesh with the blood: thus, the way was prepared for the strict prohibition of this chapter. In putting a guard around the seat of animal life Jehovah taught the Hebrews—
I. THAT BLOOD WAS TO BE REGARDED AS A SACRED THING. Not because it was unwholesome, or unclean, or repulsive, was blood not to be partaken of, but because by it atonement was made for the sins of the soul. From the earliest history of our race God had taught that life must be given for life; and that without shedding of blood there could be no remission of sins. Thus blood became—
(a) The means of expiation.
(b) The symbol of reconciliation.
(c) The type of the one great vicarious sacrifice; by virtue of which all the Mosaic offerings were efficacious and accepted.
There was nothing so precious on earth, in the estimation of God, as life; upon it, therefore, He set His most solemn seal; to it He attached rigid regulations; and around it He erected His righteous restraint.
II. THAT, BEING A SACRED THING, BLOOD WAS NOT TO BE SHED HEEDLESSLY; or to be, under any circumstances, partaken of.
Acting under such prohibitions, Israel would be distinguished from the heathen nations, who recklessly shed blood, and who not only offered it to their gods but partook of it themselves. Jehovah, as the sovereign Lord of all life, reserved the symbol of it to Himself; it was to be in no way degraded, not left anywhere carelessly exposed, but treated with profound deference. A check was thus put upon indiscriminate slaughter, and in every creature slain for food, or sacrifice, the operator, by the divine restriction he was under, would be reminded of the absolute sovereignty of the Lord.
III. THAT DISREGARD TO THESE PROHIBITIONS WOULD INCUR THE RIGHTEOUS DISPLEASURE OF THE PROPRIETOR OF ALL LIFE.
Disobedience would not only displease God but incur excommunication from His presence. The enactments may seem severe, but they were needed under the circumstances of the wilderness, and taught lessons of circumspection and moral purity, calculated to lift the people from depraved and degrading practices. The guilt of taking life could only be atoned for by the sacrifice of life. Thus, in the fulness of time, Christ, by shedding His precious blood, by offering His divine infinite life a ransom for the souls of men, satisfied the claims of divine justice, opened the way to heaven for every man. Figuratively, and by faith, we are to eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of God, but care must be taken that the acts are not performed unworthily, nor must the blood of the covenant be trampled under foot and counted an unholy thing. Those who persist in abusing or despising the precious blood of Christ will wonder and perish in the day when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed.—F. W. B.
ILLUSTRATIVE ADDENDA TO CHAPTER 17
SACRIFICES UNTO DEVILS (Lev_17:7)
The word Seirim, here translated “devils,” literally means hairy or shaggy goats, and then goat-like deities, or demons.
The Egyptians, and other nations of antiquity, worshipped goats as gods. Not only was there a celebrated temple in Thmuis, the capital of the Mendesian Nomos in Lower Egypt, dedicated to the goat image Pan, whom they called Mendes, and worshipped as an oracle and as the fertilising principle in nature, but they erected statues to him everywhere. Hence the Pan Silenus, satyrs, fawns, and woodland gods found among the Greeks and Romans; and hence, too, the goat-like forms of the devil, with a tail, horns, and cloven feet, which obtain in Medieval Christianity, and which may still be seen in some European cities.
The terror in which the devil, appearing in this Pan-like form, created in those who were thought to have seen him, has given rise to our expression panic.—Ellicott’s Commentary.
LIFE IN THE BLOOD
This statement (Lev_17:14) that “the life of the flesh is in the blood” had stood in the Mosaic Scriptures for 3,600 years before philosophers, scientists and anatomists had found their way to this physical truism.
That the blood holds the vitality of the entire bodily structure is given here as a fact of revelation; and it lay in the Bible for nearly 4,000 years before anatomists discovered the fact by their research. Now it is acknowledged as a principle confirmed by elaborate and accurate experiments.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 (Chs. 17-26) The Law of Holiness
(Chs. 17-26) The Law of Holiness
This section of Leviticus occupies a position by itself, being distinguished from the rest of the book both by style and contents. A few only of its main characteristics may be noticed here. (1) Among a large number of phrases almost, if not entirely, peculiar to this part of the Pentateuch is the constantly recurring expression 'I am Jehovah,' or 'I am Jehovah your God,' or 'I your God am holy.' This 'divine I,' as it has been called, occurs forty-seven times is these chapters, and only six times elsewhere from Genesis to Joshua, but is found again seventy-eight times in Ezekiel. See Intro. § 2. (2) A second distinguishing feature of this section is its more rhetorical style and the comparatively large number of hortatory passages, somewhat in the manner of Deuteronomy: see e.g. Leviticus 26. (3) A third characteristic is the high spiritual tone of these chapters. Compared with the rest of the book we find here less ritual and more religion, morality, and humanity. The duly of holiness is repeatedly emphasised and grounded on the holiness of God Himself. The oft-recurring key note of the whole is 'Ye shall be holy, for the Lord your God am holy.' It is for this reason that the title 'Law of Holiness' has been applied to this part of Leviticus. Some other fragments bearing a similar character outside these chapters have been assigned to the same collection, e.g. Exo_31:13.; Leviticus 11 (especially Lev_11:43-45) Num_15:37-41.
Read full note →
It has long been observed that there is a considerable resemblance both in leading ideas and phraseology between this 'Law of Holiness' and the book of Ezekiel. That Ezekiel knew and used this Law Book seems beyond dispute, but that he is also its author is not made out.
Rule of Sacrifice. Prohibition against eating Blood
1-9. The first part of this Law prescribes that all oxen, sheep, and goats, slaughtered for food, must first be presented to Jehovah at the sanctuary. This seems to presuppose a time when the Israelites used but little flesh food, and were not widely scattered, which must have been either during the wanderings in the desert, or immediately after the return from exile, when there was only a small community in the vicinity of Jerusalem. This raises the question of the date of the composition of the Law of Holiness, and scholars are still divided upon it. The law is repealed in Deu_12:15, where it is implied that different conditions of life prevail.
7. The object of this enactment was to counteract the tendency to offer sacrifice to those demons of the wilderness which were worshipped in the form of he-goats, for so the RV renders the word here translated devils: see note on Azazel in Lev_16:8. Gone a whoring] see on Exo_34:10.
10-16. Prohibition against eating blood or fallen carcases. The law against eating blood agrees with natural instincts and is here connected with a religious idea: see on Lev_3:3.
15. The law against eating what dies of itself is a corollary of the former. The flesh of such an animal cannot be thoroughly drained of blood: cp. Exo_22:31; Deu_14:21. Bear his iniquity] bear the penalty of his transgression.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 2. The Testimony Concerning the Blood
2. The Testimony Concerning the Blood
CHAPTER 17
Read full note →
1. Concerning slain animals (Lev 17:1-9)
2. Concerning the eating of blood (Lev 17:10-16)
This chapter needs little comment. Everything in this chapter speaks of the sanctity of the blood, what great value God, to whom life belongs, places upon the blood and with what jealous care He watches over it. The center of all is verse 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.” Every slain animal had to bear witness to this fact. Even the hunter had to pour out the blood and cover it with dust. No blood was to be eaten. But in the New Testament we are commanded to eat spiritually of the flesh of the Son of God and to drink spiritually His blood.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 Animals to be Slain by Priests
Animals to be Slain by Priests
v. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
Read full note →
v. 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,
v. 3. What man soever there be of the house of Israel that killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat, the most common sacrificial animals, in the camp, or that killeth it out of the camp, even if the underlying thought be merely that of slaughtering the animal for food,
v. 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, in some form of peace-offering, blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood, he would be considered guilty of slaughtering an animal without authorization; and that man shall be cut off from among his people, expelled from the congregation of the Lord;
v. 5. to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, all the clean animals slaughtered for food, 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. As a voluntary sacrifice the flesh of these animals could then be eaten on the same day or on the nest, Lev 7:16-17.
v. 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 savor unto the Lord. By this provision both the eating of blood and of the loose fat of the abdominal cavity, which was expressly forbidden, Lev 7:23-26, was made practically impossible.
v. 7. And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom they have gone a-whoring. The idols referred to are demons commonly pictured as he-goats, of which the Egyptians especially believed that they lived in the wilderness. By slaughtering animals in their honor superstitious people thought they could prevent evil influences. It seems that the Egyptian custom had found lodgment among the children of Israel, at least to some extent, and the Lord wanted this form of idolatry eradicated. This shall be a statute forever unto them throughout their generations.
v. 8. And thou shalt say unto them, Whatsover man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers which sojourn among you, that offereth a burnt offering or sacrifice, in the foolish or insolent presumption that he had the right to worship the Lord anywhere,
v. 9. and bringeth it not unto the door of the Tabernacle of the Congregation to offer it unto the Lord, in line with the ordinances which he had set forth, even that man shall be cut off from among his people. This command was to quench all tendencies of the people to choose their own places of worship, as was later done so widely. Israel had its law of sacrifices, and the Lord wanted this law to be observed in all its details. It is true for all times that not only gross idolatry, but also all self-chosen Worship is an abomination unto the Lord and cuts off the willful transgressor from fellowship with the Lord.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 5 before his tabernacle
before his tabernacle
"before Yahweh's tabernacle"
Read full note →
that man must be cut off from among his people
A person being excluded from his community is spoken of as if he had been cut off from his people, as one would cut a piece of cloth or cut a branch from a tree. This can be translated in active form. See how you translated this in Leviticus 7:20. AT: "that person may no longer live among his people" or "you must separate that person from his people" (See: Metaphor and Active or Passive)
translationWords
Yahweh
Moses
Aaron
son
people group
Israel
command
cow
lamb
goat
sacrifice
tent of meeting
tabernacle
guilt
bloodshed
cut off
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 4 17:1–26:46 This section deals with how the community of…
17:1–26:46 This section deals with how the community of Israel was to observe holiness. Holiness does not describe one attribute of God among many. Rather, it is the sum of all attributes of his person, nature, and character (see study note on Exod 3:5). His “glory” is the manifestation of his perfect person, nature, and character (see Lev 9:6). God’s covenant with Israel meant that the people and the nation participated in God’s holiness. This holiness depended on Israel’s relationship with God. This relationship brought certain ethical and ritual expectations for Israel to uphold.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.