II. The private worship of the Israelites chs. 17--27

 

The second major division of Leviticus deals with how the Israelites were to express their worship of Yahweh in their private lives.

"The first sixteen chapters of Leviticus are concerned primarily with establishment and maintainance [sic] of the relationship between Israel and God. . .

"In chapter 17, the emphasis shifts to the affairs of the everyday life of the Israelites as God's holy people."¹⁸²

In critical circles, scholars are fond of referring to chapters 17-26 as the Holiness Code.¹⁸³

"Leviticus 17-26 has been called the Holiness Code because of the frequency of the occurrence of the phrase, attributed to Yahweh: You shall be holy because I am holy,' which corresponds to the theological theme of the other priestly laws but here receives a special emphasis. One other phrase is characteristic of these chapters: I am Yahweh' (sometimes I am Yahweh your God')."¹⁸⁴

"The section is not as distinctive as some scholars imagine; but it is characterized by moral and ethical instruction (with one chapter on the annual feasts), and it does base moral obligation in the nature of God. This last point is not unique, however. The Ten Commandments are prefaced by the statement I am the Lord your God' (Exod 20:2), and a typical Holiness Code' phrase has already been pointed out in Leviticus 11:44."¹⁸⁵

"The unique feature of the Holiness Code is the fact that in its introduction and throughout its laws, the audience it addresses is not the priests as such but the whole of the congregation. It calls the entire people of God to holiness. As has long been observed, the Holiness Code is not attached directly to the Priestly Code [Exod. 35--Lev. 16]. Between these two legal codes lies a striking account of Israel's offering sacrifices to goat idols' (Lev 17:1-9). Though brief and somewhat enigmatic, this short fragment of narrative, usually taken to be the work of the final composer, portrays the Israelites forsaking the tabernacle and sacrificing outside the camp.' The content of the narrative is similar to the incident of the golden calf: the people forsook the Lord and his provisions for worship and followed after other gods--in this case, the goat idols.' Unlike the narrative of the golden calf, however, which places the blame on the priesthood, this narrative of the goat idols makes the people, not the priests, responsible for the idolatry. Thus within the logic of the text, the incident of the people's sacrificing to the goat idols plays a similar role to that of the priests' involvement in the golden calf. Just as the narrative of the golden calf marked a transition in the nature of the covenant and its laws, so here also the incident of the goat idols marks the transition from the Code of the Priests to the additional laws of the Holiness Code."¹⁸⁶

Note how the three major law collections in the Pentateuch fit into the Sinai narrative.¹⁸⁷

"The placement of the Holiness Code (Lev 17-26) at this point in the narrative, then, plays an important role in the author's strategy. It aptly shows that God gave further laws designed specifically for the ordinary people. These laws are represented in the Holiness Code. Thus, as is characteristic of the Holiness Code, its laws pertain to specific situations in the everyday life of the people."¹⁸⁸

 A. Holiness of conduct on the Israelites' part chs. 17-20

All the commandments contained in chapters 17-20 relate to the holiness of the life of every Israelite. Yahweh had brought the Israelites into covenant fellowship with Himself through atonement. Consequently they were to live as holy people different from all other peoples, especially the Canaanites.

 B. Holiness of the priests, gifts, and sacrifices chs. 21-22

All the people were to maintain holiness before God, but the priests had higher standards because of their privileges in relationship to God. Moses explained these higher regulations in this section of two chapters.

"The thrust of this section [21:1-22:16] is twofold: the office of a priest is holy, and the office is above the man. A priest must be holy in body, upright in conduct, and ceremonially clean; for he is the representative of God."²⁴²

This section also contains the requirements for sacrificial animals because the sacrificial animals were the priests of the animal world. Many of the deformities that kept a priest from offering sacrifice (21:18-20) are the same as those that kept an animal from qualifying as a sacrifice (22:20-24). Sacrificial animals corresponded to the priests, clean animals to the Israelites, and unclean animals to the Gentiles.²⁴³

A formula statement, "For I am the Lord who sanctifies them,"or a similar affirmation, closes each of the six subsections (21:8, 15, 23; 22:9, 16, 32).

 C. Sanctification of the Sabbath and the feasts of Yahweh ch. 23

God considered the Israelites (chs. 17-20), the priests, the holy gifts, and the sacrifices (chs. 21-22) as set apart to Him as holy. He regarded certain days and times of the year in the same way (ch. 23). This chapter contains a list of seven festal days and periods of the year when the Israelites were to celebrate holy meetings. These were normally convocations (v. 2) when the Israelites assembled around the tabernacle area. The recurring phrases "holy convocations"and "rest days"indicate that this calendar was primarily for the benefit of the ordinary Israelites rather than for the priests.

"There must be days set apart from the calendar of secular,' self-serving activity so that the servant people might ponder the meaning of their existence and of the holy task to which they had been called."²⁵⁴

The Israelites observed a solar year, which contains 365 days, and a lunar month. Lunar months have 29 and 30 days alternately. The Egyptians followed these alternations carefully giving them six months of 29 days and six months of 30 days. The Israelites followed the Mesopotamians, however, who observed 12 months of 30 days. All three civilizations made up the difference between 12 lunar months and one solar year by inserting another month every few years.²⁵⁵

The chapter begins with an introduction (vv. 1-2) that bears repetition at the end (v. 44).

 D. The preparation of the holy lamps and showbread 24:1-9

The connection of these instructions with what precedes is this. The Israelites were not only to offer themselves to Yahweh on special days of the year, but they were to worship and serve Him every day of the year. The daily refueling and burning of the lamps and the uninterrupted presentation of the showbread to Yahweh represented the daily sanctification of the people to their God.²⁶⁸

The Israelites donated the oil for the lamps (vv. 1-4).

It symbolized them ". . . as a congregation which caused its light to shine in the darkness of this world . . ."²⁶⁹

In this offering Israel offered its life to God daily for consumption in His service of bringing light to the nations (cf. Zech. 4; Isa. 42:6).

The flour for the twelve loaves of showbread, one for each of the tribes of Israel, was likewise a gift of the people that represented their sanctification to God (vv. 5-9). The flour represented the fruit of the Israelites' labors, their good works. It lay before God's presence continually in the holy place. The addition of incense to the bread (v. 7) represented the spirit of prayer (dependence) that accompanied the Israelites' sacrifice of work. The priests placed fresh loaves on the table of showbread each Sabbath day.²⁷⁰

 E. The punishment of a blasphemer 24:10-23

This is another narrative section of Leviticus (cf. chs. 8-10). Its position in the book must mean that it took place after God had given Moses the instructions about the holy lamps and showbread (24:1-9). This fact underlines that Leviticus is essentially a narrative work. God gave the legal information at specific times and places to meet particular situations in Israel's life.²⁷¹This is how case law developed in Israel.

God evidently preserved the record of this significant incident in Scripture not just because it took place at the time God was revealing these standards of sanctification. It illustrates how God regarded those who despised the very standards He was giving. This event was a warning to the people concerning the seriousness of sanctification just as the death of Nadab and Abihu (ch. 10) was a similar warning to the priests.

The "Name"referred to (vv. 11, 16) was Yahweh, the name by which God manifested His nature to His people. The man's blasphemy consisted of his cursing Yahweh (v. 11), cursing Yahweh in the name of Yahweh,²⁷²or using Yahweh's name in a curse.²⁷³Maybe since his father was an Egyptian (v. 10) he did not have the proper respect for Yahweh and did not sanctify Him in thought and speech as God required.

The Jews interpreted this blasphemy as a flippant use of the name Yahweh. The desire to avoid using the name of Yahweh in vain led them to omit the name Yahweh from their vocabularies completely. They substituted "the Name"in its place in conversation and in composition.²⁷⁴

When the witnesses placed their hands on the head of the offender (v. 14) they symbolized the transference of the blasphemer's curse, which had entered their ears, back onto the blasphemer's head.

"The emphasis of the narrative is that the whole congregation' was responsible for stoning the blasphemer (v. 14). This may be the reason why there is a reminder of the penalty for murder (lex talionis) just at this point in the narrative. The narrative thus sets up a contrast between the whole congregation's acting to take the life of a blasphemer and a single individual's (acting as an individual) taking the life of a human being' (v. 17). Thus the writer has made an important distinction between capital punishment and murder. Capital punishment was an act of the whole community, whereas murder was an individual act."²⁷⁵

The legal principle of limiting retaliation to retribution in kind (an eye for an eye, vv. 19-21, the lex talionis, or law of retaliation, Lat. law of the talon, claw) is another evidence of God's grace. In contemporary ancient Near Eastern culture, people commonly took excessive revenge (e.g., Gen. 4:23). A person who took another person's eye, for example, usually suffered death. In the Mosaic Law, God limited the amount of retaliation that His people could take.

"The eye for an eye' legal policy . . . is paralleled in the Code of Hammurabi [an eighteenth century B.C. king of Babylon], but there it operated only in the same social class. For a slave to put out a noble's eye meant death. For a noble to put out a slave's eye involved [only] a fine. In Israel its basic purpose was to uphold equal justice for all and a punishment that would fit the crime. The so-called law of retaliation was intended to curb excessive revenge due to passion and to serve as a block against terror tactics."²⁷⁶

"In the code of Hammurabi, property was often considered more important than person; property offenses such as theft were capital crimes. In Israelite law, sins against the family and religion were most serious."²⁷⁷

"Retribution is a principal goal of the penal system in the Bible.

"It seems likely that this phrase eye for eye, etc. was just a formula. In most cases in Israel it was not applied literally. It meant that compensation appropriate to the loss incurred must be paid out."²⁷⁸

Christians should not live on a tit-for-tat basis. Rather totally selfless love should mark our interpersonal relationships (cf. Matt. 5:38-42). However in public life punishment should match the crime (cf. Acts 25:11; Rom. 13:4; 1 Pet. 2:14, 20). This is how God will judge humankind (Luke 12:47-48; 1 Cor. 3:8).

"The Bible doesn't present capital punishment as cure-all' for crime. It presents it as a form of punishment that shows respect for law, for life, and for humans made in the image of God."²⁷⁹

 F. Sanctification of the possession of land by the sabbatical and jubilee years ch. 25

Chapter 25 concludes the laws God gave the Israelites on Mt. Sinai. It contains the only legislation on the subject of land ownership in the Pentateuch.

These laws regarding the Promised Land correspond to the laws Moses previously gave regarding the people of Israel. God owned both the Israelites and the land He was giving them.

"The central theme of this last set of instructions is that of restoration. Israel's life was to be governed by a pattern of seven-year periods, Sabbath years. After seven periods of seven years, in the Year of Jubilee, there was to be total restoration for God's people."²⁸⁰

 G. PROMISES AND WARNINGS ch. 26

"In the ancient Near East it was customary for legal treaties to conclude with passages containing blessings upon those who observed the enactments, and curses upon those who did not. The international treaties of the second millennium BC regularly included such sections as part of the text, with the list of curses greatly outnumbering the promises of blessing. In the Old Testament this general pattern occurs in Exodus 23:25-33, Deuteronomy 28:1-68, and Joshua 24:20. The maledictions of Mesopotamian legal texts or the curses in the treaties of the Arameans, Hittites and Assyrians were threats uttered in the names of the gods which had acted as witnesses to the covenants. That these threats could be implemented was part of the superstitious belief of people in the ancient Near East, and could have had some coincidental basis in fact. For the Israelites, however, there was no doubt that the God who wrought the mighty act of deliverance at the Red Sea will indeed carry out all that He has promised, whether for good or ill. Obedience to His commands is the certain way to obtain a consistent outpouring of blessing, whereas continued disobedience is a guarantee of future punishment."²⁹⁶

The blessings and curses in Exodus 23 dealt with the conquest of Canaan, but the blessings and curses in this chapter deal with Israel settled in the land.

 H. DIRECTIONS CONCERNING VOWS ch. 27

The blessings and curses (ch. 26) were in a sense God's vows to His people. This chapter deals with His people's vows to Him. Another connection between these chapters is that in times of divine discipline (26:14-33) people tend to make vows to God. Chapter 27 shows how God wanted the Israelites to honor their vows.³⁰³

"The directions concerning vows follow the express termination of the Sinaitic lawgiving (chap. xxvi. 46), as an appendix to it, because vows formed no integral part of the covenant laws, but were a freewill expression of piety common to almost all nations, and belonged to the modes of worship current in all religions, which were not demanded and might be omitted altogether, and which really lay outside the law, though it was necessary to bring them into harmony with the demands of the law upon Israel."³⁰⁴

"Just as the whole of the giving of the Law at Sinai began with ten commandments, so it now ends with a list of ten laws. The content of the ten laws deals with the process of payment of vows and tithes made to the Lord."³⁰⁵

God did not command the Israelites to make vows or to promise anything to Him. However vowing is a natural desire of people who love God or want things from God. Therefore God gave the Israelites regulations that were to govern their vowing and dedicating. Though God did not command vows He expected that once His people made them they would keep them (cf. Prov. 20:25; Eccles. 5:3-5). It may be that part of the purpose of these regulations was to discourage rash swearing by fixing a relatively high price on the discharge and changing of vows.³⁰⁶

"A vow to God placed a person or property in a special consecrated relationship which stood outside the formal demands of the law."³⁰⁷

Old Testament examples of people who made vows are Jephthah (Judg. 11:30-31) and Hannah (1 Sam. 1:11). Votive offerings were offerings made in payment of vows.

A vow was a promise to give oneself or one's possessions to God so He would bestow some blessing or because He had already bestowed a blessing. People made vows to do something or not to do something. Vows were normally temporary. When a person wanted to get back what he had vowed to God he had to pay a certain price to the sanctuary to buy back what he had given to God. This constituted redeeming what the person had vowed.