Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 1-4.

In the last chapter of Exodus which I covered yesterday, God instructed Moses to set up the tabernacle and then consecrate Aaron and his sons as priests.  Then it tells us that when Moses finished setting up the tabernacle that the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle and that Moses could not enter it because the cloud had settled on it.  Here, the Book of Leviticus begins by telling us that the Lord called to Moses from the tent of meeting and gave him instructions for the Israelites.  One of the things which this passage brought home to me was the way in which the composer of these books (Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy) intersperses describing the activities of the Israelites moving through the wilderness into the various Laws which God gave them through Moses.  I do not know if this was a literary device which the writer(s) used to break up the monotony of the laws, or if the laws were given spread out like this as events occurred to the Israelites.  Certainly today’s passage seems like the latter, as it contains instructions concerning the sacrifices which they were to offer following the setting up of the tabernacle, but preceding the ordination of Aaron and his sons.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 26-27.

I like how in this passage the consequences of a people obeying God are simple and straightforward: we will have enough to eat, we will have no reason to fear anything, and we will be successful (as followers of Christ our definition of successful is different from that of others).  On the other hand, the passage tells us that the consequences for a people of disobeying God are progressive.   First, it tells us that we will have to work harder to supply our needs.  Then, if we continue to refuse to obey God, we will suffer natural disasters and tragedies.  If that does not turn the people back to God, we will suffer plagues, shortages, and defeat at the hands of our enemies.  Finally, if we still refuse to turn to God, we will suffer famine, destruction, conquest, and exile.  But even when we reach this last stage, God will remember us, and if we confess our sins and turn to Him, He will welcome us back and start us on the path to prosperity once more.  So, let us turn from our sins now and beg the Lord to make us able to live righteously.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 24-25.

God commanded the Israelites to practice a Sabbath year every seventh year, and a Jubilee year every 50th year.  Actually, I am not quite sure how the timing of the Jubilee year was supposed to work.  So, it is clear that the year after the seventh Sabbath year was supposed to be a Jubilee year, but did the next Sabbath year come six years after the Jubilee, or did the counting for the Sabbath year start over with the Jubilee year.  Which brings me to the next thing I find interesting about the schedule of Sabbath years and the Jubilee: the Jubilee year is the year following the seventh Sabbath year.  That means there would be two years in a row where nothing was planted or harvested.  For those two years the people would live off of what the land produced without any crop management.   I want to spend a little bit of time looking at the idea of the Year of Jubilee.  The Year of Jubilee leveled the playing field by canceling debts, freeing slaves, and returning land to the family to whom it originally belonged.   In among the rules for the Year of Jubilee there are rules allowing people to redeem land which they have sold.  Finally, I want to take note that the reason why land could not be permanently sold was because it does not belong to us, it belongs to God.  We should recognize that the land we live upon is on loan to us from God and treat it accordingly. As servants of God, we should seek to return the land to Him in as good or better shape than when He first gave it in to our care.  In fact, I believe that we should treat all property which comes into our possession as on loan from God, using it to further His will for us on this earth.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 22-23.

I think we can learn something from the appointed festivals the Israelites were supposed to observe.  First I want to note that there were seven of these festivals.  We tend to forget that the Sabbath was as much one of the festivals ordained by God for the Israelites as was Passover.  I am not sure how Jews view these festivals, but the Christians I know who think about them tend to focus on Passover, the Day of Atonement, and, perhaps, the Festival of Tabernacles, mostly forgetting that the Sabbath is one of these Festivals.  I think that the importance of remembering that the Sabbath is the first of these Festivals cannot be overstated.  The importance of Passover for Jews, and Easter for Christians, cannot be overstated.  In fact, I think the fact that the English language uses Easter for that event, rather than a word derived from Passover as most other languages do, causes us to to make less of a connection between Jesus’ death and resurrection and Passover than we should.  Similarly, our failure to take notice that the Sabbath was the first of these Festivals established by God causes us to fail to take seriously God’s call for us to dedicate one day a week to worshiping and thinking about Him.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 19-21.

Every time I read this passage I am struck by the very first of the commands it contains: “Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy.”  Then throughout the rest of the commands concerning the average person some variation of the phrase, “I am the Lord” is repeated.  I believe that the phrase “I am the Lord” is repeated in order to refer us back to that first command.  As I read this passage I see that, for the most part, these commands all serve as instructions on how to be holy as the Lord our God is holy.  In fact many of them are summed up by what Jesus says is the second most important command, “love your neighbor as yourself.”  And while those many other commands can be summed up with “love your neighbor as yourself”, those other commands are a reminder that at least some of us need about what it means to love our neighbors. So, let us seek to be holy even as God is holy…and the first step in doing that is to love our neighbors, even those we think of as unlovable.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 16-18.

I want to spend a little time today looking at the Hebrew word translated as “scape goat” in chapter sixteen verse 8.  The same word is used again, twice, in verse 10, and finally in verse 26.  These four occurrences are the only time this word, azazel, appears in the Hebrew Bible.  Further, all of the other writings we have where this Hebrew word is used appear to base its meaning on that writer’s understanding of what it means here.   Some have concluded that azazel is the proper name of something, and later tradition has made this some thing to be a demon.  The basis for this conclusion is that lots were cast between the goats.  One lot was “for Yahweh”, the other lot was “for azazel”.  This can be problematic because it suggests the Israelites had been commanded to make a sacrifice to a demon (there are other problems for orthodox theology with this interpretation as well).  So, despite not being a Hebrew scholar, or even particularly knowledgeable about Hebrew, I decided to see if I could determine the meaning of the Hebrew words from which azazel is derived.   One possibility is that azazel derives from the Hebrew words “el”, which means god (often times referring to God, but not always), and “azaz”, which means strong.  That would mean that azazel means something along the lines of “God is strong”, or “strength of God”.  In this interpretation, azazel might be a proper name, Azazel,  similar to Gabriel and Michael, two of God’s messengers who appear elsewhere in the Bible, although if that were the case I would expect it to be Azaziah, because that is the form used elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible.   Or, it might just be a descriptive term making the passage read something like this:

He is to cast lots for the two goats—one lot for the Lord and the other for the strength of God. Aaron shall bring the goat whose lot falls to the Lord and sacrifice it for a sin offering. But the goat chosen by lot as the strength of God shall be presented alive before the Lord to be used for making atonement by sending it into the wilderness as the strength of God.

That does not seem to me like it fits the context of the rest of this passage.  Another possible derivation for azazel is from the word “ez”, which means female goat, and the word “azal”, which means go away.  This interpretation results in something very close to the translations which we currently possess.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 14-15.

I am really unsure where to go with today’s blog, but I am going to focus on one verse near the end of the passage: Leviticus 15 verse 31. My first thought when reading that verse was that we today should make sure that we do not expose our brothers and sisters in Christ to infection when we are sick.  If you are sick, don’t go out and spread it to others.  However, I also see another lesson here as well.  We should separate ourselves from spiritual uncleanness, and take the effort to get clean again after exposure.  The Israelites went to a lot of effort to make sure that they were cleansed after becoming unclean, we should be willing to do whatever we need to do to be cleansed as well.

This passage is a perfect example of why I write this blog.  If I was not writing this blog, I would have skimmed over this passage without truly registering what it said.  And right about now, if not sooner, I would have lost my discipline to continue reading the Bible every day.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Leviticus 10-12.

Aaron’s sons had just seen the glory of the Lord appear in the Temple and fire come out from it to consume the burnt offering and other offering pieces on the altar.  Yet, two of them used fire from other sources to burn incense in their censers, contrary to what God’s command for the incense to be burned in the censer using coals taken from the altar.  Now, what makes this interesting to me is that God’s command regarding the fire for incense burning was not recorded in any of the passages we have read so far this year.  One explanation for the death of Aaron’s two sons here is that they should not have burned incense in the censers until they had proper instructions from God.  The second is that the command had been previously given by God (perhaps along with the instructions for the incense altar), but not placed in the account being given by those composing this for one reason or another.  Either of these explanations have useful lessons we can learn from them.  The first one teaches us not to get out ahead of God’s instructions in our desire to worship and serve Him.  The second one teaches us that we should take God’s commands seriously, that the consequences for failing to do so can be deadly.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on   Leviticus 8-9.

The Book of Exodus contains a detailed description of the commands God had given for consecrating the Tabernacle, and Aaron and his sons.  Then the end of Exodus contains a description of the setup and consecration of the Tabernacle, with a passing reference to the ordination of Aaron and his sons.  Here in the Book of Leviticus, we have description of the consecration and ordination of Aaron and his sons, with a passing reference to the consecration of the Tabernacle.  In the instructions for ordaining Aaron and his sons, the Book of Exodus calls for the offering of sacrifices every day for seven days, then for Aaron to offer sacrifices for the people of Israel on the eighth day.  In today’s passage where it actually describes the ordination of Aaron and his sons it does not mention the daily sacrifices.  However, it does say that Aaron and his sons remained in the Tabernacle for seven days, eating of the sacrifice(s) for those seven days, then offering sacrifices for the people of Israel on the eighth day.  In the Exodus account of the setup and consecration of the Tabernacle it says that God’s presence filled the Tabernacle at the conclusion of the sacrifices.  Here it says that the glory of the Lord appeared before the people in the Tabernacle at the conclusion of the sacrifices offered by Aaron for the people in order to conclude his ordination.  I believe these two accounts record the same event from different perspectives.  Both accounts contain areas where they gloss over details which do not relate to their primary focus: the Exodus account glosses over the ordination of Aaron, while this account glosses over the consecration of the Tabernacle.  While the accounts are different enough that the ordination of Aaron and his sons may have taken place some days or weeks after the consecration of the Tabernacle, it seems to me more likely that Aaron’s ordination took place as part of the consecration of the Tabernacle, or immediately following it.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.