Sermon - Audio
Lev 5-7 - Audio
Lev 5-7 - Daily Reading
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Lev. 5
5.1.-4: Certain situations that incur guilt are laid out. What is interesting about these is they are things a person failed to do. He failed to give evidence at a trial, he failed to cleanse himself after becoming ritually impure, and he failed to keep an oath that he made. This raises the question, “Are these the only instances of guilt or are these examples of guilt that comes when we fail to do what we are supposed to do?”
5.6-13: God provides differing levels of offerings based on a person’s wealth or poverty. What is most striking about this is that the last offering of grain does not involve blood. In all other sacrifices blood is necessary for atonement.
5.17-19: This guilt offering seems to be given for a nagging sense of guilt but a person does not know what they are guilty of. Such an offering gives the person relief from their guilt and makes them right before God.
Lev. 6
6.1-7: This restitution/offering comes from a person who has ripped off his neighbor. The offering is necessary because it seems that the person has used God’s name in an oath to swear that he has not ripped off his neighbor. In doing so he has cheapened God’s name. As when a thing devoted to God is taken, it is not enough to return what is taken—one is to add 20% to the value of what was taken. This giving back what was taken plus 20% happens when one brings his guilt offering. It is quite possible that this is the context of two New Testament passages. The first is Jesus’ sermon on the mount in Matthew 5.“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift. What your brother has against you is the kind of things that are spoken of in Leviticus 6.1-7. The second passage is from Luke 19. It’s the story of Zacchaeus, "But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” Zacchaeus shows he knows God’s law but is also willing to go beyond what is called for in Leviticus and promises a 4x payback.
Lev. 6
5.1.-4: Certain situations that incur guilt are laid out. What is interesting about these is they are things a person failed to do. He failed to give evidence at a trial, he failed to cleanse himself after becoming ritually impure, and he failed to keep an oath that he made. This raises the question, “Are these the only instances of guilt or are these examples of guilt that comes when we fail to do what we are supposed to do?”
5.6-13: God provides differing levels of offerings based on a person’s wealth or poverty. What is most striking about this is that the last offering of grain does not involve blood. In all other sacrifices blood is necessary for atonement.
5.17-19: This guilt offering seems to be given for a nagging sense of guilt but a person does not know what they are guilty of. Such an offering gives the person relief from their guilt and makes them right before God.
Lev. 6
6.1-7: This restitution/offering comes from a person who has ripped off his neighbor. The offering is necessary because it seems that the person has used God’s name in an oath to swear that he has not ripped off his neighbor. In doing so he has cheapened God’s name. As when a thing devoted to God is taken, it is not enough to return what is taken—one is to add 20% to the value of what was taken. This giving back what was taken plus 20% happens when one brings his guilt offering. It is quite possible that this is the context of two New Testament passages. The first is Jesus’ sermon on the mount in Matthew 5.“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift. What your brother has against you is the kind of things that are spoken of in Leviticus 6.1-7. The second passage is from Luke 19. It’s the story of Zacchaeus, "But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” Zacchaeus shows he knows God’s law but is also willing to go beyond what is called for in Leviticus and promises a 4x payback.
Lev. 6
This part of Leviticus gives further regulations on how the priests were to handle the offerings. While earlier information was for all the people, this information is a handbook for the priests
6.9: The NIV’s “regulations” (also in 6.14,25) is the word “torah” in Hebrew. From our perspective this is an interesting insight into the meaning of the word Torah since we often translate it as Law. Here we see that it is more akin to directions or the way things are to be done.
6.9,12-13: The fire is to be kept burning for practical and spiritual reasons. Practically, the offering had to be totally consumed. This would take quite a bit of time. Spiritually, the constantly lit fire showed the unwavering dedication of the people to worship God and their dedication to him.
6.28: The idea is that the sin offering i.e. the animal absorbs the impurity or sin of the person. This impurity is done away with by either sacrificing on the altar or by being eaten. However, before it is eaten the “impure” meat is cooked in vessels which “absorb” the impurity. Therefore they have to be purified by either breaking them or scouring them.7.1: Most holy means that only the priests may eat it (see verse 6).
Lev. 7
7.3-4: The fat portion is considered the best so God gets it.
7:11–20 In this section there are three types of offerings of well-being: a praise offering, a votive offering , and a freewill offering (hbdn; cf 22:21; Num 15:3; Deut 12:17). A praise offering is made to glorify God and to express one’s love and appreciation for God’s presence in the offerer’s life. A votive offering is made in response to promises made at the taking of a vow. The faithful worshiper is also expressing his enthusiastic joy to God for fulfilling his vow. A freewill offering is offered spontaneously, joyfully, in order that a family or clan may celebrate a feast before God. IVP Background Commentary These different kinds of offerings remind us of the full orbed relationship the people have with Yahweh. There is more than sin and guilt, their is joy and thanksgiving.
7.36: The priests are given a part of the sacrifice for food so that they can do their work in God's tabernacle/temple. When this giving failed in later times the priests abandoned the temple to make their living in other ways.
6.9,12-13: The fire is to be kept burning for practical and spiritual reasons. Practically, the offering had to be totally consumed. This would take quite a bit of time. Spiritually, the constantly lit fire showed the unwavering dedication of the people to worship God and their dedication to him.
6.28: The idea is that the sin offering i.e. the animal absorbs the impurity or sin of the person. This impurity is done away with by either sacrificing on the altar or by being eaten. However, before it is eaten the “impure” meat is cooked in vessels which “absorb” the impurity. Therefore they have to be purified by either breaking them or scouring them.7.1: Most holy means that only the priests may eat it (see verse 6).
Lev. 7
7.3-4: The fat portion is considered the best so God gets it.
7:11–20 In this section there are three types of offerings of well-being: a praise offering, a votive offering , and a freewill offering (hbdn; cf 22:21; Num 15:3; Deut 12:17). A praise offering is made to glorify God and to express one’s love and appreciation for God’s presence in the offerer’s life. A votive offering is made in response to promises made at the taking of a vow. The faithful worshiper is also expressing his enthusiastic joy to God for fulfilling his vow. A freewill offering is offered spontaneously, joyfully, in order that a family or clan may celebrate a feast before God. IVP Background Commentary These different kinds of offerings remind us of the full orbed relationship the people have with Yahweh. There is more than sin and guilt, their is joy and thanksgiving.
7.36: The priests are given a part of the sacrifice for food so that they can do their work in God's tabernacle/temple. When this giving failed in later times the priests abandoned the temple to make their living in other ways.
5 comments:
HELP! I've been troubled by some logistical questions about the Tabernacle and the required Offerings (sacrifices).
If there were somewhere more than 600,000 males in the Hebrew group that left Egypt, it seems safe to assume there were at least a million people in the nation.
For the sake of discussion I'll assume that only the males were the spiritual leaders and presented the sacrificial offerings to the Priests.
There were at least five different catagories of sacrifices mentioned in Levitucus. (Three for Worship and Thanks and two for Atonement for sins.
To keep it simple, if each male offered one sacrificed animal per year that would require approximately 1,700 to 2,000 sacrifices a day. It seems safe to think that at least half of the people could afford an animal sacrifice. Then there would be somewhere arond 1000 animals being killed and some part burned each day.
All of this had to occur in the tabernacle area which was 75 ft. by 150 ft.
I would like to hear some insight into this.
Dale
Dale,
I think the issue stems from the number translation/transmission issues in Hebrew. Here is one thought on it that I don't necessarily endorse, but you can see the possibilities:
"The Hebrew text of Exodus 12:41; "about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children" reads "c'shesh me'ot eleph rag'liy hagebariym l'vad mitaph". This could also be translated as "about six hundred chiefs (eleph) on foot are the warriors apart from the children". We know have a group of warriors that would find the 600 chariots of Pharoah a formidable army. If we also assume that each chief (head of the family) included a wife and 5 children we have 6,000 people correlating the previous calculation of descendents from Levi to the exodus.
By changing the translation of the word "eleph" to chiefs will also fit the census records of numbers.
RSV Numbers 1:21 the number of the tribe of Reuben was forty-six thousand five hundred.
The Hebrew of this passage could also be translated as; "The number for the tribe of Rueben is six and 40 (46) chiefs and 5 hundred". With this alternate translation we have 46 chiefs and 500 family members. When we apply this method to the remainder of the tribes we come to a total number of 598 chiefs and 5,550 others (The standard translation of the complete census is 603,550, if the 3 is changed to a five, a possible error we have 605,550 very close to the 598 (2 short of 600) chiefs and 5550 people. Note, the Septuagint (LXX) does have a change of 5 to a 4 so the error is not out of the realm of possibilities).
In summary, it would appear that the slavery of the Israelites in Egypt lasted 130 years and approximately 7,000 individuals traveled to Mt. Sinai."
-Ancient Hebrew Research Institute-
*It would have been almost impossible for over 2 million people to have lived in a desert. Think about a few things:
1. With over 600,000 men why would they have been scarred of 600 egyptian chariots, or the people of Egypt in general.
2. There would have had to been a ton of reproduction happening from the time of Joseph to their exodus. The number of generations and the amount of people just don't add up.
3. There are commands to "bury their excrement." This needed to be done outside the camp which would have made them walk probably 2-4 miles each time they needed to go. That would have been next to impossible with that many people.
4. The logistics of food, water, clothing, and shelter in the desert would have been horrendous.
5. We are assuming that everyone followed the sacrificial laws to the "t." Even in Jesus' day the Jewish people only sacrificed once per year (passover). Also, remember that we may need to think in terms of community rather than individual. There are many more issues with the "2 million people #" but we'll leave it at those.
In Closing, we really don't know the exact number that came out of the exodus, but we can be certain that it is an issue in transmission over the years.
Ryan; Thanks for the research and your response.
When I read your material I was immediately struck by the writers speculation and hypothesizing. If the problem is one of "transmission over the years" (which it may well be) what does that do to our insistance on the reliability and infallibility of the Scripture? It's never simple, is it? Dale
Hey Dale,
I think it's important to think back to Jeff Wiema's sermons a couple months ago. Language/Translations have changed so much over the years that there are bound to be some misinterpretations/translations. There is no direct translation from Hebrew to English, so we are left with some less than perfect translations in various spots. It isn't that the scriptures infallibility or even inerrancy is being called into question, just that our interpretation or translation was messed up along the way. This is why we continue to have thousands upon thousands of scholars who try to go back and sort through these issues to make sense of it for the rest of us. I thank God for these people!
Also, think back to the "Jesus" videos we watched. Maybe the best example would be the "manger" and place that Jesus was born in. If you recall that was a translation/interpretation error as well. Jesus was most likely born in a lower house or cave, not a barn. However, through some poor translation we are left to believe otherwise.
Ryan; I agree completely. I just find it very interesting that although I completely believe the Scripture is infalible and reliable, I have problems, now in then, in its exact meaning. It just keeps me humble and is a good curb to cockiness. dale
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