Leviticus

“ Finally, and for this same reason, Leviticus is still of use to us as embodying in type and figure prophecies of things yet to come, pertaining to Messiah's kingdom. We must not imagine with some that because many of its types are long ago fulfilled, therefore all have been fulfilled. Many, according to the hints of the New Testament, await their fulfilment in a bright day that is coming. Some, for instance, of the feasts of the Lord have been fulfilled; as passover, and the feast of Pentecost. But how about the day of atonement for the sin of corporate Israel? ”

“ It is of immense consequence that Christians should see this issue clearly. While Jesus taught in various ways that Leviticus contains a law given by revelation from God to Moses, these teach that it is a priestly forgery of the days after Ezra. Both cannot be right; and if the latter are in the right, then—we speak with all possible deliberation and reverence—Jesus Christ was mistaken, and was therefore unable even to tell us with inerrant certainty whether this or that is the Word of God or not. ”

“ The instructions in Leviticus are given primarily to Moses and Aaron; in Deuteronomy, they are given directly to the people. This is perfectly characteristic of the two books. Leviticus may be specially termed, The priest's guide-book. In Deuteronomy, the priests are almost entirely in the back-ground, and the people are prominent. This is strikingly apparent all through the book, so that there is not the slightest foundation for the idea that Deuteronomy merely repeats Leviticus. Nothing can be further from the truth. Each book has its own peculiar province, its own design, its own work. ”

“ In it the sacrificial law of Moses attains its supreme expression; the holiness and the grace alike of Israel's God, their fullest revelation. For the like of the great day of atonement, we look in vain in any other people. If every sacrifice pointed to Christ, this most luminously of all. What the fifty-third of Isaiah is to his Messianic prophecies, that, we may truly say, is the sixteenth of Leviticus to the whole system of Mosaic types,—the most consummate flower of the Messianic symbolism. All the sin-offerings pointed to Christ, the great High Priest and Victim of the future ”

“ The book of Leviticus holds up a faithful mirror to nature: it leaves "flesh" nothing to glory in. Men may boast of their refinement, their moral sense, their dignity: let them study the third book of Moses, and there they will see what it is all really worth in God's estimation.
Finally, we learn afresh the expiatory value of the blood of Christ, and the cleansing, purifying, sanctifying virtues of the precious Word of God. When we think of the unsullied purity of the sanctuary, and then reflect upon nature's irremediable defilement, and ask the question, However can we enter and dwell there? ”

“ If ritualism has been displaced by spirituality, and if law has been suspended by a principle—in other words, if the local has made way for the universal—why shrink from the admission that limited Personality has been exchanged for unlimited Influence?
How would Moses regard nineteenth century worship—say, of a Low Church and Evangelical type, as the true evolution of Leviticus? Where is the resemblance? The eye that can see the similitude is surely looking [457] through an adapted medium. Yet the mystery would be dissolved if the Book of Leviticus were not open to reference. ”

“ To imagine for a moment that aught is left for man's wisdom to supply, must be regarded as a flagrant insult offered to the sacred canon. No one can read the book of Leviticus and not be struck with the extraordinary painstaking on the part of Israel's God to furnish His people with the most minute instruction upon every point connected with His service and worship. ”

“ According to Leviticus i. 5 f. the task of flaying the sacrifice was to be performed by the offerer. Either this passage marks a later stage in the customary ritual, or perhaps this occasion was regarded by the Chronicler as exceptional because the offerings were brought on behalf of the “congregation” in general. The verse presents other difficult features. Who were the priests who had not yet sanctified themselves? What is the significance of the evident contrast between the attitude of the priests and that of the Levites, to the disadvantage of the former? ”

“ God is holy, and man must approach Him in His own way, and according to what He is. As Moses said unto Aaron on the solemn occasion of the sin of Nadab and Abihu, "This is it that the Lord spake, saying, 'I will be sanctified in them that come nigh Me, and before all the people I will be glorified.'" The Lord alone could give directions as to how the people were to draw nigh unto Him: this is the great subject of the book of Leviticus. ”

“ Even if in many Biblical questions I have to oppose the traditional opinion, certainly my opposition rests on this side of the gulf, on the side of the theology of the Cross, of grace, of miracles!... By this banner let us stand; folding ourselves in it, let us die!" [4] To [18] which truly noble words every true Christian may well say, Amen!
We then stand without fear with Jesus Christ in our view of the origin and authority of the book of Leviticus. ”

“ With a smaller, but, it is to be feared, an increasing number, this feeling, either of indifference or of doubt, regarding the book of Leviticus, is further strengthened by their knowledge of the fact that in our day its Mosaic origin and inspired authority is strenuously denied by a large number of eminent scholars, upon grounds which they claim to be strictly scientific. ”

“ These are days when many, who would yet be called Christians, belittle atonement, and deny the necessity of the shedding of substitutionary blood for our salvation. Such would reduce, if it were possible, the whole sacrificial ritual of Leviticus to a symbolic self-offering of the worshipper to God. But against this stands the constant testimony of our Lord and His apostles, that it is only through the shedding of blood not his own that man can have remission of sin. ”

“ The accuracy, which is here so apparent, draws forth the soul's admiration. It is one and the same Spirit which records the ingredients of the type, and gives us the facts in the Antitype. The One who has detailed for us, with such amazing precision, the types and shadows of the book of Leviticus, has also given us the glorious subject thereof in the gospel narratives. ”

“ Leviticus 23. treats of the Sabbath and the great annual festivals - the passover, pentecost, feast of trumpets, day of atonement, and feast of tabernacles.
Leviticus 24. treats of the oil for the lamps, and the shew-bread; the law concerning which had already been given, see Exodus 25, etc.; mentions the case of the person who blasphemed God, and his punishment; lays down the law in cases of blasphemy and murder; and recapitulates the lex talionis, or law of like for like, prescribed Exodus 21. ”

“ And further, speaking of the types of Leviticus,—"Though Christ in His work is the sum and substance of these types, it is Christ as discerned by one who already knows the certainty of redemption; it is Christ as seen by one who, possessing peace with God and deliverance, is able to look with joy at all that Christ has so fully been for him, . ”

“ Leviticus 16. treats of the solemn yearly expiation to be made for the sins of the priest and of the people, of the goat and bullock for a sacrifice, and of the scapegoat; all which should be offered annually on the tenth day of the seventh month.
Leviticus 17. The Israelites are commanded to offer all their sacrifices at the tabernacle; the eating of blood is prohibited, as also the flesh of those animals which die of themselves, and of those that are torn by dogs. ”

“ We have become accustomed to think of religion as a thing so exclusively of the spirit, and so completely independent of bodily conditions, provided that these be not in their essential nature sinful, that it is a great stumbling-block to many that God should be represented as having given to Israel an elaborate code of laws concerning such subjects as are treated in these five chapters of Leviticus: a legislation which, to not a few, seems puerile and unspiritual, if not worse. ”

“ The great leaders of the various reformations are apparently also quite ignorant that none but a priest could sacrifice, and none but a Levite take charge of the ark. Samuel, who was not a Levite, sleeps beside the ark and offers sacrifice. Elijah does nothing to recall the people to the ritual of Leviticus.
(4) The conclusion is that, while later ages were right in attributing to Moses the founding of their religion and some of their ritual, all the accumulation of law, which had only been the growth of many centuries, has been placed to his credit. ”

“ If Aaron was a type of Christ, then Aaron's house was a type of Christ's house, as we read, in Heb. iii, "But Christ as a Son over His own house; whose house are we." And again, "Behold I and the children whom God hath given Me." Now, it is the privilege of the Church, as led and taught by the Holy Ghost, to gaze upon and delight in that aspect of Christ which is presented in this opening type of Leviticus. "Our fellowship is with the Father," who graciously calls us to participate with Him in His thoughts about Christ. ”

“ Exodus, no doubt, is equally plain, containing as it does merely an account of the ten plagues, [55] the decalogue, [56] and sundry mysterious and divine precepts! The meaning of Leviticus is of course self-evident, although every sacrifice that it describes, nay more every word that it contains, the description of Aaron’s vestments, [57] and all the regulations connected with the Levites are symbols of things heavenly! The book of Numbers too—are not its very figures, [58] and Balaam’s prophecy, [59] and the forty-two camping places in the wilderness [60] so many mysteries? ”

“ The nature of sin as seen in Leviticus, (a) its effect on man's nature, (b) its effect on his relation to God.
CHAPTER IV.
Numbers.
Name. It is named from the two enumerations of the people, at Sinai, Ch. 1. and at Moab, Ch. 26.
Connection with Former Books. Genesis tells of Creation, Exodus of redemption, Leviticus of worship and fellowship, and Numbers of service and work. In Leviticus Israel is assigned a lesson and in Numbers she is getting that lesson. In this book as in Exodus and Leviticus Moses is the central figure. ”

“ For it is right for us to investigate the saying of the prophet, and especially on account of heretics who have turned their mind against the law. By Moses then, God gave commandment respecting sacrifices, and all the book called Leviticus is entirely taken up with the arrangement of these matters, so that He might accept the offerer. ”

“ Man is capable of placing a stumbling-block in the way of a fellow-creature afflicted with blindness. Such is man! Truly, the Lord knew what was in man when He wrote the statutes and judgments of the book of Leviticus.
I shall leave my reader to meditate alone upon the remainder of our section. He will find that each statute teaches a double lesson, namely, a lesson with respect to nature's evil tendencies, and also a lesson as to Jehovah's tender care. ”

“ Thus already, this expression, so strange to our ears at first, as descriptive of Jehovah's offerings made by fire, points to the person and work of the adorable Redeemer as its only sufficient explication.
But, again, we find another expression, xvii. 11, [33] which is of no less fundamental consequence for the interpretation of the bloody offerings of Leviticus. In connection with the prohibition of blood for food, and as a reason for that prohibition, it is said: "The life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls ”

“ PRIESTHOOD OF ALL BELIEVERS, Leviticus, 215;
Peter, 69-82.
PRIESTLY CODE, The, Leviticus, 12;
Numbers, 6, 12, 314, 317, 363, 368;
Deuteronomy, 9, 19, 23-25, 27, 28;
I. Kings, 191;
Ezekiel, 402, 434, 443.
PRIESTS OF THE HEBREWS, Anointing of the, Leviticus, 201.
---- as types, Leviticus, 184.
---- Investiture of the, Leviticus, 191.
---- The law of holiness of the, Leviticus, 432-446.
---- lead across the Jordan, Joshua, 108.
---- Portions for the, Leviticus, 175-180. ”

“ Hottinger, De Dec. vi. 8, ix. 17) .
14 For some suggestive remarks on the relation between nomadism and the Levites, and their influence upon Israelite religion and literary tradition, see E. Meyer, Die Israeliten u. ihre Nachbarstämme (1906) , pp. 82-89, 138; on the problems of early Israelite history, see Simeon (end) , Jews, §§ 5, 8, and Palestine, History.
LEVITICUS, in the Bible, the third book of the Pentateuch. The name is derived from that of the Septuagint version (τὸ) λευ [ε] ιτικόν (sc. βιβλίον) , though the English form is due to the Latin rendering, Leviticus (sc. liber) . ”

“ In these days of continually progressive relaxation of the laws regulating the relations of the sexes, this seems indeed to be one of the chief lessons from this chapter of Leviticus; namely, that in God's sight sins against the seventh commandment are not the comparative trifles which much over-charitable and easy-going morality imagines, but crimes of the first order of heinousness. We do well to heed this fact, that not merely unnatural crimes, such as sodomy, bestiality, and the grosser forms of incest, but adultery, is by God ranked in the same category as murder. ”

“ A Levite could not ultimately sell his house: if sold he could redeem it at any time in the interim between the two jubilees; but if not redeemed, it must go out at the following jubilee. And why? "Because Moses framed his laws so much in favor of the priesthood, that they had peculiar privileges?" etc. Just the reverse: they were so far from being peculiarly favored that they had no inheritance in Israel, only their cities, to dwell in: and because their houses in these cities were the whole that they could call their own, therefore these houses could not be ultimately alienated. ”