Tuesday, September 15, 2020

Leviticus, chapter 7, comments: law of the trespass offering and the sacrifice of peace offerings

 

Leviticus 7:1 ¶  Likewise this is the law of the trespass offering: it is most holy. 2  In the place where they kill the burnt offering shall they kill the trespass offering: and the blood thereof shall he sprinkle round about upon the altar. 3  And he shall offer of it all the fat thereof; the rump, and the fat that covereth the inwards, 4  And the two kidneys, and the fat that is on them, which is by the flanks, and the caul that is above the liver, with the kidneys, it shall he take away: 5  And the priest shall burn them upon the altar for an offering made by fire unto the LORD: it is a trespass offering. 6  Every male among the priests shall eat thereof: it shall be eaten in the holy place: it is most holy. 7  As the sin offering is, so is the trespass offering: there is one law for them: the priest that maketh atonement therewith shall have it. 8  And the priest that offereth any man’s burnt offering, even the priest shall have to himself the skin of the burnt offering which he hath offered. 9  And all the meat offering that is baken in the oven, and all that is dressed in the fryingpan, and in the pan, shall be the priest’s that offereth it. 10  And every meat offering, mingled with oil, and dry, shall all the sons of Aaron have, one as much as another.

 

Concerning the trespass-offering, as Matthew Henry noted, he that does the work should have the wages. The priest’s benefit from the altar would encourage diligence in attending to it. He also noted that as God covered Adam and Eve in the skins of animals, He may have continued to give Adam the skins of sacrificed animals as a reward.

Verse 6 suggests to us that only believers should partake of what is given to God, holy to Him, as only the priests here were to eat of the remainder. Only those who trust Christ will have eternal life and only believers should participate in the Lord’s Supper. The dead have no say among the living, as we know, apart  from things such as wills and insurance, man-made devices.

Famed Baptist preacher, John Gill, reported that heathen priests would wrap themselves in the skins of sacrificed animals to seek revelations from their false gods. Whether or not this is true I have not researched to see what the evidence is. I thought it was interesting because many of the things God requires would have been known by the heathen world but in the Law God probably restored His original reason for requiring it. Heathen religious belief and practice was probably taking something that God had originally told man but that man had added to or taken away from. Note how, before the Law is given here, that Noah is required to take not clean and clean beasts into the Ark long before we have this distinction in the record.

Genesis 7:2   Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female.

 

Clean, based on the context, can mean pure so these unclean beasts may have been corrupted by the evil doings of the fallen sons of God in Genesis 6.

Job 11:4   For thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.

 

Psalm 24:4   He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.

 

Proverbs 20:9   Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?

 

Speaking of Job, he, too, before this Law was given performs sacrifices for sin and makes statement showing that there was, at one time, as religion continued its decline, an understanding of God’s standard. The process of degenerating religious practice from Adam onward is outlined by Paul in Romans, chapter 1.

Leviticus 7:11 ¶  And this is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which he shall offer unto the LORD. 12  If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, fried. 13  Besides the cakes, he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offerings. 14  And of

it he shall offer one out of the whole oblation for an heave offering unto the LORD, and it shall be the priest’s that sprinkleth the blood of the peace offerings. 15  And the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day that it is offered; he shall not leave any of it until the morning. 16  But if the sacrifice of his offering be a vow, or a voluntary offering, it shall be eaten the same day that he offereth  his sacrifice: and on the morrow also the remainder of it shall be eaten: 17  But the remainder of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burnt with fire. 18  And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings be eaten at all on the third day, it shall not be accepted, neither shall it be imputed unto him that offereth it: it shall be an abomination, and the soul that eateth of it shall bear his iniquity. 19  And the flesh that toucheth any unclean thing shall not be eaten; it shall be burnt with fire: and as for the flesh, all that be clean shall eat thereof. 20  But the soul that eateth of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings, that pertain unto the LORD, having his uncleanness upon him, even that soul shall be cut off from his people. 21  Moreover the soul that shall touch any unclean thing, as the uncleanness of man, or any unclean beast, or any abominable unclean thing, and eat of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which pertain unto the LORD, even that soul shall be cut off from his people. 22  And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 23  Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, Ye shall eat no manner of fat, of ox, or of sheep, or of goat. 24  And the fat of the beast that dieth of itself, and the fat of that which is torn with beasts, may be used in any other use: but ye shall in no wise eat of it. 25  For whosoever eateth the fat of the beast, of which men offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD, even the soul that eateth it shall be cut off from his people. 26  Moreover ye shall eat no manner of blood, whether it be of fowl or of beast, in any of your dwellings. 27  Whatsoever soul it be that eateth any manner of blood, even that soul shall be cut off from his people. 28  And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 29  Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, He that offereth the sacrifice of his peace offerings unto the LORD shall bring his oblation unto the LORD of the sacrifice of his peace offerings. 30  His own hands shall bring the offerings of the LORD made by fire, the fat with the breast, it shall he bring, that the breast may be waved for a wave offering before the LORD. 31  And the priest shall burn the fat upon the altar: but the breast shall be Aaron’s and his sons’. 32  And the right shoulder shall ye give unto the priest for an heave offering of the sacrifices of your peace offerings. 33  He among the sons of Aaron, that offereth the blood of the peace offerings, and the fat, shall have the right shoulder for his part. 34  For the wave breast and the heave shoulder have I taken of the children of Israel from off the sacrifices of their peace offerings, and have given them unto Aaron the priest and unto his sons by a statute for ever from among the children of Israel.

 

Regarding the peace-offering, to offer it as a thanksgiving from verse 12;

 

Psalm 107:21  Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men! 22  And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing.

 

Prayer is likened to a sacrifice;

 

Psalm 141:2   Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

 

Proverbs 15:8   The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the LORD: but the prayer of the upright is his delight.

 

Nothing was to be left of the peace-offering for thanksgiving. Like the Passover Lamb it was to be eaten in the same day and nothing left until morning.

 

Exodus 12:10  And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire.

 

As in verse 16 for a vow or a voluntary offering we have other mentions in the Bible.

 

Proverbs 7:14  I have peace offerings with me; this day have I payed my vows.

 

Ezekiel 46:12  Now when the prince shall prepare a voluntary burnt offering or peace offerings voluntarily unto the LORD, one shall then open him the gate that looketh toward the east, and he shall prepare his burnt offering and his peace offerings, as he did on the sabbath day: then he shall go forth; and after his going forth one shall shut the gate.

 

It was acceptable, though, for a peace-offering for a vow or voluntary offering to not be eaten at once as long as the remainder was eaten in the next morning. Anything left was to be burnt on the third day. The person who wrongfully ate of this sacrifice was to be cut off from his people. This isn’t exile. This is death, usually.

 

1Samuel 28:9   And the woman said unto him, Behold, thou knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut off those that have familiar spirits, and the wizards, out of the land: wherefore then layest thou a snare for my life, to cause me to die?

 

Amos 1:8   And I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him that holdeth the sceptre from Ashkelon, and I will turn mine hand against Ekron: and the remnant of the Philistines shall perish, saith the Lord GOD.

 

We see also that it was forbidden to eat fat and blood. Verse 24 shows us that fat that wasn’t offered as sacrifice could be used for other purposes. For example, think of medicines, poultices, candles, and grease.

Heave and wave offerings as part of the peace-offering were lifted up before the Lord, given back to the offerer, and then given to the priests. I think of how Christ was lifted up on the Cross and in His Resurrection how we were given, in a sense, His life for eternity as eternity is the sole provenance of God and to whom He chooses to share it with.

 

Leviticus 7:35 ¶  This is the portion of the anointing of Aaron, and of the anointing of his sons, out of the offerings of the LORD made by fire, in the day when he presented them to minister unto the LORD in the priest’s office; 36  Which the LORD commanded to be given them of the children of Israel, in the day that he anointed them, by a statute for ever throughout their generations. 37  This is the law of the burnt offering, of the meat offering, and of the sin offering, and of the trespass offering, and of the consecrations, and of the sacrifice of the peace offerings; 38  Which the LORD commanded Moses in mount Sinai, in the day that he commanded the children of Israel to offer their oblations unto the LORD, in the wilderness of Sinai.

 

Here is a summary of what has been discussed previously. The Aaronic priesthood could partake of these things in their successive generations until the coming of the Messiah. And so Paul brought this ideal forward in permitting ministers of the gospel to be supported.

 

1Corinthians 9:13  Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? 14  Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.

No comments: