Exodus: Unity of Law and Grace

The Center

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Lesson: The Center

Genre: Lessons with Q & A

Track: 126

Dictation Name: RR171BQ126

Location/Venue:

Year: Early 70’s

Let us worship God. Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High. To show forth thy lovingkindness in the morning and thy faithfulness every night. Delight thyself also in the Lord and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Let us pray.

We thank thee, our Father, that thou art our refuge and our strength. Our refuge from all the cares of this world, and the troubles of our own spirit. Our strength in the face of all adversities and griefs. We thank thee that we can come unto thee and cast our every care upon thee, knowing thou carest for us. In thy sovereign grace and mercy thou hast called us to be thy people. Thou hast given us great and marvelous promises in thy word, and thy word is truth. We thank thee that hitherto, thou hast been with us to protect, to guide and to bless us, and so we commit unto thee all our todays and our tomorrows, knowing the certainty of thy love and thine unfailing care. In Christ’s name. Amen.

Our scripture this morning is Exodus 38:1-31, and we continue our studies in The Center, the second of four studies in The Center. Exodus 38. “And he made the altar of burnt offering of shittim wood: five cubits was the length thereof, and five cubits the breadth thereof; it was foursquare; and three cubits the height thereof. And he made the horns thereof on the four corners of it; the horns thereof were of the same: and he overlaid it with brass. And he made all the vessels of the altar, the pots, and the shovels, and the basons, and the fleshhooks, and the firepans: all the vessels thereof made he of brass. And he made for the altar a brasen grate of network under the compass thereof beneath unto the midst of it. And he cast four rings for the four ends of the grate of brass, to be places for the staves. And he made the staves of shittim wood, and overlaid them with brass. And he put the staves into the rings on the sides of the altar, to bear it withal; he made the altar hollow with boards. And he made the laver of brass, and the foot of it of brass, of the lookingglasses of the women assembling, which assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And he made the court: on the south side southward the hangings of the court were of fine twined linen, an hundred cubits: their pillars were twenty, and their brasen sockets twenty; the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver.” Now skipping over to the twenty-first verse.

“Now this is the sum of the tabernacle, even of the tabernacle of testimony, as it was counted, according to the commandment of Moses, for the service of the Levites, by the hand of Ithamar, son to Aaron the priest. And Bezaleel the son Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, made all that the Lord commanded Moses. And with him was Aholiab, son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, an engraver, and a cunning workman, and an embroiderer in blue, and in purple, and in scarlet, and fine linen. All the gold that was occupied for the work in all the work of the holy place, even the gold of the offering, was twenty and nine talents, and seven hundred and thirty shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary. And the silver of them that were numbered of the congregation was an hundred talents, and a thousand seven hundred and threescore and fifteen shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary: a bekah for every man, that is, half a shekel, after the shekel of the sanctuary, for every one that went to be numbered, from twenty years old and upward, for six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty men. And of the hundred talents of silver were cast the sockets of the sanctuary, and the sockets of the vail; an hundred sockets of the hundred talents, a talent for a socket.”

This chapter gives us the details of the construction, and we’ve hit the high points of it instead of all the details. We saw last time that some commentators have estimated the amounts of the materials therein. Since the weights were sometimes variable, that is, a caret is not always equivalent to the same number of ounces. It depends on what measure you use. But roughly the estimates are that, according to J.P. {?}, and I won’t give the details, about a ton of gold was used, about three and a quarter tons of silver, and over two tons of brass. Quite a bit of wealth. H.R. Ellison wondered, and I quote, “If the immense value and church plate, etc. could not be put to better use, as did the communists when they came to power in Russia.” Well, to call the Bolshevik’s seizure of all the wealth of the church as “better use” is an amazing statement.

Ellison saw the use of these things in the tabernacle as valid simply because in the wilderness, he said the riches involved had no other use or value, which is an amazing comment. There’s no place where you cannot use gold where there are other people. Some scholars give higher estimates of the amount of metals used. As I said, the differences are due to the variations of the reckoning of the weights of that time, the talent and the shekel. The gold used, according to the statement of verse 24, was of the gold of the offering. That is, the freewill offering.

According to verse 26, some of the silver came from the house shekel paid by all males age 20 and older as their temple or governmental tax. This was the only required giving that went into the construction. All the rest was freewill offerings above and over their tithe. The tithe, at no point, figured into the construction.

In verse 8, we have a reference to ministering women who assembled by groups at the door of the sanctuary. The only other reference in the Old Testament, very open, plain spoken one, to this apparently organized body of women is much later, in 1 Samuel 2:22 where we are told of the sexual abuse of these women by Eli’s renegade sons. However, there seems to be a reference to these women in the New Testament, in Luke 2:36-38, where we are told of Anna, a prophetess. Anna was a widow of about 64 years of age, and it is said, “which departed not from the temple but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.” The text in Exodus 38:8 indicates an organized body of women who assisted the priests and the Levites. Anna seems to have been one such woman. In Acts 9:36 we are told of a remarkable woman at Jopha named Tabitha, or Dorcas. It means “a doe,” as in the deer family. A woman full of good works and alms deeds, which she did. Her death was a great loss to the community of Christians, and especially all the widows who were weeping. Dorcas had been a great help to them, providing them with clothing. Peter raised Dorcas from the dead, and then presented her to the saints and widows. It is possible that we have here an order of widows, whose work for the church and for the needy was a continuation of what appears in Exodus 38:8.

In 1 Timothy 5:3-16, Paul discussed the place of widows in the church. His discussion is especially interesting because he lays down rules for an already established and functioning group. He’s not creating a group, he is establishing some guidelines. Not any widow could qualify, he says. She had to be of age 60, of good character, not a busybody or gossip, and also needy. There is every reason to believe that we have an order well known in Israel which was continued by the Christian church or the Christian synagogue. Later, the Christian order of widows developed into the nuns convents, but the age restriction was dropped in the process.

With this in mind, we can see something more in the Old Testament texts. Widows were entitled to receive a portion of the third year poor tithe according to Deuteronomy 14:29, and Deuteronomy 26:12-13. In Deuteronomy 27:19, there is an especial curse on all who pervert justice for aliens, orphans, and widows. From both biblical and non-biblical Hebraic sources, we see that the widows had a lawful claim on society. To be mindful of the helpless was a strict moral law. The widows were thus women needing help who were also used in serving the church, and before that, the temple. Not all widows but those who were outstanding and had special abilities.

In Romans 16:1-2, Phoebe is referred to as a deacon, although some scholars insist on reading it merely as a reference to her service to the church. The words can be interchangeably used. However, the text does indicate some status and authority is given to Phoebe. In verse 12 of the same chapter, Romans 16, two other women are also mentioned as laboring in the Lord. Then in Pliny’s letter to the Emperor Trajan, dated about 110 AD, he has a reference to young women in the church who were called deaconesses. Later, the needy widows and the deaconesses are cited as two separate groups in the apostolic constitution. Later, the Counsel of Orleans referred to the widows who were called deaconesses.

Now, the lack of any explanation at these various points in the history indicates that it was an old and established order that everyone was familiar with. Thus, this is important because first of all, we have a vast outlay of god and silver for the sanctuary and construction, but at the same time, we see evidence of a care for the needy. Instead of a conflict between a wealthy sanctuary and the care of the needy, we see a harmony. Second, some have questioned the validity of Exodus 38:8 on the grounds that an order of ministering women could not have existed before the sanctuary was built, which is a ridiculous assertion. Very many ancient cultures, some going way back before Moses, did make provisions for the care of widows and their social function, so an order of widows was something common to more than one culture in Antiquity. Wherever society has been family-oriented, such care has not been unusual. The trouble with these scholars is they’re modern, whether they claim to be evangelical or modernists, and modern man regards himself as advanced and superior. He finds it hard to believe that people in the past could be superior and more thoughtful than himself.

In verses 1-7, the construction of the altar of the burnt offering is described, and the vessels and instruments used with it. The altar is described in Leviticus 4:7 as the altar at the door. There was no approach to God except by way of atonement. The claim of the altar had to be met first. The offering required had to be given totally to God. The ancient term for it, much used in earlier centuries was “holocaust,” the holocaust offering. It is an offering wholly given to God and setting forth total devotedness. The only true holocaust is the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ on the cross. Any other usage of the word is sacrilegious. Paul, in Ephesians 5, 1-2 refers to Jesus Christ as a holy given offering, a holocaust, on our behalf. He says, “Be ye therefore followers of God as dear children, and walk in love as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour.” Paul’s Greek phrase is the same as that of the Septuagint for Leviticus 1:9, a holocaust.

In verse 8, the construction of the laver of brass is cited. This laver stood between the altar and the door, and the priests had to wash themselves as they entered. It is referred to in Psalm 26:6, “I will wash my hands in innocency, so will I compass thine altar, O Lord.” The ceremony symbolized innocence. In Deuteronomy 21:6, the elders of the city, when they failed to locate a murderer, made restitution and atonement for the murder and washed their hands to indicate their fulfillment of God’s requirement whereby their innocence was accomplished. Pilate made wrongful use of the ceremony of innocence in Matthew 27:4. This ceremony also meant that one had cleansed himself of all persons and activities which were false and polluting.

In Exodus 37:1-9, the construction of the ark is described. Then in 37:10-24, the table and the lampstand, and 25-28, the altar of incense. In Exodus 38, we have the construction of the forepart. In verse 21, we see that Ithamar, one of Aaron’s sons, had an important part in this work. As we have seen, Exodus gives us the government and justice of God as the social center of any order, and of all law. It is the center of society. As against this, the modern world has a shift from God to the state as the center. One result is a major instability among men and societies. When the Emperor Justinian had his institutes promulgated, they represented some dependence on Roman law, but they also had a Christian emphasis. One definition tells us of Justinian’s perspective, and I quote, “Jurisprudence is the knowledge of things divine and human, the science of the just and the unjust.” Law is the science of morality, and it begins, Justinian held, with the knowledge of things divine and human.

Since World War 2 especially, western law has been steadily purged of God’s law. One whose views were very powerful in Scotland and America, and whose influence is now being denied and expunged was John Knox. Of him, James K. Cameron wrote, and I quote, “Knox made clear the policy which he would wish to have effected in Scotland, to live according to the word of God entailed by the upholding of the validity for Christians of the Old Testament law and the responsibility of seeking from those who exercised the civil sword their full cooperation and compliance. Knox, of course, was aware that some claim that Christians lived under a new dispensation for whom the rigors of the Levitical law had passed away. His answer to them is characteristically blunt. Knox said, ‘If ye claim any privilege by the coming of the Lord Jesus, Himself will answer that he is not come to break or destroy the law of His heavenly Father.”

Where God’s law is not at the center of a society, the result is then a struggle by men to establish their particular versions of human sovereignties and manmade laws. We are present in a vast conflict created by this shift, the shift from the center of God’s word and law to man. It is a shift from Jesus Christ, the rock, the rock of ages, to shifting sand. Let us pray.

Our Father, thy word is truth, and thy word is the only hope for men and nations. Grant, we beseech thee, that thy holy spirit working in the hearts of men and nations may bring them back to thy word. They teach them to grow in thy grace, in faithfulness to thee. Grace us this, we beseech thee, in Christ’s name. Amen. Are there any questions now about our lesson? Yes?

[Audience] When does the distinctive dress of the nun come into being?

[Rushdoony] What? When did . . .

[Audience] When did the distinctive dress of the nun come into being?

[Rushdoony] That’s a good question. I’m not sure of the details, but you must remember that prior to the Medieval era, the toga, in some form, was the dress of men and women. So, whether it was in Palestine, or in Greece, or in Rome, men wore some variation of that. The trousers were not common except among women in some cultures, except in northern Europe where, because of the cold, tight-fitting britches and shirts were worn. With the Barbarian invasion of Rome, what they gave to the areas they conquered was that in time, their type of garb prevailed in those areas, and there are a few hints here and there that they may have been adopted by both men and women. They did prevail for men, so that, essentially, the nun’s garb was a survival from the Roman era, and then it developed certain things such as color, white and black, as the case may be, but the purpose of making it distinctive was that it made them identifiable. It was a kind of protection as well as a means of saying, “Here is someone who is laboring in the Lord’s vineyard.” The sad fact is that now, except on television, you don’t see priests on the street in priest’s garb, or nuns either, for that matter, because they are subjected to too many insults in most places. Yes?

[Audience] Last week, you made a comment about the movie, “The Raiders of the Lost Ark.” Could you, after church, could you redo that?

[Rushdoony] Oh yes. Well, the point I made was that the ark, of course, was highly prized by whoever took it. Any modern conqueror would melt down something like that, but in Antiquity, temples were a place of great wealth, and the various furnishings as well as in pagan temples, the idols, were often made of very costly materials, gold and silver very commonly. So conquerors would take these and place them in their sanctuaries, in the belief that the power of those gods went with them. The Hebrews were the only ones who did not do that. Now . . except in a few periods in the Old Testament of great decadence, there seems definite evidence that it was done, but by and large, it was never done, in any time of religious faith. So, the army of Nebuchadnezzar took the temple furnishings very carefully to Jerusalem, uh, to Babylon. When the Medes and the Persians overthrew that order, they took them. Then, the Persian monarchy, in allowing Nehemiah to reestablish Jerusalem and the temple, allowed them to take them back. That was an unprecedented act, but they needed a friendly power there on their western front, and so they were ready to go overboard in being helpful to the Jews. Subsequently, the Romans seized them. Now, in Tyacus{?} epiphanies, earlier, tried to make the temple itself his own sanctuary towards the worship of himself, however, the Romans took them and we have a picture of them in the Triumphal Arch in Rome, of Trajan. After the Fall of Rome, they were carted off by the Barbarians, and for a time, there was knowledge of their whereabouts, but it disappeared finally, knowledge of it, and no one knows where it ended up. Now, the picture “The Raiders of the Lost Ark” used that fact that it was something preserved, all such things were preserved, and the author, I think his name was also Rader, R-A-D-E-R, something like that, and he was the attorney for Armstrong’s group, wrote a story based on it, after doing a great deal of research, and he claimed that the picture “Raiders of the Lost Ark” was plagiarism. It plagiarized his story. What happened to the lawsuit, I don’t know whether it was settled out of court or what other disposition was made, I cannot say. Yes?

[Audience] The shear volume of precious metals used here indicates that there must have been considerable accumulated knowledge of metallurgy, yet it doesn’t talk about anybody who was, has that ability, or of any of the processes or how they arrived at that kind of technology, because gold, at least in modern times, you don’t find gold in pure form, it’s always alloyed with something. So, either they were finding gold, large quantities of gold that was unusually pure, or they had developed the ability to purify it in order to get this kind of quantity.

[Rushdoony] They had developed the ability. It was known in a number of countries and very extensively used. We don’t know how they developed it or how they obtained the ability to refine it so thoroughly. For example, the construction of the pyramids is a mystery. They obviously had developed some kind of technology to move vast stones, weighing sixty, a hundred tons. What we do know is that in Egypt, the Hebrews were used for all kinds of construction projects, from rough labor to finer labor, so that they provided a great many of such services, and undoubtedly a great deal of the technology left Egypt when the Hebrews left. In one culture after another, those who had the technology were commonly slaves or near slaves. All the technology, virtually, of Greece, and all their scientific knowledge, was developed by captives, by slaves who, when they did something remarkable, were given freedom and a Greek name. So, when you read about the development of Greek scientific knowledge, and science, you’re reading about foreigners who were honored with a Greek name for their achievement. Any other questions of comments? Well, if not, let us conclude with prayer.

Our Father, give us grace day by day to center our lives wholly on thee, to make ourselves every sphere in which we operate, our society progressively, to be centered on thee. Bless us to this purpose. And now go in peace. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you this day and always. Amen.

End of tape.