Leviticus; The Law of Holiness and Grace

Responsibility

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Genre: Lessons with Q & A

Lesson: 5

Track: 05

Dictation Name: RR172C5

Date: Early 70s

Let us worship God.

This is the confidence we have in him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us. Having these promises, let us draw near to the throne of grace with true hearts in full assurance of faith. My voice shalt Thou hear in the morning, Oh Lord, in the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee and will look up. Let us pray.

Oh Lord our God we give thanks unto Thee that Thou who art on the throne art mindful of all things great and small, of the evil of nations and of the prayers of the least of Thy children. We thank Thee, oh Lord, that Thy justice shall be made manifest, that before Thee the nations are as nothing, and it is Thy will, Thy kingdom that shall prevail. Make us therefore strong by Thy Word and by Thy Spirit, that we may serve Thee with boldness of heart and in the confidence that in Christ Jesus we are victors—more than conquerors. And the every knee shall bow and every tongue praise the Lord Jesus Christ who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. In His name we pray, amen.

Our scripture is Leviticus 4:1-35. Our subject: responsibility.

“1 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

2 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a soul shall sin through ignorance against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done, and shall do against any of them:

3 If the priest that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the Lord for a sin offering.

4 And he shall bring the bullock unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the Lord; and shall lay his hand upon the bullock's head, and kill the bullock before the Lord.”

[Rushdoony] Then, skipping over to verse 13:

“13 And if the whole congregation of Israel sin through ignorance, and the thing be hid from the eyes of the assembly, and they have done somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which should not be done, and are guilty;

14 When the sin, which they have sinned against it, is known, then the congregation shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the congregation.

15 And the elders of the congregation shall lay their hands upon the head of the bullock before the Lord: and the bullock shall be killed before the Lord.”

[Rushdoony] Now let’s skip over to 22. We have seen what the sin of the priest requires, then the sin of the whole congregation, the whole nation. Now the ruler.

“22 When a ruler hath sinned, and done somewhat through ignorance against any of the commandments of the Lord his God concerning things which should not be done, and is guilty;

23 Or if his sin, wherein he hath sinned, come to his knowledge; he shall bring his offering, a kid of the goats, a male without blemish:

24 And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the goat, and kill it in the place where they kill the burnt offering before the Lord: it is a sin offering.”

[Rushdoony] Then let’s skip to verse 27. We’ve had the sin of the priest, the whole people, then a ruler, and now in verse 27,

“27 And if any one of the common people sin through ignorance, while he doeth somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done, and be guilty;

28 Or if his sin, which he hath sinned, come to his knowledge: then he shall bring his offering, a kid of the goats, a female without blemish, for his sin which he hath sinned.

29 And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the sin offering, and slay the sin offering in the place of the burnt offering.”

This is a very important portion of Leviticus, in that it is a source of more than one statement in the New Testament. These several sections which I singled out just a portion of, so we could highlight the fact that there are four classes of people involved: priests, the entire people, congregation or nation, the ruler, and then any of the common people, deals with inadvertent sins. However, the term can also include sins of weakness, sins of human frailty. No capital offenses are included.

For example, a man can be weighing out some merchandise to another man, and without realizing it, put the wrong weights in the balances so he renders an improper weight and overcharges the man. Or, realizing it as he does, still keeps his mouth shut. This is the kind of sin that is covered here. It is a desire to gain something which momentarily possesses us and then we repent of it, or we do something not realizing that we’re doing it. We’re busy chatting with the man. We put the wrong things on the scale. We adjust it improperly. Now, these are the sins that this chapter deals with. All sins require restitution—a restitution to man and sacrifices of restitution to God. Here, the restitution to man is not dealt with, that is dealt with elsewhere, but the restitution to God of the sacrifice.

As we have seen, there are four classifications:

1. The sin of the priest
2. The sin of the congregation, the entire nation, or the entire people together as a worshiping community.
3. The rulers
4. The ordinary people.

If you noticed, there are variations in the offering that are required of each of them. The priest must give a bullock without blemish; the congregation, the church, or the nation, the same—a bull or bullock without blemish. Now this tells us something about the equation in God’s sight of sin. The sin of a religious leader is as important, as serious, in the sight of God as the sin of the entire people. The sin of any clergyman in the United States, in other words, is as serious a thing as the sin of the entire people of the United States. God is saying that the greater the responsibility, the greater the culpability. Then we come third to the ruler. The ruler is to give an unblemished male goat; a kid. This is dramatically less than a steer or a bull. Much less! This tells us how God evaluates civil government. In scripture, civil government has a very limited role. It is not to take over the whole realm of government and be equated with government. As I pointed out on many an occasion, in terms of scripture, government means first of all the self-government of the believer under God. Second, it means the family. Third, it means the church, or the worshiping community. Fourth, it means the school. Fifth it means your vocation which governs you. Sixth, it means the community, the society, the people in their thinking and their standards. And seventh it means civil government, one form of government among many whose role is justice and defense. In other words, by saying that the sin of the ruler is very different from that of the priest, the religious leader, God is also saying that the role of civil government must be a very limited one, because then we see that the fourth type of sacrifice, that of the commoner, the ordinary person, an unblemished female goat. In other words, God says that every man as the head of a household has a power, a position, a governmental role in society that is equal to that of a president. Equal to that of a king. Equal to that of a governor, or a judge, or whatever civil authority you wish to name. He is giving a tremendously important role to the head of a household, not equal to that of a religious leader, but he is saying it is a critically important one. It’s put on the same level, virtually, as people we regard as high and important officials. This tells us how God evaluates the family.

Now these gradations tell us a great deal as to how the New Testament views things. When our Lord tells the Church, “Go ye and make disciples of all nations,” He is saying that the religious authorities have the duty to conquer the World for God and his kingdom. This is a tremendous role. And accordingly, Peter tells us in 1 Peter 4:17, “Judgment must begin at the house of God.” God holds the Church accountable first before any other group in society. And it will hold the Church of our time accountable as it has held the Church accountable in many a country. This chapter underlies our Lord’s statement in Luke 12:48, “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required. And to whom men have committed much of him, they will ask the more.” The greater the responsibility, the greater the culpability.

However today, as with the pagans of old, we have a total reversal of the position that scripture here takes. Here we are told the greater your responsibility, the greater your accountability to God and to man. But today, like the pagans of old, it is held that statist position and power give immunity from law and its consequences. We’ve read more than once how white collar crime doesn’t get punished like blue collar crime that you can steal millions and get probation and be assigned to do useful work for society if you’re a bank president. That is, if you get convicted. Several books lately have called attention to the massive fraud that has taken place and no one’s been convicted—only a slap on the wrist. And the interesting thing is that while people complain about this, juries are the ones who very often give the verdicts. It’s a common assumption, a pagan assumption, if you’re important; somehow you have a degree of immunity from law. Unless, of course, it’s someone you dislike intensely, then you want him clobbered the more. At any rate, our modern position is anti-Biblical.

As I said earlier, the sins involved in these offerings did not include capital offenses. However, as J. R. Porter noted, “On the other hand, inadvertent transgressions also included occasions of ritual impurity. In the priestly theology sin is an objective quasi-physical thing.” Hence, even if committed inadvertently, its consequences cannot be avoided, and so, not sharply distinguished from defilement or uncleanness. Thus, sin and guilt offerings are made on occasions where sin in our usual understanding of the word is hardly involved. But in God’s sight, we must add, they are serious. Our materialistic age depreciates sins which do not have physical effects; sins such as envy (which has been turned into a virtue), jealously, and so on. The spiritual is not seen as altogether real, so sins which originate in the spirit of man are seen often as nothing. Crime is redefined very often today to mean physical damage or harm. Thus, whatever goes on between consenting adults is harmless.

But the root of all sin is spiritual. It is in the heart of man. To depreciate the spiritual finally means to depreciate all crime. And of course the day, with our environmentalism, we are further depreciating crime because we find causes external to man--external to the heart of man--which are supposedly the source of sin; of crime. Willfulness is denied because man’s will has been depreciated. The high seriousness of the priest’s sin stresses the religious roots of sin and also justice. The blood of the sin offering of the priest was smeared on the altar of incense. All others were smeared on the horns of the altar of burnt offering. The priest’s sins required a special prayer. The priest’s sacrifice was not burned on the altar, but outside the camp on the ash heap because there was an especial defilement in his sin. The fall of man and the entrance of sin and death have religious roots so that no man can understand sin and evil, justice and injustice apart from Biblical faith. Our Lord says in Matthew 15:18-19, ‘But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.’” To deny the religious foundations of life is thus to blind oneself to reality and to court death. The sin offering also provided that a portion was to be consumed by the priest, except for his own. The worshiper had to identify himself with the sacrificial animal by laying his hands on the animal that was substituted for him and had to die. The three previous offerings we have discussed: the burnt offering (in chapter 1), the meal offering (in chapter 2), and the peace offerings (in chapter 3) are all voluntary. The sin offering is compulsory. Forgiveness had to be sought and secured. There were unavoidable consequences for man and society if there were no restitution and atonement. This sin offering underscores this fact.

Not only individuals but communities are punished in this world. Men cannot escape involvement in their sins or in the sins of their community by withdrawing from the world or from other men. The same is true of churches. No church can escape from God’s judgment by withdrawing from the world around and saying, ‘we are holy, no matter what the world is.’ They have a responsibility. Thus we see this in Hosea 4:6-9 where God says,

“6My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me; seeing as thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

7As they were increased, so they sinned against me; therefore will I change their glory into shame.

8They eat up the sin of my people, and they set their heart on their iniquity.

9And there shall be, like people like priest; and I will punish them for their ways, and reward them for their doings.”

In all conditions, our personal responsibility remains. Our responsibility as members of a community also makes it necessary to forsake indifference to what happens all around us. This does not mean that we are to continue in futile action. Ezekiel was told very plainly by God that he had a duty to warn the people, having done so; he was innocent of their blood. Thus Ezekiel was not told to be a nag, he has said, “make your witness to the people and then you are innocent.”

Moreover, the fact that rulers were specifically included in the list of sacrifices as a class, like the priests, is of particular importance. They had, and they always have, a responsibility to God and under God to be his ministers in terms of His (God’s) Law. A ruler in fact, is specially bound in scripture to be a man of God. The book of Proverbs gives us at great length all kinds of statements concerning the responsibility of rulers of all nations. Proverbs is clear that the ruler need not be a part of Israel or of Judah. Any ruler anywhere is in God’s world and is bound by God’s Word. They face either atonement or judgment. Bonar gave us an excellent summation of what this atonement means. “The offender comes confessing his sin and bringing a victim to suffer in his stead. The animal is slain in his room. The man is forgiven and retains his standing as a protected Israelite, remaining under the shadow of the guardian cloud. The sacrifice never failed to produce this effect, but nothing else than the sacrifice ever did. Without shedding of blood there is no remission. This principle of divine government was engraven on the heart of Israel, ‘Whosoever is pardoned, any offense must be pardoned by means of another’s death.’ The great multitude of the saved are all pardoned by one of infinite worth, having died for them all.”

Now, was Bonar just reading the New Testament into the Old? Did such a faith exist in the Old Testament era? The answer is very clear. A belief in the vicarious atonement is basic to the Old Testament. It cannot be read, it cannot be understood apart from that. All too many scholars who insist on seeing everything in the Old Testament as primitive, and then everything in the New Testament as primitive compared to themselves, are illustrative of Job’s words to Zophar when he told him, “No doubt but ye are of the people and wisdom shall die with you.” (I’ve always liked Job’s sarcasm there. Every generation has its elite and intellectuals who believe that wisdom was born with them and will die with them.) The Bible was not given by God from Moses’ day through the New Testament to become the esoteric province of New Testament scholars. They seem to feel that no one can understand the Bible except themselves. The Bible was given—the Old Testament—to the tribesmen of Israel, and the New Testament to the Jews and Gentiles of first-century Rome to be understood and obeyed by everyone, learned and unlearned. Our Lord accuses the Pharisees as well as the scribes of making God’s Law of none effect through their traditions. Too often the traditions of Biblical scholarship are as deadly as those of the Pharisees if not more so. They write without the fear of God, not in awe of Him. But Psalm 33:8-12 says,

“8Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.

9For he spoke, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.

10The Lord bringeth the counsel of the heathen to naught; he maketh the devices of the people of none effect.

11The counsel of the Lord standeth forever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations.

12Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord; and the people whom he hath chosen for his inheritance.”

This is not to deny that very often simple believers, like scholars, have erred again and again in interpreting the Bible. But we err through sin, not because the Bible fails to speak, and to speak clearly. And the fact remains that these simple believers so despised by scholars have also been both very right and devoutly active for the Lord, and they have accomplished great things for Christ’s kingdom. It is time that the book of Leviticus be opened up to simple believers.

All too often, these simple believers are treated with contempt by the scholars of their day when great movements have begun in the history of the faith. And that’s why whether we go back to the early days of the Church, the second and third centuries, on through the medieval era, the Reformation and to the present, so many of the great movements that began in each era were not documented by the scholars of that era. We only get the documentation from a few contemptuous critics and those within the movement. Only when such simple believers are safely dead to they provide research data and subjects for ghoulish scholars. Alive, they are avoided like the plague and treated with contempt, even as our Lord was by the religious leaders and scholars of His day. Our Lord spoke of this in Matthew23:29-33 when he said,

“29Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchers of the righteous

30And say, if we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.

31Wherefore, ye are witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them who killed the prophets.

32Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers,

33Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?”

They could not, and did not, nor can the experts of our day in every sphere who close the doors of truth with their unbelief.

And chapter 4 of Leviticus is especially relevant to religious leaders because it says the greater the responsibility the greater the culpability. And the churches need to open up the meaning of this book. To whom much is given (and that includes every believer), of him shall much be required. Let us pray.

Thy Word is truth, Oh Lord, and Thy Word speaks plainly to our every condition. Give us hearing ears, that we may hear, and hearing—obey. Give us the spirit of zeal, that we may make disciples of all nations as Thou hast ordered us. In His name we pray, amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson?

Yes.

[Audience] Concerning the significance that the ruler offers the male goat, and the common individual offers a female goat, is there any significance in {?}?

[Rushdoony] Well, ah, it is possible that it involves a gradation, a minor one, ah, from the modern point of view, the commoner’s offering would be more important because it would be breeding stock. However, from the Biblical point of view, the male had a typological significance of leadership; so that, ah, it was slightly more important than the offering of a common man. But it’s not a great difference.

Yes.

[Audience] Would you equate the professionals of today with the clergy?

[Rushdoony] Yes, because the very word that historically, in the Western World has applied to the intellectuals has been ‘clerics’ or ‘clergy’. In other words, since the birth of Christianity, the thinker, the intellectual has been a part of the ministry. The university began out of the cathedral. The graduate to this day puts on a clerical garb so that when he graduates he has joined the ranks of the clergy. He is now charged with a duty to administer his sphere of learning under God. That’s the meaning of our universities. They’ve turned it of course, into a mockery and to an anti-Christian thing. But that in our culture is its root meaning.

And this is why they are such religious men. Their religion is Humanism. They are anti-Christian but they do have a zeal. They want to take over the world. They’re not minor practitioners in a particular sphere. They’re men out with a mission to make disciples of all nations.

Any other questions or comments? Yes, {?}

[Audience] Some people seem to be {?} the idea of public confession of sins. And of course, this is taken to an extreme in Communist countries where they have cell groups and continual examination of one another. It’d seem like some could grab ahold of this passage and state that any time a leader, whether religious or political, does some mistake he needs to tell the world about it and therefore make atonement. What’s your comment along these lines?

[Rushdoony] There is a long and interesting history of confession and its role in the church. First of all, confession is a Christian idea. Second, it has had a kind of checkered history in that there have been different practices over the centuries. At times confession has been before the entire congregation, and still is amongst some groups. Other times, totally private, during much of its history, to a priest or a pastor, and that confession totally immune from any governmental interference and to be held as a trust by the pastor.

Now, going back ah, to see to a degree how it was practiced in the early years: There seems to be a dual aspect. If the sin were against the entire congregation or a people, then the ruler had to make a public confession. Thus when Henry II was responsible for Thomas a’Becket (even though, and it’s possible, because Henry was a hot tempered man and he was not giving an order to those knights who killed Thomas a’Becket, he was simply ranting as he often did. He was a man of remarkable brilliance; one of the most remarkable kings in history, but a man of remarkable tantrums, actually, to rolling around on the floor and chewing on the carpet. And, ah, he was always in a fight with somebody. So when he burst out with a “Will someone not rid me of this priest?” these knights acted on it and killed him. And Henry, with some justice, said he was just venting his rage, not issuing an order), all the same, he was held accountable in that degree and had to make a public act of confession and penance to be witnessed by any and all of the people of England who chose to be there.

So, this too, in the early Church seems to be the case, that you had to make restitution to the individual that you wronged, and that was it. You didn’t have to advertise the fact to everyone. That was between you and God and the person you wronged; but if the whole people or the whole congregation were involved, or a group of peoples, you also had to right yourself with them.

Now today, the whole thing has been cheapened, because psychoanalysis has entered the field with Freud. And confession now is, to a psychoanalyst, confession in itself is supposed to right things without bringing God or the other person, or if it brings in the other person, it still doesn’t bring in God. So today too often confession is a matter of words because it doesn’t go through the proper channels, because it has lost its social significance and its religious significance. So today when a person says they’re sorry, it doesn’t mean much, and we’re rightly distrustful and we wait and see if there’s a change in their lives before we say they have changed and they should be forgiven. So, the fact that confession as an institution has lost its meaning has had far-reaching repercussions in society. It has become a psychoanalytic fact. It has been reduced to words, and it’s hard for people to get that connection of restitution back there into the meaning of forgiveness.

Any other questions or comments?

[Audience] Not really a question, but I thought it was very interesting part of your sermon where you are speaking, when you quoted Job, where, ah, Job, ah, is sort of amazed that how, when men die, they feel that wisdom will die with them, and then again in the New Testament where Christ tells the Pharisees that they are the sons who, ah, of the people who killed the prophets. Uh, um, and we, we sort of feel the same way today, ah, especially with the advent of, uh, of Darwin with the evolutionary thinking. I mean, men just tend to feel that, ah, people, it shows that the Bible is for every age, I mean, the time between Job and Christ and now today we just, we look, we tend to look back through history, and, and like you were saying that what the historians will say with this new archeological dig that they’ll tend to discount it because it’s not in our time. Today we have the wisdom and we, you know, we, people, I’m sure it’s true of every age, to tend to, to doubt the, you know, the truthfulness of the scriptures because, you know, it’s so long ago, it’s, its, and today we’re wise, you know, um, it’s, it’s just—and, and, it’s the uh, philosophy of Darwin, really, and man’s evolving, you know, and what happened long ago doesn’t really…you know, we’re much smarter today than to be fooled by, you know…the Bible that’s three thousand years old {?}.

[Rushdoony] Well, we see that clearly and dramatically several times in history. For example, when printing was invented, we’re beginning now to realize a great deal of scientific and other knowledge was lost because it was believed that all those things were a part of the past, and, ah, no longer valid. And the same thing is happening today with the birth of modern technology.

Our time is up. Let us conclude now with prayer.

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.