Leviticus; The Law of Holiness and Grace

Sacrilege and Phariseeism

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Genre: Lessons with Q and A

Lesson: 17

Track: 17

Dictation Name: RR172J17

Date: Early 70s

Let us worship God. Grace be unto you, and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most high shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him. Let us pray.

Oh Lord our God, in whom we live and move and have our being, we give thanks unto Thee that our times are in Thy hands and Thy hand is upon us for good. Give us grace to be mindful day by day that because Thou art on the throne, all things shall be ordered in terms of the kingship of Thy Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, that the ends of the earth shall serve Him, that all His enemies shall be put under His feet and the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. Make us zealous therefore in His service, confident of His victory, and joyful in His service. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

Our scripture this morning is from Leviticus 10: 1-11. Our subject, “Sacrilege and Phariseeism.” Leviticus 10:1-11, Phariseeism and sacrilege.

“1 And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not.

2 And there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them, and they died before the Lord.

3 Then Moses said unto Aaron, 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. And Aaron held his peace.

4 And Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Uzziel the uncle of Aaron, and said unto them, Come near, carry your brethren from before the sanctuary out of the camp.

5 So they went near, and carried them in their coats out of the camp; as Moses had said.

6 And Moses said unto Aaron, and unto Eleazar and unto Ithamar, his sons, Uncover not your heads, neither rend your clothes; lest ye die, and lest wrath come upon all the people: but let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning which the Lord hath kindled.

7 And ye shall not go out from the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: for the anointing oil of the Lord is upon you. And they did according to the word of Moses.

8 And the Lord spake unto Aaron, saying,

9 do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations:

10 And that ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean;

11 And that ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses.”

In this episode we have an example of sacrilege. Sacrilege is theft directed against God. It is an attempt to infringe on His sovereignty and to appropriate what belongs to God for the service of Man. Sacrilege also means trying to co-mingle God’s prerogatives with Man’s self-will. God not only claims our first fruits and tithes, but our selves and our wills as His to command. We are God’s property, His possession, and we are created for His purposes, not our own. We are not told that Nadab and Abihu did what God had forbidden, but what He had not commanded—an important distinction. We’re not told that they disobeyed a commandment of God, but they did what He had not commanded. We are given laws of holiness, and we cannot add to or subtract from these laws or do anything in addition to God’s law to gain holiness.

Nothing we can do can enhance the holiness God sets forth in His law. We cannot exercise, in other words, our autonomous will. Autonomy means literally, ‘self-law’; ‘autos’ (self), ‘nomos’ (law). And self-law autonomy can only render us unholy.

What these two men, Nadab and Abihu did was to offer strange fire; in other words, to bring some kind of kindling to an already burning fire on the altar. What did this involve? Well, the word ‘strange’ can refer to people who are not priests, and is used that way a few times in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers. But even more often it refers to aliens, to outsiders, so that it is alien fire; outside from the altar. The Golden Calf Cult had found expression in Israel fairly recently. The fire could have been from the fertility cult altar, as a step of ecumenicity. However, it is not necessary to posit this, because the point has far-reaching ramifications. What they may have been attempting to do in some very simple fashion was to improve on the ceremony at the altar.

Man has a propensity for trying to improve on God’s requirements. Over the centuries, people have interpreted the Bible to make it mean all kinds of things—to try to read meanings into it—all to seek a supposedly greater holiness. Let me give you an example at some length, because this is typical of all the churches, Eastern and Western, Catholic and Protestant. In this instance is a commentary by a priest of the church of Armenia on the parable of the Good Samaritan, and the Samaritan parable is given by our Lord in answer to the question, “Who is my neighbor?” So the Bible states what the purpose of the parable is. But now let us read what this commentator has to say, “The Church looks beyond this superficial and simplistic interpretation, that is that the parable is to answer the question, ‘Who is my neighbor?’ to provide us the faithful a complete and comprehensive understanding of the Lord’s words. A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. Jerusalem sits on a hill and is the city of the Lord. Jericho on the other hand, is in the valley and is a city of worldly pleasures. The man had turned his back on God and was slipping down into sinful life of worldly pleasures, and he fell among robbers who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. The wages of sin is death! Here we see how a man’s sins can rob him, destroy his life, and kill him. The robbers are his sins. Now by chance a priest was going down that road and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side, so likewise the Levite when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. Here the priest and Levite represent the Law and the Prophets who are the, [cough] who only are complete in the Christ. They of themselves are incapable of salvation. But a Samaritan as he journeyed came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion, and went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring oil and wine. Samaritans, although of Jewish blood, were hated by the Jews. Here the Samaritan represents our Lord who was a Jew but not accepted by them. Only our Savior can cure the wounds of our sins and cure us. The wine represents His life-giving blood shed for our sins, and the oil the gifts of the Holy Spirit which cures, seals, and comforts. Then he set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. Christ took upon Himself the care of mankind. He gave of Himself for the salvation of mankind. And the next day he took out two denarii, and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him.’ The inn and innkeeper here refer to the Holy Church. The Lord has commissioned the Church to care for the souls of His people, but He has also provided the Church with two—two denarii—not three or more, aids in which the Holy Church should care for His children: The Holy Scriptures, and holy tradition. With these two elements, the Church guards and guides us for the Lord. ‘And whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Here is the greatest promise of all: our Lord promises to return. He shall not leave us, but return to secure our care and salvation. This simple and short parable reveals Christ’s love for mankind and his promise of salvation and the second coming. Yet it is only through the Church that the hidden truths of the Holy Scriptures become obvious to us.”

Now this kind of interpretation, you can find for the same parable, dozens of examples in all the churches. Well, there is nothing in the parable that resembles this exegesis, or eisegesis more literally, because it reads into, not out of, the man who was going on his journey to Jericho was not going towards sin to sin, so the interpretation begins falsely. He was a traveler. It was real robbers. It was not sin that waylaid him, and so on. The whole thing rests on eisegesis; reading something into the text and then pursuing it relentlessly and logically. But this should not surprise us. This is the method taken by so many in all churches as a way of introducing their own will, of trying to be super-pious, super holy. This however, is an embroidered word, a falsified word. It diverts the faithful from God’s Word to man’s word.

To give you two more examples, current ones, from people who call themselves Protestants:

One Protestant clergyman in a series of sermons on Esther went so far as to say, and title the whole series, “The Authority of the Church.” Where is the Church in the book of Esther? Whose authority is wrongfully, sinfully denied? Why that of Haman, the tyrant. Now, this is not exegesis, interpretation. It is insanity.

Another clergyman gave a series of sermons on the dietary laws, proving to his satisfaction at least, that if you refuse to eat pork, you are not a Christian.

Well, all that departs from the plain Word of God is sacrilege and blasphemy. It substitutes man’s interpretation for God’s Word. It is Phariseeism. What we must recognize is this: that Pharisees were seeking to go beyond God’s Word, to be more holy than God requires. Their attitude was that, ah, if God asks so much of us, we’re going to give more and prove how holy we are—more than ordinary people.

Nadab and Abihu may well have intended to improve on God’s Law. We are not told that they did anything that was in and of itself, apart from disobeying God’s requirements for the ritual, intended to be evil. Next week, we shall see exactly how this is intended because Moses is concerned with any variation from what God has required. So it was a variation, an addition. It was alien fire. It was adding something to the service.

And Pharisees sought to do precisely this. They were earnest men, well-intentioned men as far as their own desire to be holy was concerned, except their good intentions represented what the Bible calls “Original Sin,” man’s desire to be his own god. So, they were trying to improve on God’s Law and add a measure of extra holiness, if such a thing is possible.

Well, people have been doing this over the centuries. They are doing it today. I regularly find that many Protestants now are saying that there must be no divorce. But the Bible does permit divorce in some instances as a remedy to evil. And to feel that a position of no divorce makes their particular group more holy is wrong. Others, because the Bible teaches temperance, are against any consumption of alcoholic beverages, as though this represented greater holiness. But the Bible speaks of wine as something that maketh glad the heart of God and man, and also speaks of it as a help to those who are in grief. It also forbids it on certain occasions, as we shall see. But these efforts are false, all these efforts to improve on God’s holiness. The family is all-important in God’s sight, but not so important that we can set aside His law. So, to preserve the law, ah, to preserve the family, people are ready to say, “No divorce.” To preserve sobriety, “No wine.” They are being more holy than God.

The Pharisees, thus, we must see as sincere people, yes, as their champions to this day insist. But this does not absolve them of sin. This past week, I, I picked up a book written by a Catholic nun, a convert from Judaism about the crucifixion of our Lord. And she goes a long ways towards exonerating the Sanhedrin. Why? She does it on the grounds they were passionately concerned with the purity of Israel and they felt Jesus was going to destroy that. So she excuses them on the grounds of their deep religious sincerity, and their moral concern. Well, it’s possible Hitler was very sincere; that does not exclude him from any moral judgment. And neither anti-Semitism nor anti-Christianity are excusable on grounds of sincerity. To apply such a criterion to the Pharisees or to Nadab and Abihu is to say that the truth does not matter.

God’s sentence on death is clear-cut in this passage. It is death. God’s sentence on Phariseeism is always death, and it is quick in the case of Nadab and Abihu. But slow or quick, God’s sentence is always death. For men to seek to be more holy than God is to pre-suppose that they are above God. And this sin has brought death ever since Adam.

In verse 3, God declares through Moses that he must be sanctified, that among all His people there must be sanctification and they must honor Him. And this means obeying Him. To seek to improve on God is to dishonor Him. It is to place ourselves above the Almighty.

Moses called on Aaron’s cousins Mishael and Elzaphan to remove the bodies of the two men. The high priests could not as a servant of God, who represented the life of God, come into contact with death. And this requirement is extended to the two sons who are to succeed Nadab and Abihu. Because of the high priest’s greater responsibility, there is a greater culpability. We see this of course, as we did in studying Leviticus 4, and in many other passages of scripture. For example, in Amos 3:2, God declares to Israel, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” Our Lord declares 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.” Or 1 Peter 4:17, “For the time is come, that judgment must begin at the House of God.”

The commandment then, to Aaron, Eleazar and Ithamar in verses 6 and 7, forbids them to do two things:

1.      There can be no mourning on their part. They can have no part in the funeral. They must show no sign of grief.

2.      They cannot attend the funeral, because their calling must take priority over the funeral. They were forbidden on penalty of death to leave the sanctuary.

Our Lord refers to this commandment when He declares in a couple of passages, for example in Luke 9:59, 60, “And he said unto another, follow me. But he said Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. Jesus said unto him, ‘let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God.’” And again, Luke 14:26, 27, “If any man come unto me and hate not his father and mother, and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever does not bear his cross and come after, cannot be my disciple.” The family of God is the basic institution.

We cannot allow our human family to take priority over God’s calling and purpose. At this point, Joseph Parker’s comment was particularly telling. And it’s a pity that others have not seen his point also. He said, “The reason it’s given in the words, ‘the anointing oil of the Lord is upon you;’ that oil must separate between you and the appearance of unbelief. That oil is a restraint as well as an inspiration. Is it not so now varying the terms and the relation of things? If we could enter into the spirit of that restriction, what different people we should be.”

The Lord speaks to Aaron then, the only time in the Leviticus commentary on the Law and the development of the Law, that we are told that God speaks to Aaron directly and not through Moses. In verses 8-11, He re-confirms Aaron’s office and He commands Aaron and through him, all priests, saying, that when serving as priests, they are to drink no wine or strong drink. But they must enter the sanctuary sober. It is possible that Nadab and Abihu were not entirely sober. This forbids, however, anything except a clear, unaltered, sober mind whenever anyone is doing the Lord’s work.

Then second, the reason is given. In Wenham’s translation, “It is your duty to distinguish between the holy and the common and between the clean and the unclean.” This refers both to the things sacrificed, and the sacrificers. They have to have a clear mind so that no unclean or unblemished animal is brought in. They must know that the worshipers are not guilty of sacrilege or that they have a rightful place in the sanctuary. We see an example of that when Eli rebuked Hannah, the mother of Samuel. Now, he was wrong, because he assumed due to her strong emotion that she was drunk; and he rebuked her. But he was exercising his right as a priest to make sure that there was no profanation of the sanctuary. So, this is what is meant here by this requirement.

And then third, sobriety is required that they might teach God’s Law clearly. So wine is forbidden only in this context we are told, as I mentioned that wine, according to scripture, can enhance joy and relieve grief. But it cannot enhance our teaching, nor our work. The line is here very clear throughout this passage, between holiness and Phariseeism. In all its forms, Phariseeism is sacrilege. It infringes on God’s sovereignty, it seeks to correct or improve on God’s Word by man’s way and word. It is an arrogation and a presumption to claim the wisdom to improve on God’s Law. Thus fanciful, allegorical, symbolic interpretations of God’s Law, Word and worship, are forbidden. It was an intertestamental group that gave its name to Phariseeism, but Phariseeism as a state of mind has existed since the Garden of Eden, wherever and whenever men believe that their wisdom can correct or add to God’s wisdom and mind. Thus, however earnest, however sincere Phariseeism may be, it is in the sight of God a great evil and a particular offense in His sight. And those guilty of Phariseeism have His judgment sooner or later: death.

Let us pray.

Thy Word, oh Lord, is truth. Make us ever-joyful in Thy truth that we may seek neither to add to it nor to subtract from it, that we may be in all things faithful, rejoicing that Thou hast spoken plainly unto us, and that we can clearly and openly follow Thy Word. Bless us in Thy service, in Christ’s name, amen.

Are there any questions no concerning our lesson?

Yes.

[Audience] So the Phariseeism is what I keep encountering on South Africa {?} …

[Rushdoony] yes…

[Audience] …I was interviewed on a radio program in Albany, day before yesterday, and the fellow said “How can you say that the government of South Africa is Christian when they practice Apartheid?” And I said, “Well, all the sins are listed in the Bible and Apartheid is not listed as a sin.” And therefore, ah, you don’t understand Christianity when you pose that question. And that brought in some pretty indignant telephone calls!

[Rushdoony] [Laughter] Well, the classic example of Phariseeism is in a recent issue of US News & World Report, a senior Senator from Massachusetts, who is righteously indignant of all people to exercise to exercise righteous indignation at the situation in South Africa. So, ah, we now know, if we didn’t before, what marks Senator Kennedy—Phariseeism.

Any other questions or comments? Yes.

[Audience] Isn’t it though incorrect to assume that when the Pharisees were going beyond God’s requirements that they were even fulfilling God’s requirements? Originally? I mean to say that in the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, I heard it interpreted that the Pharisee was in fact following all of God’s Laws perfectly and everything else, and was just doing more, and it was just his arrogance. But isn’t the mark of arrogance the fact that you’ve lost the spirit of the Law?

[Rushdoony] The common statement of the Pharisees concerning what they expounded was that the word is like water, but the interpretation like wine. In other words, ah, if you have your choice between drinking water and wine, or between the plain word of scripture and their interpretation of scripture, aren’t you going to take wine? Now consider the arrogance of that aphorism. It’s incredible!

And yet, the Pharisees are regularly, supposedly vindicated. One prominent Jewish scholar some years ago, a book which is regarded as a classic by scholars, wrote a two-volume study on the Pharisees, vindicating them as really very sincere people, and that Jesus was supposedly closer to the Pharisees than to anybody else. Well, that’s not taking our Savior at His word! And there is no lack of approval of that book and extensions of it by Christian scholars who vindicate precisely the Pharisees.

There’s only one reason for it: Phariseeism is so prevalent among us on all sides. It’s prevalent among Catholics and Protestants, among Eastern Churches and Western, Modernists and Fundamentalists, Reformed and Armenian, you see Phariseeism everywhere. It’s a lot of fun for these people, I guess, to invent new sins while forgetting about the old ones. It makes it very convenient for them to define sin, because when people define sin, it usually is somebody else who is the sinner. It’s a very convenient thing to be able to do that.

We all tend to do it, and we have to watch ourselves, as I’ve told Dorothy often in the past, my sins are loveable ones, and her sins are stinky ones. [Laughter] Well, that’s a temptation we all have and we have to watch out, lest we carry that too far, because then we become Pharisees through and through.

Any other questions or comments?

Yes.

[Audience] {?} It seems Biblically, that Phariseeism was always equated with hypocrisy.

[Rushdoony] Yes…

[Audience] They’re almost synonymous.

[Rushdoony] Yes. And to be a hypocrite is to wear a mask. And Phariseeism does insist that a mask of man’s own making is somehow going to conceal the truth from God and man, whereas when we face God as sinners, we face people with humility. We know that God knows what we are, and by His grace He has saved us. And therefore we can face people not with our hypocrisy, but by the grace of God.

Nowadays, and for some years now, people have ridiculed the saying that used to be common a couple of generations back about people who were in trouble, “There but for the grace of God go I.” That has been much ridiculed. But that was once a common frame of mind. And it represented humility. It represented the en—the, the recognition that we might be in the gutter, we might be all kinds of things if it were not for the grace of God. Worse of all, we might be Pharisees!

Any further questions or comments? Well if not, let us bow our heads in prayer.

Oh Lord our God, we give thanks that Thy grace has made us Thy people, that Thy mercies are new every morning, that we live, move, and have our being in Thee and that our times are in Thy hands who doest all things well. Give us joy, therefore, in our calling, in our life in Christ, in one another. Make us ever mindful of the victory that is ours, and grant that we face all the burdens and problems of this world knowing that the sentence of death is pronounced on the old order, and the promise of life is ours, in Christ. 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.