Numbers: Faith, Law, and History

Priests and People

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Lesson: Priests and People

Genre:

Track: 34

Dictation Name: RR181S34

Location/Venue:

Year:

Let us worship God. Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise. Let us pray.

Oh Lord, our God, we thank thee that thou who art Lord of heaven and earth, maker of all things visible and invisible hast, in thy mercy chosen to dwell with us. Thou hast promised that where two or three are gathered together in thy name, thou art there in their midst. Then welcome, oh Lord. Bless us by thy Holy Spirit. Open our eyes to understand better thy word and rejoice therein, and to know that greater is He that is in us and with us than he that is in the world. We thank thee that thou art He that rules and overrules, who is all wise and all provident purposes shall prevail. Our God, we thank thee. In Christ’s name. Amen.

Our scripture is Numbers 18:8-19. Our subject: Priests and People. Numbers 18:8-19. Priests and People. “And the Lord spake unto Aaron, Behold, I also have given thee the charge of mine heave offerings of all the hallowed things of the children of Israel; unto thee have I given them by reason of the anointing, and to thy sons, by an ordinance for ever. This shall be thine of the most holy things, reserved from the fire: every oblation of their's, every meat offering of their's, and every sin offering of their's, and every trespass offering of their's which they shall render unto me, shall be most holy for thee and for thy sons. In the most holy place shalt thou eat it; every male shall eat it: it shall be holy unto thee. And this is thine; the heave offering of their gift, with all the wave offerings of the children of Israel: I have given them unto thee, and to thy sons and to thy daughters with thee, by a statute for ever: every one that is clean in thy house shall eat of it. All the best of the oil, and all the best of the wine, and of the wheat, the firstfruits of them which they shall offer unto the Lord, them have I given thee. And whatsoever is first ripe in the land, which they shall bring unto the Lord, shall be thine; every one that is clean in thine house shall eat of it. Every thing devoted in Israel shall be thine. Every thing that openeth the matrix in all flesh, which they bring unto the Lord, whether it be of men or beasts, shall be thine: nevertheless the firstborn of man shalt thou surely redeem, and the firstling of unclean beasts shalt thou redeem. And those that are to be redeemed from a month old shalt thou redeem, according to thine estimation, for the money of five shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs. But the firstling of a cow, or the firstling of a sheep, or the firstling of a goat, thou shalt not redeem; they are holy: thou shalt sprinkle their blood upon the altar, and shalt burn their fat for an offering made by fire, for a sweet savour unto the Lord. And the flesh of them shall be thine, as the wave breast and as the right shoulder are thine. All the heave offerings of the holy things, which the children of Israel offer unto the Lord, have I given thee, and thy sons and thy daughters with thee, by a statute for ever: it is a covenant of salt for ever before the Lord unto thee and to thy seed with thee.”

God often repeated himself even as we do with unruly children. He knows our habit of listening closely to what is favorable to us, and then having a sudden attack of deafness if our desires and views are contradicted. We had better listen carefully to what this chapter has to say. This same material is, in substance, repeated before and after. Later, in Deuteronomy 18:1-8 and in Ezekiel 44:28-31 and it appears earlier in Leviticus 6:16-18 and Leviticus 7:6-9 and 31-33 as well as elsewhere.

In verse 8, God says, I have given thee the charge of various offerings, which can be translated, “I have given thee what is reserved from the altar of the contributions made to me, even all the sacred gifts.” In other words, certain things which belong only to God are reserved for the priests.

First, there were portions of the sacrificial animals, other than the whole offering and the shared animal, which was eaten in a shared communion meal, these went to the priests. Second, the oil, wine, and firstfruits. Third, the firstborn of animals and men, male firstborns, were to be redeemed by the believer and a payment made. Fourth, these things that were for priestly consumption were to be shared with his family but not with a married daughter who is no longer in the same household. Fifth, in verse 19, this is called a covenant of salt, an expression we find also in 2 Chronicles 13:5. Because salt was used to preserve foods, a covenant of salt meant an enduring covenant.

Now, St. Paul refers to this chapter when he cites the fact that although it was his right to do so, he had never charged the church for his travel or for his support. In 1 Corinthians 9:13-14, he says, “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? Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.” The priest could take only certain specified things.

Now, this meant that in times of faith, they were well provided for as worshippers brought in their sacrifices and firstfruits. At other times, they were no doubt near starvation. This meant that it was a temptation in times of waning faith for the priests to give the people the kind of religion they wanted. They were thus open to temptation. Now this is an important fact. Historically, it is very important. It says that in a time of faith, those who serve the Lord, are going to prosper. When there is no faith, they’re going to be starving, and the people will get what God then metes out to them. I said this is an important fact, historically. Nothing has been written, only incidental references to the history of this fact, in the history of western Europe, in the modern age. We had state churches. This meant that everywhere, the clergy, whether Catholic or Protestant, were dependant on the state. In old Russian, for example, while the state chose to build magnificent cathedrals and churches, the priests were barely given enough to live, and because they would have left in order to find gainful employment, they were compelled to remain in the priesthood and their sons had to secede them by law, or go to prison. That’s the only way they maintain the church. They starved the clergy.

Now, this only ended in the latter days of the czars, but by that time it was too late. They had a broken clergy. There was a state church in Lutheran Germany, again treated the same way, and what was the result? They were so abjectly humiliated by the state that they could not marry without the permission of the local prince, who gave them his cast-off mistresses. That was his way o getting rid of unwanted women.

The Galician church, the state-controlled Catholic church of France, did the same thing. In fact, there and elsewhere, the use of the Magnificat, a part of the liturgy in Lutheranism and Catholicism and other churches, was forbidden because the Magnificat said of our Lord, Jesus Christ, that he came to put down the mighty from their seats and to exalt them that are of low estate. In England, the same thing prevailed, and the only reason why it was saved from a revolution was because there was enough freedom of religion to permit the possibility of the Wesleyan revival and then the evangelical revival at the beginning of the last century. So, there is a correlation between obedience to God’s required support of His servants and as we shall see in a couple weeks, of His scholars and what happens to a country.

There is no where in the Bible any guarantee against sin, nor any ground for believing that a good and safe society can be established apart from God and His law word. There were other things that the priests could receive; a tenth of the tithe paid to the Levites was to be paid to the priests according to Numbers 18:26. This was the tithe that provided for instruction for scholarship, but again, it depended on whether the people paid the tithe. Where there was no living offended person to whom restitution could be made, it was to be made to the priests, according to Numbers 5:6-8. The priest could also eat the bread set before the Lord, and they received the hide of burnt offerings.

According to Marsing, the ultimate pleasure of all these offerings was to ensure the good pleasure of the Lord. To eat of them was to have a share in this great benefit, and faithfulness to God leads to an ever-widening circle of benefits. If His priests, His clergy, and His scholars are blessed by the people, the benefits move outward.

A difference is made between the priest’s portions. First, in verses 9 and 10, we are told that the cereal offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering portions are most holy and could be eaten only by the priest within the sanctuary. Second, the other group of offerings could be eaten by any clean member of the priest’s family, according to verses 11-19. Now there is an important aspect to these rules. The priests are required, or were required to be faithful to God. At every point, like the Levites, they had a carefully circumscribed part in God’s realm. We can say that everyone has such a place, strictly under God’s government and law. At the same time, the priests and also the Levites were dependant on the people for their living. It was therefore very easy for them to be unduly swayed by the people. They could be very prone and we can all think of clergymen today who are so, to giving the people what they want, and prospering in that way. The greater, however, the responsibilities God gives us, the greater our exposure to temptation attacks and liabilities, and to His judgment. People prefer to live their lives without any reminder of their duties to God and his servants. In God’s providence, maximum responsibilities and privileges mean maximum exposure and hostilities.

In the modern age, the age of the state, the goal has been to make responsibility faceless by means of bureaucracies, committees, and group decisions. Not surprisingly, we are thereby especially vulnerable to corruption on a massive scale. I can recall being at a meeting, it was in the late 40s or early 50’s, and I was invited on the strength of an article I wrote on welfarism, which was reprinted in papers from coast to coast. They were important men; industrialists, and one of the things I remember vividly from that meeting was that the foundations they had created were all going to be destroyed. How? Because the ruling step-by-step was going to lead to something which was finally accomplished within twenty years thereafter. No man could control a foundation. He had to have a committee. In time, that committee had to be governed by people neither employed by him nor related to him, which meant he would lose control, and the foundation would become faceless, just as state bureaucracies are faceless. Group decisions and committees are the order of the day.

Not surprisingly, we are thereby especially vulnerable to corruption on a massive scale. This situation, whereby God’s servants are required to be strictly faithful to Him while materially dependant on the people is of God’s devising. It requires a strong and courageous clergy and clerisy, one capable of withstanding the voice of the people. The voice of the people is not the voice of God. Only the voice of God is the voice of God.

The premise of the gifts brought to the sanctuary is that all increase of every kind belongs to God. This must be acknowledged by the presentation of at the shrine of the firstfruits and the first that is born. They are not given to God, but presented since they are already God’s. Not only the gift but the giver belongs to God, and the presentation of the firstfruits, and the gifts, and the tithes requires the surrender of ourselves to the triune God. The plain meaning of this chapter militates against the notion that the service, the true service of God, is easy. We are required to be dependant upon God, while materially dependant upon the people. This means that God’s clergy and clerisy must seek faithfulness rather than material success. It means that courage is required. It means standing up to the people. It means going against the current, in our time, of democracy, and insisting on God’s rule, not man’s. The modern state hides its evils in a vast bureaucracy, and endless rules and regulations which make for anonymity, and this was the downfall of the church, in the Middle Ages and in the modern era.

We forget because it’s being dropped out of the history books that for centuries, one of the three great popes was regarded as the infamous Borge Alexander. Why? Because he was an able administrator who created the papal bureaucracy which is still in place. Only with the embarrassment created by modern historians as they have told more plainly the facts about that Borge pope, as he been quietly forgotten as one of the three great popes. But, the bureaucracy continues in the Vatican, and it continues in every Protestant church. It’s created as soon as a new church is created.

One sizable church that broke away after World War 2 already has a considerable bureaucracy. The anonymity of cowardice now surrounds us, and all too many men are silent. We do not advance in history by means of any bureaucracy, or any natural force, or any pendulum, but only by faith and moral courage as individual men manifest it, and this is the great need of our time. Let us pray.

Oh Lord, our God, we thank thee for thy word, and we thank thee that thy word speaks to our needs. We know, oh Lord, that men hide from thy word. They relegate it to oblivion or to past generations and dispensations, and they refuse to acknowledge thy truth. Oh Lord, our God, make us receptive. By thy Holy Spirit, open our hearts to know, to hear, to obey, to know that whether or not we obey thee, thy will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven, and it will be either done against us and to our judgment or for our blessing. In Christ’s name. Amen. Are there any questions now about our lesson? Yes?

[Audience] You spoke of the repetitions that certain commands enjoy throughout scripture. Where {?} where you build doctrine around one scripture but ignore the commands that are repeated many, many times throughout scripture.

[Rushdoony] When we what?

[Audience] We build doctrines around single scripture like the millennium {?} something that’s repeated many, many times we don’t pay attention to it.

[Rushdoony] That’s right, and we forget something that is basic not only to the Bible, but to teaching as it once existed. Repetition. Drill. Line upon line, precept upon precept, and of course, that is something that in some of our modern music is missing. The thematic element, and without the thematic element, it loses its meaning, it becomes mindless. Yes?

[Audience] Well, bureaucracy began as an improvement because it’s systematized effort, and the problem is that it’s strength between the sweetness, because as it increased, its efficiency declines. The Soviets have got a problem with fifteen million bureaucrats calling themselves the Community party.

[Rushdoony] Yes. King John, whom we knew as boys as the bad king, is now regarded as a great king because he started the English bureaucracy. The trouble with bureaucracy is that it becomes faceless. Now, when a bureaucracy around a ruler had a face, it was incorruptible. It is interesting that the one who preserved Queen Elizabeth’s throne, Walsingham, has never had a biography. Others around her have had, but Walsingham, unlike all the others, was incorruptible. He lived and died a poor man. His widow and family were near starvation because she did not pay, except rarely, and he served faithfully. He stood out. He never sought anonymity and he never courted publicity, but he was rigorously honest, preserved Queen Elizabeth, and to this day, there is not a single thing written about him, no biography that I know of.

[Audience] Elizabeth hated him.

[Rushdoony] Yes. She hated him. He was rigorously honest. He was a Puritan also.

[Audience] She could have no control over him.

[Rushdoony] And yet she knew she needed him. She could not do without him. But a faceless bureaucracy is the order of the day.

[Audience] Now the second regulation issued by a single agency of our government, including the White House, has got the name of the {?}

[Rushdoony] That’s right, and I shall never recall about twenty years ago when I spoke to a group in Washington, D.C., one of the listeners was a man from the IRS. He indicated that it was my materials, the Chalcedon Report, came across his desk regularly, but he said, “I did not understand the nature of the IRS and other federal bureaucracies, that they prefer anonymity,” and he said, “You cannot understand what it is all about unless you recognize that everything we do by our own desire as well as the intent of any agency is faceless and impersonal.

[Audience] That’s a very personal attack.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience] One that comes to mind, the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings law which they all scrambled to get their name on, and then immediately repudiated right after the election. It was meant purely to {?} the government was going to balance the budget when in fact they knew it was impossible to do.

[Rushdoony] Yes. Well, that kind of thing has happened. I read a book recently which gives several similar instances. Yes, Martin?

[Audience] You spoke of clergy being kept penniless, sometimes by {?} design. Is there any relationship between that and the vow of poverty?

[Rushdoony] And the what?

[Audience] Vow of poverty that certain churches . . .

[Rushdoony] Between that and the vow of poverty? No, because the vow of poverty was taken between certain orders, whether in Catholic countries or in old Russia, and this was the regular clergy that was kept in poverty, because they had the ear of the people every week and during the week. We must remember daily masses in some countries, and a variety of services in Lutheran churches and Russian Orthodox churches. So, by keeping them in poverty, they kept them subservient. They broke their will. It’s an aspect of modern history that we do not know. The captivity of the Russian church began with Peter the Great. The old believers broke and they were independent and they were the capitalist class of old Russia. They were the great sources of charity. What they did was very, very remarkable, and they were growing by leaps and bounds, and they were crushed by legislation in the latter years of the last century, and in bitterness, they turned and supported the enemies of the regime, unfortunately, and helped create the revolution, but the old believers are still there. We’ve heard nothing of late of them, but Solzhenitsyn was very close to them, and may have been one of them. We don’t know. He’s never spoken of it, except he has very favorable things to say about them. Yes?

[Audience] Can you define the meaning of the word “heave” as in heave offering?

[Rushdoony] A heave offering was an offering that was taken to the altar and it was heaved or waved before the Lord like this, like that, so a sign of the cross was made as it was presented before God, which is a very interesting fact that people don’t deal with, either Christians or Jews, ironically, but it was given to God first to indicate it was his, and we, together with him, belong to him. Any other questions or comments? If not, let us close with prayer.

Our Father, it is good for us to be here, for thy word is truth. Thy word speaks to our every need and to all the burdens and problems of this world, to its sins, and to its hopes. Bless us by thy word and by thy spirit, and make us faithful. 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