Deuteronomy

The Levites

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Pentateuch

Lesson: 40-110

Genre: Talk

Track: 040

Dictation Name: RR187V40

Location/Venue:

Year: 1993

Let us worship God. Grace be unto you and peace from Go dour Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord and to sing praises unto the most High. To show forth Thy loving kindness in the morning and Thy faithfulness in the night. Delight Thyself in the Lord and He shall give you the desires of Thy heart. Let us pray.

Our Father we thank thee that Thou art our refuge from the noise of the world and the cares of our own spirits and from the malice from ungodly men. Grant us Thy peace, draw near to us that we may draw near to Thee. Speak to each one of us the word that we need and let Thy word abide in us until it has wrought in us Thy holy will. Renew our strength that we may grow in Thy service, by Thy worship be better enabled all the days of our life. In Christ’s name, Amen.

Our scripture this morning is Deuteronomy 12:17-19. Our subject: The Levites. We shall consider this again next week because this is a key passage in scripture which is radically neglected in our time. The Levites, Deuteronomy 12:17-19.

“Thou mayest not eat within thy gates the tithe of thy corn, or of thy wine, or of thy oil, or the firstlings of thy herds or of thy flock, nor any of thy vows which thou vowest, nor thy freewill offerings, or heave offering of thine hand:

18 But thou must eat them before the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy manservant, and thy maidservant, and the Levite that is within thy gates: and thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God in all that thou puttest thine hands unto.

19 Take heed to thyself that thou forsake not the Levite as long as thou livest upon the earth.”

We come now to a very often stressed law throughout the books of law concerning the Levites. Israel’s clerisy. That is, people who are religious teachers, who are scholars, who function to apply the faith in various spheres. But the Levites have been a problem to modernist scholars. As Merlin D. Rem [sp??] noted and I quote:

“Wellhausen had believed he had solved the problem with the Levites by showing that they had never existed as a priestly class before the monarchial period.” Unquote.

So Wellhausen’s attitude was I’ll get rid of them, I’ll just say this was mythical and someone stuck it into the Bible. In 1902 William Robertson Smith and Abe [unknown] were following the basic Wellhausen premise also as scholars are still doing. Such writers tell us less about the Levites and more about their evolutionary faith and perspective. They force on the biblical pattern an evolutionary scheme. Patrick Fairbairn however unlike these men wrote of the diverse functions of the Levites. Duties in the temple, administrators of the temple treasures, officers for outward business, often servers and judges for the realm, singers, musicians and so on. Above all they were as Deuteronomy 33:10 tells us the instructors, the scholars of Israel. Despite some periods of disobedience by the Levites, speaking of the Old Testament era, William Smith would still say of the Levites:

“It is not often in the history of the world that a religious past or order has passed away with more claims to the respect and gratitude of mankind than the tribe of Levi.” Unquote.

Well, the problem with the Levites is that they do not fit into the patterns men expect. They were as a class very diverse, including of everything from temple custodians to administrators, treasurers and scholars. They were created to meet God’s requirements, not men. This is why C.S. Lewis spoke of the need for reviving a clerisy, Christian scholars who would function in a variety of fields, practical and intellectual for Christ and His kingdom.

The standard for all believers and for the Levites also is stated at the end of verse eighteen, Thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God in all that Thy putest Thy hands unto. God gives to the Levites a variety of tasks, both humble and great, both intellectual and practical and all are to be respected. The Levite in a very important respect made life livable. They provided the intellectual stimulus, the music, the business end of the sanctuary, judgment in everyday life and a focus for living, and on top of that they controlled the great field of charity using the tithe money of the peoples. As a clerisy they bound society together with their duties. They made the difference in society. The world of most Israelites would be a rather private one because during most of Israel’s history the people lived on their ranches and their farms. The requirements to obey the festivals at a central sanctuary made their lives public periodically and it was on these public occasions that their respect for those chosen or protected by God had to be made public, the Levites! Their servants had to be treated as family members but the Levites also had to be regarded as essential to the family life of all and they had to be honored. All men have dependencies on one another, we are told in Ecclesiastes 5:9 moreover over the profit of the earth is for all, the king himself is served by the fields; he cannot live without what the peasant farmer provides in the way of food. Because we do not live rightfully unto ourselves the Lord requires that we share our bounty with the needy and with God’s clerisy. There is no requirement here that the priest necessarily become a party to the families’ celebration. The inclusion of widows and orphans however with God’s clerisy, the Levites, is very clearly stated in Deuteronomy 14:29. Scripture ties the hand and the head together. Faith and works. For as [unknown] and other cultures radically separated the intellectual and practical realms the Bible unites them. The farmer and the sheep rancher, the widow and the orphans, the needy and the foreigner and the Levitical thinker sat down together periodically. They ate together. This has been the function of church potluck suppers from the agape feasts of the early church to the present. These are sacred meals. In verse nineteen the people are warned to not neglect the Levites. The food eaten on such occasions was that which had been specifically set aside for God’s use and it was therefore to be eaten at His sanctuary. This did not exclude feasting with servants, the needy and the Levites in one’s home. Both were aspects of the life of faith.

In verse seventeen the food was referred to as the tithe and this refers to at least part of the second or poor tithe. It is referred to again in Deuteronomy 14:22-29, the Levite which is within thy gates refers to those living within your tribal area and jurisdiction. In Numbers 19:25-26 we are told that where men did not themselves administrate the tithe the Levites received it and administered it. In other words, the decentralized Levites were not an institution but they served God and His people in a variety of capacities as persons. They were not locked into a frame work of institutional character since there was no penalty by men for failure to pay the tithe the status of the Levites could be both high and low. The inclusion of the Levites in the tithe meal before the Lord meant that God’s clerisy had to be regarded as a necessary part of family life. Likewise men and women servants had to be included. To rest in the Lord means to include both high and low in that rest. An older translation of verse eighteen reads and I think it’s beautiful: “And thou shalt be merry before the Lord thy God in all things whereunto thou puttest thy hand.” Thou shalt be merry! Marvelous commandment. I think one that churches pay almost no attention to. This stress on the freedom of joy is an important one. The feast before the Lord was not to be a chore, a sense of duty, but it was to be celebrated as an aspect of the joy of life. First Peter 3:7 speaks of husbands and wives as being heirs together of the grace of life. As men become godless they become joyless. The song departs from life to be replaced by an unending hunger for noise and activity to cover the barren and empty lives of men. It is after this command to rejoice and make merry before the Lord that we have the warning to forsake not the Levite as long as thou livest upon the earth. They are the ones who provide charity, scholarship and the application of the law. Man’s peace with God requires faith in his law word. To neglect the Levite, God’s clerisy, is to reduce one’s vision. According to Proverbs 29:18:

“Where there is no vision the people perish (or literally, is made naked), but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.”

Vision comes from the faithful interpretation and application of God’s revelation. We need God’s clerisy to interpret the times in terms of God’s revelation. The bonding of society from the needy to the leaders is here set forth and it is in terms of God and His covenant. Let us pray.

Our Father, provide Thy church, make it again a strong movement of power on earth. One that is joyful, that makes merry in Christ for Thee. One that is faithful to Thy law word, one that honors and supports scholarship and charitable work as well as missions. One that honors thy clerisy, thy Levites. We thank Thee that Thy word is truth, speak to us always the word that we need and bless and prosper us to Thy glory and to Thy service. In Christ’s name, Amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson?

As I said we will be dealing with this text again next week because there is so much here that we cannot cover in one day. We’ve dealt with texts on the Levites several times before and yet the material is really remarkable and almost inexhaustible. One of the things I hope for and I believe is absolutely necessary if we when the world is collapsing all around us are enabled to turn the world around and it is precisely for the revival of Christian scholarship and Christian charity. And this is the work of the Levites in biblical terms and of the clerisy in the modern term. So the subject is very important. If there are no questions, then let us bow our heads in prayer.

Our Father, we rejoice in Thy word. Thy word is truth and light and lamp upon our heads. Grant oh Lord that Thy church open its heart and its eyes to Thy word, to Thy truth, to the burden and responsibility to obey Thee in every jot and tittle of Thy word. For Thou hast said through Thy Son that heaven and earth shall not pass away until every jot and tittle be put into force, fulfilled. Make us instrumental to that 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.