Leviticus · Chapter 17

V. 3. That killeth-Not for common use, for such beasts might be killed by any person or in any place but for sacrifice. In the camp, or out of the camp-That is, anywhere.

Verse 3. That killeth — Not for common use, for such beasts might be killed by any person or in any place, (Deuteronomy 12:5-14, 26, 27,) but for sacrifice, as the sense is limited, verse 5, where the reason of the injunction is given. It is true, some suppose that the Israelites were forbidden by this law, while they were in the wilderness, to kill, even for food, any of the animals that were wont to be sacrificed, elsewhere than in the door of the tabernacle, where the blood and the fat were to be offered to God upon the altar, and the flesh returned to the offerer to be eaten as a peace-offering according to the law. And the statute is so worded in Verses 3, 4, as to favour this opinion. The learned Dr. Cudworth understands if in this sense, and thinks that while they had their tabernacle so near them, in the midst of their camp, they ate no flesh but what had first been offered to God; but that when they were about to enter Canaan, this constitution was altered, and they were allowed to kill their beasts of the flock and herd at home, as well as the roe-buck and the hart, (Deuteronomy 12:21,) only that thrice a year they were to see God at his tabernacle, and to eat and drink before him. It is indeed probable, that in the wilderness they did not eat much flesh but that of their peace-offerings, preserving what cattle they had for breed, against they came to Canaan. And yet it is hard to construe into a mere temporary law, what is expressly said to be a statute for ever, verse 7. And, therefore, it seems rather to forbid only the killing beasts for sacrifice anywhere but at God’s altar. They must not offer a sacrifice as they had done in the open field, (verse 5,) no, not to the true God; but their sacrifices must be brought to the priest, to be offered on the altar of the Lord. And the mighty solemnity they had lately seen of consecrating both the priests and the altar, would serve for a good reason why they should confine themselves to both these which God had so signally appointed and owned.

Verse 3. Killeth an ox; not for the purpose of eating, but for sacrifice. The object of this precept was first to prevent idolatry, and next to support the religion appointed of God to shadow forth the glory of Christ. But the precept was not absolute. Samuel offered sacrifice in Mizpeh, David at Araunah’s, and Elijah on mount Carmel.

3. In the camp — In addition to the ceremonial, there were doubtless sanitary grounds for the requirement that all slaughter in the camp be in one place, where there was doubtless some way of disposing of the blood without endangering the public health. See Introduction, (6.) The private slaughter of domestic animals was doubtless forbidden as a safeguard against the propensity to idol offerings, which the people brought with them out of Egypt. The suggestion has weight, that since the herds were scanty, the requirement to bring animals for slaughter to the tabernacle was also designed to act as a check against too great a reduction of their number. Only the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half of Manasseh seem to have had what might be called large herds. Numbers 32. There can be little doubt, that during the forty years in the wilderness oxen and sheep were rarely used as food, whence it was flesh that Israel so greatly lusted after. Out of the camp — The inconvenience of this requirement, when Israel was widely scattered in the wilderness for pasturage, is greatly mitigated by the fact that they were miraculously fed with manna. Their disgust for this, and clamour for animal food, (Numbers 11:6,) indicates that they rarely slew any animal of their flocks for food. But when the manna had ceased, and the tabernacle was fixed in one place, this prohibition was repealed in advance by Moses, (Deuteronomy 12:13-15,) so far as animals intended for food are concerned, and the people were permitted to kill and eat in all their gates.

V. 4. The tabernacle-This was appointed in opposition to the Heathens, who sacrificed in all places; to cut off occasions of idolatry; to prevent the people’s usurpation of the priest’s office, and to signify that God would accept of no sacrifices but through Christ and in the Church; (of both which the tabernacle was a type.) But though men were tied to this law, God was free to dispense with his own law, which he did sometimes to the prophets, as 1 Samuel 7:9, 11:15. He hath shed blood-He shall be punished as a murderer. The reason is, because he shed that blood, which, though not man’s blood, yet was precious, being sacred and appropriated to God, and typically the price by which men’s lives were ransomed.

Verse 4. And bringeth it not unto the door] As sacrifice was ever deemed essential to true religion, it was necessary that it should be performed in such a way as to secure the great purpose of its institution. God alone could show how this should be done so as to be pleasing in his sight, and therefore he has given the most plain and particular directions concerning it. The Israelites, from their long residence in Egypt, an idolatrous country, had doubtless adopted many of their usages; and many portions of the Pentateuch seem to have been written merely to correct and bring them back to the purity of the Divine worship.

That no blood should be offered to idols, God commands every animal used for food or sacrifice to be slain at the door of the tabernacle. While every animal was slain in this sacrificial way, even the daily food of the people must put them in mind of the necessity of a sacrifice for sin. Perhaps St. Paul had this circumstance in view when he said, Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God, 1 Corinthians 10:31; and, Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. While the Israelites were encamped in the wilderness, it was comparatively easy to prevent all abuses of this Divine institution; and therefore they were all commanded to bring the oxen, sheep, and goats to the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, that they might be slain there, and their blood sprinkled upon the altar of the Lord. But when they became settled in the promised land, and the distance, in many cases, rendered it impossible for them to bring the animals to be slain for domestic uses to the temple, they were permitted to pour out the blood in a sacrificial way unto God at their respective dwellings, and to cover it with the dust; see Leviticus 17:13, and Deuteronomy 12:20,21. Blood shall be imputed unto that man] Having poured out the blood improperly, he shall be considered as guilty of murder, because that blood, had it been properly and sacrificially employed, might have made atonement for the life of a man.

Verse 4. The tabernacle — This was appointed in opposition to the heathens, who sacrificed in all places; to cut off occasions of idolatry; to prevent the people’s usurpation of the priest’s office, and to signify that God would accept of no sacrifices but through Christ and in the church; of both which the tabernacle was a type. But though men were tied to this law, God was free to dispense with his own law, which he did sometimes to the prophets, as 1 Samuel 7:9; 11:15. He hath shed blood — He shall be punished as a murderer. The reason is, because he shed that blood, which, though not man’s blood, yet was precious, being sacred and appropriated to God, and typically the price by which men’s lives were ransomed.

4. An offering unto the Lord — The blood and fat were sacrificially treated, but nothing is said respecting the priest’s portion which was allotted in peace offerings. There was also the same priestly inspection. Modern Jews eat no meat which has not the seal of the rabbi certifying that the animal was without blemish. Herein again is a sanitary safeguard. Blood shall be imputed — This is explained by the following words: He hath shed blood. He is classified with those who have wickedly shed human blood, and are guilty of murder. Cut off — He shall be punished with death, without defining the manner. Thus the Seventy and the Vulgate. The punishment is never exile, as is supposed by J.D. Michaelis.

V. 5. They offer-The Israelites, before the building of the tabernacle, did so, from which they are now restrained. Peace-offerings-He nameth not these exclusively from others, as appears from the reason of the law, and from Leviticus 17:8,9, but because in these the temptation was more common in regard of their frequency, and more powerful, because part of these belonged to the offerer, and the pretence was more plausible, because their sanctity was of a lower degree than others, these being only called holy, and allowed in part to the people, whereas the others are called most holy, and were wholly appropriated either to God, or to the priests.

Verse 5. They offer — The Israelites, before the building of the tabernacle, did so, from which they are now restrained. Peace-offerings — He does not name these exclusively from others, as appears from the reason of the law, and from verses 8, 9, but because in these the temptation was more common in regard of their frequency, and more powerful, because part of these belonged to the offerers, and the pretence was more plausible, because their sanctity was of a lower degree than that of others, these being only called holy, and allowed in part to the people, whereas the others are called most holy, and were wholly appropriated either to God, or to the priests.

5. Sacrifices which they offer — Animals which Israel would have slain for food in the open field, that is, outside the enclosed space of the court of the tabernacle, are required to be slain as peace offerings, in the manner prescribed in Leviticus 3, and 7:11-34, though the limitation of the time of eating was probably removed, nor is it certain that the priest’s portion, the heave offering, was demanded.

V. 6. Upon the altar-This verse contains a reason of the foregoing law, because of God’s propriety in the blood and fat, wherewith also God was well pleased, and the people reconciled. And these two parts only are mentioned, as the most eminent, and peculiar, though other parts also were reserved for God.

Verse 6. Upon the altar — This verse contains a reason of the foregoing law, because of God’s propriety in the blood and fat, wherewith also God was well pleased, and the people reconciled. And these two parts only are mentioned, as the most eminent and peculiar, though other parts also were reserved for God.

6. Burn the fat — See Leviticus 3:3, 17; 7:23, 25, notes. Sweet savour — Leviticus 1:9, note.

V. 7. Unto devils-So they did, not directly or intentionally, but by construction and consequence, because the devil is the author of idolatry, and is eminently served, and honoured by it. And as the Egyptians were notorious for their idolatry, so the Israelites were infected with their leaven, Joshua 24:14, Ezekiel 20:7, 23:2,3. A whoring-Idolatry, especially in God’s people, is commonly called whoredom, because it is a violation of that covenant by which they were peculiarly betrothed or married to God.

Verse 7. They shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils] They shall not sacrifice µyry[cl lasseirim, to the hairy ones, to goats. The famous heathen god, Pan, was represented as having the posteriors, horns, and ears of a goat; and the Mendesians, a people of Egypt, had a deity which they worshipped under this form. Herodotus says that all goats were worshipped in Egypt, but the he-goat particularly. It appears also that the different ape and monkey species were objects of superstitious worship; and from these sprang, not only Mendes and Jupiter Ammon, who was worshipped under the figure of a ram, but also Pan and the Sileni, with the innumerable herd of those imaginary beings, satyrs, dryads, hamadryads, &c. &c., all woodland gods, and held in veneration among the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans.

After whom they have gone a whoring.] Though this term is frequently used to express idolatry, yet we are not to suppose that it is not to be taken in a literal sense in many places in Scripture, even where it is used in connection with idolatrous acts of worship. It is well known that Baal-Peor and Ashtaroth were worshipped with unclean rites; and that public prostitution formed a grand part of the worship of many deities among the Egyptians, Moabites, Canaanites, Greeks, and Romans. The great god of the two latter nations, Jupiter, was represented as the general corrupter of women; and of Venus, Flora, Priapus, and others, it is needless to speak. That there was public prostitution in the patriarchal times, see Clarke on “Genesis 38:21”. And that there was public prostitution of women to goats in Egypt, see Herodotus, lib. ii., c. 46, p. 108, edit. Gale, who gives a case of this abominable kind that took place in Egypt while he was in that country. See also many examples in Bochart, vol. ii., col. 641; and see Clarke’s note on “Leviticus 20:16”.

Verse 7. Unto devils — So they did, not directly or intentionally, but by construction and consequence, because the devil is the author of idolatry, and is eminently served and honoured by it. And as the Egyptians were notorious for their idolatry, so the Israelites were infected with their leaven, Joshua 24:14; Ezekiel 20:7; 23:2, 3. And some of them continued to practise the same in the wilderness, Amos 5:25, 26, compared with Deuteronomy 12:8. The Hebrew word which we render devils, µyry[c, segnirim, properly signifies goats, from their rough and shaggy hair, and hence denotes those idols, probably deified dead men, who were worshipped under the symbol of goats. It is the same word that we translate satyrs, Isaiah 13:21. What gives light to so obscure a passage is what we read in Maimonides, that the Zabian idolaters worshipped demons under the figure of goats, imagining them to appear in that form, whence they called them by the name here mentioned, segnirim, or goats; and that this custom being general in Moses’s time, gave occasion to this precept. After whom they have gone a whoring — Idolatry, especially in God’s people, is commonly termed whoredom in Scripture, because it is a violation of that covenant by which they were peculiarly betrothed or married to God. And here the phrase has a peculiar propriety, and denotes their having worshipped those goats, or goat-like demons, with rites horribly impure, after the manner of the idolatrous pagans.

Ver. 7. Devils. µry[cl literally, beings full of hair, as the goats worshipped in Egypt; figuratively, fawns and satyrs of every kind which the imagination can paint. It was under a thousand vain figures in which the idols were made, that Satan availed himself, to draw the worship of men wholly to himself. Our version reads “devils,” as the Vulgate; and St. Paul calls the cup of idols “the cup of devils,” to which they offered blood. Israel being now married to the Lord, such worship would be spiritual fornication or adultery.

7. Devils — The Hebrew seirim, literally, the shaggy ones, or goats, has a wonderful variety of renderings in the Authorized Version. See Leviticus 23:19, note. The Vulgate renders it daemones, and Luther “field devils;” the Seventy, toiv mataioiv, usually translated idols; but Schleusner here renders it demons, the Revised Version, “devils.” These were supposed by the Egyptians to inhabit the desert. The Israelites had brought this superstition out of Egypt, where goats were worshipped as gods, particularly Pan, the impersonation of the male principle in nature, under the name of Mendes. From these arose the innumerable herd of satyrs, fauns, and dryads which figure so largely in Grecian and Roman mythology. Gone a whoring — This strong metaphor for the practice of idolatry expresses Jehovah’s abhorrence of polytheistic rites celebrated by his people. As Jehovah by his covenant had married Israel, their worship of other gods was like the infidelities of a wife. Jeremiah 3:1, 14; James 4:4, 5, R.V. But since most of the ancient idolatries were grossly licentious, the term whoring may be used in a sense not altogether figurative. See Numbers 14:33, note. A statute forever — Since there was a repeal of the laws relating to the place of killing animals for food, (see verse 4, note,) the unchangeable statute must relate to the worship of demons and false gods. No command is more scrupulously kept by the Jews of to-day. The first sentence taught to every Hebrew child is the Shema Israel, “Hear, O Israel, Jehovah thy God is one God.” This safeguard against polytheism rings out in all their synagogues whenever the scroll of the law is taken from its sacred depository, every reading being prefaced by this loud proclamation.

8. Strangers… sacrifice — For the religious privileges and obligations of strangers, see Leviticus 1:2; 23:22, notes. The Israelites were expressly forbidden to offer burnt offerings in every place, but only “in the place which the Lord shall choose,” in order to preserve the unity of the ritual and of the nation, and to exclude idolatry. To build a rival altar was to erect a rival throne. See Joshua 22:10-12. It was reasonable that resident strangers should be subjected to a law which concerned the life of the state. No sacrifice can be offered except at the door of the tabernacle, and this can be erected only in the place selected by Jehovah; (Deuteronomy 12:5-14;) it follows that, since Mount Moriah was the last place chosen for the “house of sacrifice,” (2 Chronicles 7:12,) the Jews, ever since their exclusion from this sacred spot, have been destitute of all lawful burnt offerings, sin offerings, and days of atonement. This wretched disability has induced a few of them to bow to Jesus Christ. To the sin-burdened Jew this is the weakest point in his religion.

V. 10. I will set my face-I will be an enemy to him, and execute vengeance upon him immediately; because such persons probably would do this in private, so that the magistrate could not know nor punish it. Write that man undone, for ever undone, against whom God sets his face.

Verse 10. I will set my face — I will be an enemy to him, and execute vengeance upon him immediately; because such persons probably would do this in private, so that the magistrate could not know nor punish it. Write that man undone, for ever undone, against whom God sets his face.

10. I will even set my face against — This form of words indicates that the extermination of the blood eater will not be by imperfect human judicatories, but by the direct intervention of Jehovah cutting off the offender, as if guilty of a most heinous crime. See Leviticus 7:26, note.

V. 11. Is in the blood-Depends upon the blood, is preserved and nourished by it. The blood maketh atonement-Typically, and in respect of the blood of Christ which it represented, by which the atonement is really made. So the reason is double;

1. because this was eating up the ransom of their own lives, which in construction was the destroying of themselves.

2. because it was ingratitude and irreverence towards that sacred blood of Christ which they ought to have in continual veneration.

Verse 11. For the life of the flesh is in the blood] This sentence, which contains a most important truth, had existed in the Mosaic writings for 3600 years before the attention of any philosopher was drawn to the subject. This is the more surprising, as the nations in which philosophy flourished were those which especially enjoyed the Divine oracles in their respective languages. That the blood actually possesses a living principle, and that the life of the whole body is derived from it, is a doctrine of Divine revelation, and a doctrine which the observations and experiments of the most accurate anatomists have served strongly to confirm. The proper circulation of this important fluid through the whole human system was first taught by Solomon in figurative language, Ecclesiastes 12:6; and discovered, as it is called, and demonstrated, by Dr. Harvey in 1628; though some Italian philosophers had the same notion a little before. This accurate anatomist was the first who fully revived the Mosaic notion of the vitality of the blood; which notion was afterward adopted by the justly celebrated Dr. John Hunter, professor of anatomy in London, and fully established by him by a great variety of strong reasoning and accurate experiments. To support this opinion Dr. Hunter proves:—

1. That the blood unites living parts in some circumstances as certainly as the yet recent juices of the branch of one tree unite with that of another; and he thinks that if either of these fluids were dead matter, they would act as stimuli, and no union would take place in the animal or vegetable kingdom; and he shows that in the nature of things there is not a more intimate connection between life and a solid than between life and a fluid.

2. He shows that the blood becomes vascular, like other living parts of the body; and he demonstrated this by a preparation in which vessels were clearly seen to arise from what had been a coagulum of blood; for those vessels opened into the stream of the circulating blood, which was in contiguity with this coagulated mass.

3. He proves that if blood be taken from the arm in the most intense cold that the human body can suffer, it will raise the thermometer to the same height as blood taken in the most sultry heat. This is a very powerful argument for the vitality of the blood, as it is well known that living bodies alone have the power of resisting great degrees of heat and cold, and of maintaining in almost every situation while in health that temperature which we distinguish by the name of animal heat.

4. He proves that blood is capable of being acted upon by a stimulus, as it coagulates on exposure to the air, as certainly as the cavities of the abdomen and thorax become inflamed from the same cause. The more the blood is alive, i.e., the more the animal is in health, the sooner the blood coagulates on exposure; and the more it has lost of the living principle, as in cases of violent inflammation, the less sensible it is to the stimulus produced by being exposed, and coagulates more slowly.

5. He proves that the blood preserves life in different parts of the body. When the nerves going to any part are tied or cut, the part becomes paralytic, and loses all power of motion, but it does not mortify. But let the artery be cut, and then the part dies and mortification ensues. It must therefore be the vital principle of the blood that keeps the part alive; nor does it appear that this fact can be accounted for on any other principle.

6. He thinks this vitality farther proved from the case of a person who was brought to St. George’s hospital for a simple fracture of the os humeri, and who died about a month after. As the bones had not united, he injected the arm, and thus found that the coagulated blood which filled the cavity between the extremities of the fractured bones was become vascular, and in some places very much so, which vessels, had it been dead matter, it never could have produced.

This system has been opposed, and arguments have been adduced to prove that the principle of vitality exists not in the blood but in the nervous system. But every argument on this ground appears to be done away by the simple consideration that the whole nervous system, as well as every other part of the body, is originally derived from the blood; for is it not from the blood of the mother that the fetus has its being and nourishment in the womb? Do not all the nerves, as well as the brain, &c., originate from that alone? And if it be not vital can it give the principle of vitality to something else, which then exclusively (though the effect of a cause) becomes the principle of vitality to all the solids and fluids of the body? This seems absurd. That the human being proceeded originally from the blood admits of no doubt; and it is natural and reasonable to suppose that as it was the cause under God which generated all the other parts of the body, so it still continues to be the principle of life, and by it alone all the wastes of the system are repaired. Two points relative to this subject are strongly asserted in Divine revelation, one by MOSES, the other by ST. PAUL.

1. Moses says, The LIFE of the flesh is in the BLOOD, Leviticus 17:11. This has been proved by the most indisputable facts.

2. St. Paul says, God hath made of ONE BLOOD all nations of men, Acts 17:26. And this is demonstrated, not only from there being only one pair from whom all the nations of men have been derived, but also from the fact that every human being, from the first-born of Eve to the present hour, has been formed out of and supported by the mother’s blood; and that from the agency of this fluid the human body, after being born into the world, has its increment and support. The reason given by God for the law against eating blood is perfectly conclusive: I will set my face against that soul that eateth blood-for the LIFE (vpn nephesh) of the flesh is in the BLOOD, and I have given it to you upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls (נפשתיכם naphshotheychem, your LIVES:) for it is the blood (because it is the LIFE, vpn nephesh) that maketh an atonement for the soul (vpnb bannephesh, for the life; for the word is the same in all these cases.) By transgression a man forfeits his LIFE to Divine justice, and he must die, did not mercy provide him a substitute. The life of a beast is appointed and accepted by God as a substitute for the sinner’s life (in reference to the life of Christ, which was to be given for the life of the world;) but as this life is in the BLOOD, and as the blood is the grand principle of vitality, therefore the blood is to be poured out upon the altar: and thus the life of the beast becomes a substitute for the life of the man. And it is well worthy of being remarked, that Christ not only died for sinners, but our redemption is everywhere attributed to his BLOOD, and the shedding of that blood; and that on the altar of the cross, this might make an atonement for the lives and souls of men, he not only bowed his head, and gave up the ghost, but his side was opened, the pericardium and the heart evidently pierced, that the vital fluid might be poured out from the very seat of life, and that thus the blood, which is the life, should be poured out to make an atonement for the life of the soul. The doctrine of Moses and Paul proves the truth of the doctrine of Harvey and Hunter; and the reasonings and experiments of Harvey and Hunter illustrate and confirm the doctrine of Moses and Paul.-Here then is a farther proof of the truth and authority of Divine revelation. See Clarke’s note on “Genesis 9:4”; Dr. J. Corrie’s Essay on the Vitality of the Blood; and the article Blood, in the Encyclopædias.

Verse 11. Is in the blood — Depends upon the blood, is preserved and nourished by it. The blood maketh atonement — Typically, and in respect of the blood of Christ which it represented, and by which the atonement is really made. So the reason is double. 1st, Because this was eating the ransom of their own lives, which in construction was the destroying themselves. 2d, Because it was ingratitude and irreverence toward that sacred blood of Christ, which they ought to have had in continual veneration.

Ver. 11. The life of the flesh is in the blood. Death, and deadness of a limb, follow obstructions of circulation in the blood. The ancients knew this fact, lately adopted in modern science, that animal life flows in the blood. Blood is ceremonially forbidden, for the gentiles drank the blood of their enemies, and offered libations of it to their idols. Genesis 9. Psalm 16:3.

11. The life… in the blood — Literally, “the nephesh (soul) of the flesh.” The soul has a double sphere of life. It is both animus, the subject of all the activities of knowing, feeling, and willing, and anima, the principle of animal life vitalizing the blood and operating in nutrition and respiration. In 1628 Dr. Harvey discovered the vitality of the blood, for the circulation of the blood results from a living principle inhering in it. This wonderful discovery of anatomical science had been standing as an open secret in the Mosaic writings three thousand years, overlooked by science in her pride and disbelief of revelation. This is more surprising when we read Solomon’s beautiful announcement of the same truth in Ecclesiastes 12:6. The Bible, when rightly understood, never contradicts science. I have given it… for your souls — Jehovah has not only devised the scheme of an atonement, but he gives the blood which is demanded to perfect this scheme. He not only saves through sacrifice, but he affords the victim. “Behold the Lamb of God” — the Lamb which God requires, and which he accepts, himself provides. The atonement originates with the Father. John 3:16. He is not, as some blasphemously portray him, an inexorable Shylock demanding his pound of flesh. The blood which he demands he gives. How widely different the divine scheme from human attempts at propitiation, in which the god to be appeased is to be bought off by costly sacrifices. God provides his own means of propitiation, so that all boasting is excluded, for we are saved by grace through faith in the one God-given, atoning sacrifice. “The death of Christ,” says Delitzsch, “was a conscious act of loving free-will, the central act of his own self-sacrifice, the solution of the enigma, ‘I have given it,’ in which the saints of the Old Testament had to rest their implicit faith.” Atonement for the soul — All the versions, except the Revised Version, have missed the great truth revealed in the Hebrew, “it is the blood that maketh atonement BY REASON OF THE LIFE.” b is plainly an instrumental preposition, and not to be rendered anti, instead of, as the Seventy, nor pro, for, as the Vulgate, nor fur, as Luther. See extensive discussion in the Introduction,

(6.) Men are redeemed from death only by the price of a life. Jesus gave his life a ransom for the world. Says Kalisch, “It is impossible to doubt that the doctrine of vicarious sacrifice was entertained by the Hebrews… The animal dies to symbolize the death deserved by the offerer on account of his sins.” The apparent discrepancy between this verse and Hebrews 10:4, 11, is removed when, with Outram, we regard the blood as a “condition of pardon,” and with Ebrard and Alford, “not the instrument of complete vicarious propitiation, but an exhibition of the postulate of such propitiation.” See concluding note.

12. Neither shall any stranger… eat blood — So ingrained into the Hebrew conscience did this prohibition become that it was as imperative as any precept of the moral law. It was as impossible for even the first Christian Council to conceive of piety in a Gentile convert who ate blood, as in one guilty of fornication. Acts 15:29.

13. Pour out the blood… and cover — This prescribes the manner of killing clean wild beasts and birds. Their blood must be treated as something sacred, lest the blood of atonement on their altars might come to be regarded as a common thing. The covering with dust is omitted in the outline in Deuteronomy 12:24. Even should the bird be killed by a blow or a shot, it would be unclean unless its throat was immediately cut.

Verse 14. Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh] Independently of the moral reasons given above, we may add, 1. That blood, being highly alkalescent, especially in hot climates, is subject to speedy putrefaction. 2. That it affords a gross nutriment, being very difficult of digestion, so much so that bull’s blood was used in ancient times as poison, “Its extreme viscidity rendering it totally indigestible by the powers of the human stomach.” 3. It is allowed that when blood was used in this country in great quantities, the scurvy was more frequent than at other times. 4. It appears from history that those nations who lived most on it were very fierce, savage, and barbarous, such as the Scythians, Tartars, Arabs of the desert, the Scandinavians, &c., &c., some of whom drank the blood of their enemies, making cups of their sculls!

V. 15. That eateth-Through ignorance or inadvertency; for if it was done knowingly, it was more severely punished. A stranger-Who is a proselyte to the Jewish religion: other strangers were allowed to eat such things, Deuteronomy 14:21, out of which the blood was either not drawn at all, or not regularly.

Verse 15. That which died of itself, or that which was torn] Because, in both cases, the blood was retained in the body; hence the council at Jerusalem forbade things strangled as well as blood, because in such beasts the blood was coagulated in the veins and arteries. See Acts 15:28-29. Every thing considered, surely there is as little propriety in eating of blood as there is necessity to do it. They who will do otherwise must bear their iniquity. If blood eating be no offence, then they have no sin to answer for. The principal subjects of this chapter have been already so amply handled in the notes, that there is no need to add any thing by way of reflection or improvement.

LEVITICUS

Verse 15. That eateth — Through ignorance or inadvertency; for if it was done knowingly, it was more severely punished. A stranger — Who is a proselyte to the Jewish religion: other strangers were allowed to eat such things, (Deuteronomy 14:21,) out of which the blood was either not drawn at all, or not regularly.

15. Died of itself — Hebrew, carcass. The ground of this requirement, that one ignorantly eating such flesh should ceremonially cleanse himself, is that he has eaten blood corrupting in the flesh. The wilful eater of carrion would probably be cut off with the blood-eater. Bathe himself in water — Hebrew, wash with water; the Seventy, udati, with water, as in Luke 3:16, “I baptize you udati;” also Acts 1:5; 11:16. A heavy burden, indeed, and one utterly impossible in many instances to be borne, would be the requirement to bathe or immerse the entire person in water; but in any desert where men can live they can find sufficient water with which ceremonially to wash themselves. The same words are correctly translated “wash with water” in Leviticus 22:6.

V. 16. His iniquity-The punishment of it, and therefore must offer a sacrifice for it.

Verse 16. His iniquity — The punishment of it, and therefore must offer a sacrifice for it.

16. He shall bear his iniquity — The punishment shall be visited. The same words, in the original, in Exodus 34:7, and Leviticus 10:17, (see note,) signify to bear away or expiate iniquity. See Numbers 9:13, note. A voluntary neglect of purification from an involuntary fault is not a trifle but an iniquity. The great sin of Gospel-hardened sinners is their neglect to wash away their sins and inherited depravity in the precious blood of Jesus Christ.

CONCLUDING NOTE. — VICARIOUS ATONEMENT.

Bahr regards verse 11 as the key to the whole theory of the Jewish sacrifices. His comment thereon, covering fifteen pages of his great work, embraces the following chief points: that the central point of the sacrifice is not the killing of the animal, but the procedure with the blood; that the end of the sacrifice was expiation or atonement; that it is Jehovah from whom the atonement proceeds; (“I have given it;”) and that it is for man; (“for your souls;”) and that the blood makes an atonement because the soul is in the blood; that the atoning power does not reside in the material blood, but in the soul that is in the blood — bannephesh — “by means of the soul.” There is a substitution of the soul of the animal for the soul of man; yet only a symbolical substitution. The sacrifice has also a sacramental character, so far as blood is the means, ordained of God, of bringing the soul of man into connexion with himself.

Winer says, that “the parallelism of the soul of the animal with the souls of the persons who offered it is assuredly not without significancy.” Tholuck thus proves that the expiatory sacrifices of the Old Testament were in their nature vicarious: 1.) The idea has prevailed in all nations. 2.) Among the Jews the death of men was considered vicarious; (2 Samuel 12:15, etc.; Isaiah 53:4, 5; especially Daniel 9:24-27;) allied to this is substitution by means of animals. 3.) The ritual favours this view; only in the expiatory sacrifices is the animal rendered unclean and its remains burned without the camp, because “it is a sin offering.” Exodus 29:14. 4.) Substitution may be inferred from Leviticus 17:14. 5.) Also from Deuteronomy 21:1-9, where the guilt of an unknown slayer is chargeable upon the whole people, and by washing the hands is transferred to the sacrifice. 6.) The noun kopher, ransom, cognate with the verb kipper, expiate, includes the idea of substitution. 7.) The symbol of the scapegoat is a visible manifestation of the taking away of guilt by means of the expiation. Jewish tradition is very full and positive on this point. The standing rule is, that there can be no expiation except by blood.