Leviticus 1--Laws for Burnt Offerings

Leviticus 1
English Standard Version

Laws for Burnt Offerings
1 The Lord called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When any one of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of livestock from the herd or from the flock.

3 “If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish. He shall bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting, that he may be accepted before the Lord. 4 He shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him. 5 Then he shall kill the bull before the Lord, and Aaron's sons the priests shall bring the blood and throw the blood against the sides of the altar that is at the entrance of the tent of meeting. 6 Then he shall flay the burnt offering and cut it into pieces, 7 and the sons of Aaron the priest shall put fire on the altar and arrange wood on the fire. 8 And Aaron's sons the priests shall arrange the pieces, the head, and the fat, on the wood that is on the fire on the altar; 9 but its entrails and its legs he shall wash with water. And the priest shall burn all of it on the altar, as a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

10 “If his gift for a burnt offering is from the flock, from the sheep or goats, he shall bring a male without blemish, 11 and he shall kill it on the north side of the altar before the Lord, and Aaron's sons the priests shall throw its blood against the sides of the altar. 12 And he shall cut it into pieces, with its head and its fat, and the priest shall arrange them on the wood that is on the fire on the altar, 13 but the entrails and the legs he shall wash with water. And the priest shall offer all of it and burn it on the altar; it is a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

14 “If his offering to the Lord is a burnt offering of birds, then he shall bring his offering of turtledoves or pigeons. 15 And the priest shall bring it to the altar and wring off its head and burn it on the altar. Its blood shall be drained out on the side of the altar. 16 He shall remove its crop with its contents and cast it beside the altar on the east side, in the place for ashes. 17 He shall tear it open by its wings, but shall not sever it completely. And the priest shall burn it on the altar, on the wood that is on the fire. It is a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

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We start Leviticus with the instructions for what most people best know the Levitical system--burnt offerings.  These instructions are probably given first because they are probably of primary importance, but also they are going to be easy to find.  It also sets the tone for the rest of the book as I mentioned in my introductory blog yesterday that the biggest issue this new people that God is making is sin and being "unclean" and that the only satisfaction for God's holiness is going to be a blood sacrifice for the purposes of substitutionary atonement--so we are already starting to see that priestly ministry and the ministry of Christ are one in the same.  Yet we too are called to be a nation of royal priests (just like Israel was called to be)--a royal priesthood.  So then some of these instructions must be for us too in how we should live our lives and conduct our ministry.  The challenging thing is going to be to figure out how these Old Covenant instructions apply to us today in a New Covenant world--that's where books like Hebrews, James and 1st and 2nd Peter really can help us out along with the gospels and other epistles.

First we see that the offering offered to the LORD must be from the man's own flock.  He cannot offer something that costs him nothing, and the animal from his livestock that will be offered must be a male and without blemish (sounds like a foreshadowing of Jesus to me).  There is then an imputation whereby the man lays his hand on the head of the sacrifice and the man's sin (and guilt) are "transferred" from the man to the substitute and atonement (a covering of the sin so that God chooses to no longer see it) is made.

There are then specific instructions on where the offering was to be presented (different locations for different types of animals) and what is done by the man and what is done by the priests, and not just any priests, but only the priests that are the sons of Aaron.  We'll see as we continue to study some of the other books of the Old Testament that God has already predetermined certain roles for certain people and families and that bad things happen many times when people try to step outside these roles.  This may not appeal our Western sensibilities where we think we get to make our own identity and our own destiny--including what job we have, but God told these people what their job was going to be before they were even born and promised to equip them for that job that He had given them to do.  This is quite an interesting thought for sure.

The animal's blood is drained and the blood is thrown onto all sides of the altar, meaning that the altar is going to be covered in blood at all times because there are going to be so many sacrifices that are going to be made here.  Then a fire is made on the altar and pieces of the sacrifice are arranged so that all of it will be burnt, but the entrails and legs were to be washed first before they were burnt.  Nothing was to be saved.  All the blood was to be drained and all the flesh and fat was to be burned.

The instructions are repeated, yet slightly varied for if the sacrifice is a lamb or goat from the flock or if it an offering of one of the clean birds that was acceptable for sacrifice--specifically turtledoves were usually used here, and this was usually an indication that someone was too poor to own sheep, goats, or cattle.  The size of a man's herds and flocks was usually a good indicator of his wealth and it is one of the reasons that we are told that the LORD "owns the cattle on a thousand hills" because He has abundant resources of and to have land and animals was to be extremely wealthy at that time.  These sacrifices that God was requiring were no small thing, and we're only one type of sacrifice into the book of Leviticus and we already see that the entire sacrifice needed to be burnt.  We don't really see the purpose of such an offering yet (there will be many specific types of offerings that will be "burnt offerings" such as "sin offerings," "guilt offerings," "fellowship offerings," etc.).  As we go along in Leviticus more specific instructions for each type of offering will be given and we'll see how Christ fulfills each and every one of these offerings as He removes our sin and guilt and puts us in fellowship with both God and man.