Leviticus 17:1-9--The Place of Sacrifice

Leviticus 17:1-8
English Standard Version

The Place of Sacrifice
17 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to Aaron and his sons and to all the people of Israel and say to them, This is the thing that the Lord has commanded. 3 If any one of the house of Israel kills an ox or a lamb or a goat in the camp, or kills it outside the camp, 4 and does not bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting to offer it as a gift to the Lord in front of the tabernacle of the Lord, bloodguilt shall be imputed to that man. He has shed blood, and that man shall be cut off from among his people. 5 This is to the end that the people of Israel may bring their sacrifices that they sacrifice in the open field, that they may bring them to the Lord, to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and sacrifice them as sacrifices of peace offerings to the Lord. 6 And the priest shall throw the blood on the altar of the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting and burn the fat for a pleasing aroma to the Lord. 7 So they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to goat demons, after whom they whore. This shall be a statute forever for them throughout their generations.

8 “And you shall say to them, Any one of the house of Israel, or of the strangers who sojourn among them, who offers a burnt offering or sacrifice 9 and does not bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting to offer it to the Lord, that man shall be cut off from his people.

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This may seem like an odd statement to make at the time, but God knew what the Israelites were going to do in the future and exactly how they would be unfaithful in driving out the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Amorites, Jebusites, and all the rest of the pagan, idolatrous peoples that were the descendants of Ham from the land and would intermarry with them and would worship their gods and goddesses.  They would set up their own priesthoods and their own temples and set up their own high places on which to offer sacrifices to these gods, and they would eventually even offer their own children as sacrifices to to gods like Molech.

There will be laws here that should have prohibited any of that from happening as the Tabernacle and the place of sacrifice at its entry near the Bronze Altar was the only place that anyone should offer any sacrifice to the LORD--the should put to rest the argument from people saying "I can meet with God and worship Him alone in the wood if I want and don't need to go to church."  God is the one who designates the time, the place, and the means of worship to Him, and He has said that any sacrifice offered anywhere else was not only unacceptable, but it was rebellious unless the killed animal was brought to the priests at the entrance of the Tabernacle (also called The Tent of Meeting) so that it could be offered as a sacrifice in the proper way--giving the fat portions to the LORD and the portion given to the priest of the right thigh and breast when appropriate.  Anyone doing otherwise would have "bloodguilt" on him, meaning that person's blood would be required of them by God.  It would be no different than if a man were a murderer and had bloodguilt on him for taking an innocent human life.

Any such man should be cut off from the nation (lose his status and citizenship and his privilege to come and worship at the Tabernacle, and he would no longer be included in the ones for whom atonement was made on Yom Kippur).  All sacrifices that were made by the people in their fields were to stop and the people were to bring these sacrifices to the LORD at the designated place in front of the altar, but if they did sacrifice an animal in the open field (say they needed to "put down" an animal), then it must be brought as a peace offering--such an imperfect sacrifice could not be offered as a sin offering or as a burnt offering, but only as a peace offering (a fellowship offering).

The "goat demons" is specifically mentioned here as one of the false gods that the people were offering sacrifices to, but we even see today that Satan represents himself in many cultures today as as a "goat demon" and its possible that God is saying that all sacrifices that are made to any other false gods are ultimately being offered to Satan and his demons, or it could just be a reference to the current practices of the people that they had been caught up in as they dwelled among the Canaanites and lived in Egypt and were now in the land of the Midianites as they travelled back to Canaan.

Here's some additional commentary to my own that takes into account some other passages of Scripture along with this one and may give some fuller context:  https://biblehub.com/commentaries/leviticus/17-7.htmbiblehub.com/commentaries/leviticus/17-7.htm.  This prohibition was to everyone, even the foreigners and sojourners among them.  The commentary provided makes note that God would make some provision in the Law later when they entered the Land and it would be too far for them to bring all of the animals that they would eat to the LORD as a peace offering first that this part of the restriction was given exception, but they were still only to offer sacrifices in the place the LORD would tell them (wherever He told them to set up the Tabernacle, because His presence rested there, and then eventually at the Temple in Jerusalem, again because His presence rested there).  This commentary also makes some good points as you will also see in Deuteronomy 12 which it is referencing that the people didn't eat nearly as much meat at that time as we do today.  God seems to indicate this in Deuteronomy 12:20 when He says that that the day will come when their borders are expanded and they will desire to eat meat.  We'll talk about this more when we get to the book of Deuteronomy though.  Understand that this specific statute in Leviticus seems to be mostly preserved, though will be modified by God as the people and the borders of the Land grow and as the dietary habits of the people change that would make keeping this statute impossible.  There would not be enough priests and enough hours in the day to bring all these animals to the LORD's altar in the tabernacle if the people were to become mostly carnivorous in their diets, yet the prohibitions on eating or drinking blood (which we will study next) will always remain--even into the New Testament as we'll eventually see in the book of Acts.