Levite Instruction Overview - Leviticus 6 & 7

Chapter 6 and 7 go together and are basically just a re-hashing of all the sacrifices and offerings again but as instruction to the officiating priests. TB says that the previous discussions of the ordinances are meant to be addressed to the lay audience, whereas chapters 6 and 7 are for specifically for the instruction of the Levite priests who were to perform the ordinances. I’m not going to go over the sacrifices again because I feel like I covered them pretty in depth before so I’m just going to point out the few aspects that I thought were interesting.

First is from chapter 6 verse 13 which is referencing the fire on the altar that is used to burn up the sacrifices. It says, “the fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out.” So basically one of the jobs of the priests is to stand guard day and night to make sure that the fire on the altar doesn’t go out. I assumed that it was symbolic like the Olympic torch that was never supposed to go out even in the 4 years in between the games but this is more than that. TB and the IM both point out that the very first time a fire was kindled on the altar, it was “by direct action of Jehovah.” Basically, no man started the first fire on the altar, it was God who sent down fire from heaven and ignited the fire on the altar the very first time. TB notes that if the fire was to go out then no man could rekindle that flame or start it again because it was a gift directly from God so it must be tended to and cared for as a direct gift and commandment from God should be.

Second was a basic break down of who could consume which parts of which sacrifices. TB gave a general rule of thumb that was interesting explaining that any sacrifice or offering that was given by the priests either for themselves or for the people of Israel as a whole could not be consumed by the priests. Conversely, if a sacrifice or offering was brought to the priests by lay people, then the priests could eat it or use the parts afterward. So presented for sacrifice by priests, had to be all burned up and not used afterward at all, but presented by non-priests or laypeople, then the priests could eat and/or use it afterward.

Third, there is a part that discusses God’s prohibition of the people to consume animal blood in anyway. Interestingly, he says that animal blood can not only not be consumed in the tabernacle but anywhere throughout the Israelite camp. TB notes that this is because there were many rules that were applicable to the tabernacle specifically but were fine to do in the camp so consuming blood had to be forbidden in all the camp for all the people. TB says that the rule might have been made to symbolize the fact that blood is the ultimate method of atonement and is therefore sacred and if people consumed it they might start to take the atonement lightly or think that they had more power over it then they do. I think it might have been a health thing that had to be framed in religious light so that the people would comply. Just a few thoughts that I had while studying chapters 6 and 7, but otherwise I feel like everything else was adequately covered in previous discussions.