THE RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE HEBREWS.
THIS system contemplates as its ultimate end the obedience, homage,
and worship due from men to God. As a prime means toward this end, it
prescribes modes and forms of worship. It proposes to bring God near
to men and men near to God; and for this purpose would cultivate in men
the spirit of penitence and of faith――impressing them with a sense of
their sins and suggesting to them how sin may be forgiven; and how, on
the basis of God’s own provision for pardon, he can accept the humble,
reverent worship of his people.――――These fundamental ideas respecting
the sinner’s acceptance with God, the system now before us sought
especially to develop by means of visible symbols――these symbols
constituting the very elaborate and minutely described _religious
system of the Hebrews_.――――This system, having long since “waxed old
and vanished away” is no longer in practice, and therefore can not be
useful as a rule of present duty, but is useful for the light it throws
on the great and fundamental questions――How shall man――a sinner――become
just before God? Is an atonement necessary? What are the fundamental
ideas of “atonement”? How were they developed in the Mosaic system, and
what light does this development bring to the atonement presented to
view in the New Testament?
With superlative wisdom God began to give lessons on this great
subject very early in the history of our race. It was wise to give
such lessons long and carefully before the Great Atoning Sacrifice
came in human flesh. It was also wise to give them largely by visible
illustrations――by the aid of a system having so much of the external
and the visible that minds not disciplined to abstract thought might
see the truth and feel its power by means of sensible manifestations.
The reader will now see readily the purpose of the ensuing examination
of this religious system. It is not for historic curiosity――in which
case we might select points amusing or strange or sensational; it is
not to guide the worshiper (as Moses sought to do) in the minutest
details of the system that he might make no mistake in obeying it:――but
it is to gather as best we may its designed moral impression, to study
its underlying assumptions, and evolve its true doctrine in regard
to the great question of the sinner’s acceptance before a holy and
righteous God.
* * * * *
Briefly and comprehensively we may classify the leading features of
this system viewed externally, on this wise:
I. _Its prescribed sacrifices and offerings._
II. _Its stated times and seasons of worship._
III. _Its sacred edifices and apparatus for worship._
IV. _The religious orders――classes designated for sacred service._
I. The sacrifices and offerings of this system may be classified
variously:――――_e. g._ (1.) Bloody, or not bloody:――terms which will be
readily understood. The former were slain animals, a portion of whose
blood was sprinkled. The latter included offerings of flour, oil, wine,
etc.――――Or (2.) Some were specially required: others were voluntary or
free-will offerings.――――(3.) They may be classified with reference to
the times and seasons when they were to be made; some being daily, as
the morning and evening sacrifice; others for the Sabbath; others for
the new moons; others on occasion of the three great yearly festivals;
and, among the most useful for its suggestive import, those of the
great day of atonement.――――(4.) Or we might classify them under
the somewhat distinctive names given them in the law, of which we
find a large number. We have (a.) The generic word sacrifice [Heb.
Zebah]――a word which implies slaying, taking life:――――(b.) Another
quite generic term, “offering,” which is used to translate several
Hebrew words, and of course with very considerable latitude of
meaning:――――(c.) “Burnt-offering”――[which is the quite constant
translation of the Heb. “Olah”] signifying what _goes up upon the
altar_ and is consumed there. The phrase “whole burnt-offering” gives
according to the Hebrew, the sense of _completeness_――the whole of
the animal being burned on the altar:――――(d.) “Sin-offering”――in
Hebrew, one of the most common words for _sin_――[hatta]. Paul’s
use of the corresponding Greek word (2 Cor. 5: 21) follows
this usage of the word for sin: “God hath made him to be sin”
[a sin-offering] “for us who knew no sin,” etc.:――――(e.) “Trespass
offering”;――which is another of the Hebrew words for sin, offense
[“asham”]:――――(f.) “Meat-offering”; some variety of food or drink
other than flesh:――――(g.) “Peace-offering”――which seems closely related
to the “thank-offering,” being an expression of gratitude to God; the
animal sacrificed being in large part eaten socially by the offerer and
his friends; also by the poor, the widow, servants, etc.:――――(h.) Wave
and heave offerings――terms which refer to ceremonies of elevating or
waving certain parts of the sacrifice.
(5.) A much more important distinction in the Mosaic sacrifices lies
between those which were _expiatory_ and those which were not specially
so, the former class being slain animals whose fat at least was burned
on the altar and whose blood was sprinkled in specified and various
ways; the latter class having somewhat various objects, but chiefly
that of expressing gratitude for blessings or joy in the God of their
salvation.
* * * * *
Two other points in respect to sacrifices are of importance, viz.――
(a.) _The choice of animals to be slain in sacrifice._
(b.) The killing itself, coupled with the use made of the blood, of the
fat, and in some cases of the flesh――with the attendant ceremonies.
(a.) It should be carefully noted that animals for sacrifice were not
taken up at random. It was not merely life and blood that were sought.
They were not the wild, but the tame, domesticated; not the savage,
flesh-eating animals, but the docile, grass-eating; not animals mostly
or altogether useless to man, but precisely those which were most
useful; not animals of the sort nobody loves or cares for, but those
most loved and cared for, between whom and the human family there
often arises a special intimacy and affection. In a word they were the
representatives of utility, docility, and innocence. The ox, patient
of toil, in his early years invaluable for food; the goat, useful
for flesh and milk; the lamb――the symbol of affection, attachment,
innocence:――these three classes of animals formed the staple material
for bloody sacrifice. [Of birds, the turtle-dove and young pigeon,
being less expensive, were permitted to the poor. As naturally
representing innocence and loveliness, they are quite of the same
class].――――It sometimes escapes notice that the Orientals brought these
animals much nearer to their hearts and homes than our Western notions
and habits know of. We forget that not infrequently to this day they
live under the same roof along with sons and daughters. The prophet
Nathan in that touching verse about the “one little ewe lamb” (2 Sam.
12: 3) drew not from his imagination but from Oriental life. “The
poor man had nothing save one little ewe lamb which he had bought and
nourished up, and it grew up together with him and with his children:
it did eat of his own meat” [food] “and drank from his own cup and lay
in his bosom, and was to him as his daughter.”――――Moreover, the Hebrew
might not select for sacrifice the deformed, the torn, the lame, the
sickly; but evermore, the unblemished, the perfect――those specially
lovable and choice pets around which the hearts of the household, young
and old, were wont to cling: of these must the worshiper take for the
altar.
Let us think of the scene at that altar of sacrifice. The place is
in the front court of the tabernacle, whose inner sanctuary was made
glorious with the visible presence of Jehovah. The one all-engrossing
thought associated with this sacred spot, was――_God is here_. I go up
to meet God. Before his face I bring this prescribed offering. It is
one of my sweet lambs of the flock, or as the case may be, a young
bullock of one or two years old. I know that the animal must die there.
Either in my own person or through the priest, acting in my behalf,
I am to lay my hand on the head of the victim and thus confess my sin.
From that moment the innocent lamb takes my place and stands before
the executioner, as if guilty of capital crime. The sight and the smell
of blood; the struggle and the recoil; the outcry of horror――the only
awful, horrible sound uttered by these animals――go to make up a scene
which, once witnessed, can never be forgotten. We of this age might see
it in some of its aspects if we would; we rarely do. We should find it,
not in our worshiping sanctuaries but in the secluded slaughter-house
whither no one is ever attracted――whither none ever go save those who
must. Think of the blood, the death-groans, the struggle, the whole
dying scene. Is there any meaning in it? Is there any thing in it
appropriate to the sanctuary of God and to his solemn worship?
The transaction is by no means so mysterious as it might be. It would
be profoundly mysterious were it not that man is a sinner before the
holy law of God――a sinner under condemnation of death. It would be
utterly inexplicable if there were not in nature, in thought, in fact,
something which we may call substitution, to which we give the name
vicarious――something which involves, not indeed an entire exchange of
one personality for another, but something which approximates toward it.
One being suffers in the place and stead of another. An innocent being
steps into the place of a guilty one and takes upon himself the guilty
man’s doom. We need not pause here to hunt up analogies of this sort
in human life; suffice it that God signifies by these striking symbols
that he has found a place for this principle in his great scheme
for the pardon of sinners condemned to death by his holy law, and
that he saw fit to fill this Hebrew religious system absolutely full
of illustrative typical representations of this stupendous fact.
The elementary facts in this system of sacrifices, considered as
illustrating the scheme of pardon are few and simple; thus――
(a.) Man has sinned against God and stands condemned by his law to
eternal death.
(b.) God loves this sinning man and longs to save him――but must not
break down his law.――――So he finds a Lamb for a sacrifice whose death
for sinners will abundantly sustain the majesty of law, and proceeds
thereupon to “lay on him the iniquity of us all.” This done, it only
remains that the sinner repent of his sin, and humbly, thankfully
accept the death of this Lamb of sacrifice in place of his own eternal
death.――――These few and simple elements comprise substantially the
essence of this wonderful system.
This system seeks a symbolic representation in these bloody sacrifices.
The offerer brings forward his lamb of the flock; he lays his hand upon
that innocent head and confesses there his sin: he in a sort transfers
his own personality――or more precisely, his own sin and guilt, to
that animal victim; he stands by and witnesses the death-scene with
a deepened sense that he deserves a death far worse than that himself.
But when the fires from heaven descend and consume his offering, and
he finds himself not only spared but blessed of God and bidden to go in
peace, he gets a sense unknown before, of the peace and joy of pardoned
sin. The blood sprinkled upon and around the altar and toward the most
holy place and upon himself becomes a memorial of what his salvation
cost; the pardon himself receives testifies how much it is worth,
“speaking better things than the blood of Abel.”
If any special argument should seem called for to prove that this is
the true significance of these bloody sacrifices, we shall come to it
with better preparation after the main points of the system are more
fully before us.
As an illustrative system, there is yet one other point of great
significance, viz. that in many of these sacrifices _a portion of the
animal was eaten_ by the offerer and by his family and friends. This
great amount of animal flesh was not all consumed by the fires of the
altar. Yet we are not to suppose that public economy――the saving of
so much valuable human food――was the prime consideration. We must go
deeper than this. Nor was it that the Lord would cultivate the social
nature of his worshiping people, and therefore provided these materials
for agreeable social feasting. We must go very much deeper than even
this. This feasting upon the flesh of the slain animal is in germ what
the gospel gives us in full development, viz. that the same Lamb of
Calvary who “washed us from our sins in his own blood” “gave us his
flesh to eat” as “the bread of life.” The memorial supper carries in it
the same double symbol――_blood_ and _bread_――the blood looking toward
pardon; the bread toward sustenance for the spiritual life. So the
pious Israelite might on the one hand see the blood of his sacrifice
gurgling forth, caught, sprinkled toward the mercy-seat and upon his
own person; and on the other hand, might take of the flesh of his slain
lamb and sit down, not merely in peace but in joyful thanksgiving that
death brings life――that sacrificial blood brings after it the new life
of the redeemed, restored sinner, and sustenance therefor from the very
animal whose body and blood became symbols of his pardon.
* * * * *
Besides these sacrifices of a general character, the system provided
others of a special and personal character for individuals under
peculiar circumstances, _e. g._ for the case of vows; of purification
from ceremonial uncleanness; for the restored leper, etc. Of these
I need say only that they suggest the fitness of recognizing God’s
hand every-where, in all possible events and under all the various
dispensations of providence. These events are never barren of
significance. It behooves us to study their meaning and adjust
ourselves to God’s hand with resignation and with gratitude――with a
sense of our unworthiness and of God’s great mercy.――――The detailed
methods of that ancient system have at this day no vital interest.
Scarcely of the nature of sacrifice, yet intensifying the idea of
ceremonial uncleanness was the burning of the “red heifer”――the
gathering up of her ashes and the preparation from them of “the water
of separation”――a purification from sin in the ceremonial sense. Num.
19 gives the details, specifying the sorts of uncleanness which this
purifying water washed away. The writer to the Hebrews (9: 13, 14)
gave the great moral inference thus: “For if the blood of bulls and
of goats and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctifieth
to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ
who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unto God, purge your
conscience from dead works to serve the living God”?
II. STATED TIMES AND SEASONS OF WORSHIP.
1. _The Morning and Evening Sacrifice._
Two lambs of one year were offered every day; the one in the morning
and the other at evening [Heb. “between the evenings”]; burnt offerings,
consumed wholly upon the altar. They were accompanied with a small
portion of flour, oil, and wine. This was a perpetual ordinance,
never to be omitted. The original institution (Ex. 29: 38–46) is
accompanied with God’s very gracious promise to meet with his people
and dwell among them, sanctifying the place of this meeting by his
glory. Nothing could suggest more pertinently and tenderly that God
loves to see the face of his worshiping people and to meet them as each
day opens in the morning and as it closes with the setting sun. Let
this communion between God and his sons and daughters never be in any
wise interrupted.――――The usage seems to have led pious Jews in later
times to adopt these hours for their morning and evening prayer, as
we may see in the case of Daniel (9: 21), and in the New Testament
history.――――The ritual for these sacrifices is given in detail
(Num. 28: 3–8).
2. _The Sacrifices for the Sabbath._
Each Sabbath had an extra service in addition to the continual morning
and evening sacrifice――two lambs of the first year without spot; with
the attendant meat and drink-offerings (Num. 29: 9, 10).
* * * * *
3. _The sacrifices at each new moon_ were on a larger scale than
either of the preceding, viz. two young bullocks, one ram, and seven
lambs for the burnt-offering; one kid of goats for the sin-offering.
As the Hebrew months were lunar (not solar), these sacrifices upon
the appearance of the new moon inaugurated the successive months. It
was probably for this reason that they were announced with blowing
of trumpets (Num. 10: 10). The calendar was thus regulated――a matter
of special importance, since it fixed the time of their three great
religious festivals as also the great day of atonement.
4. _The Three Great Religious Festivals._
Of these the first in order (the Passover) has been considered already.
The next in order of time was the _Pentecost_――otherwise called “the
feast of weeks, of the first-fruits of wheat-harvest” (Ex. 34: 22);
“the feast of harvest, the first-fruits of thy labors which thou hast
sown in the field” (Ex. 23: 16); also “the day of first-fruits” (Num.
28: 26). The other passages which treat of it are Lev. 23: 15–21 and
Deut. 16: 9–12)――――The name _Pentecost_ is not from the Hebrew but from
the Greek, meaning the _fiftieth_ day, _i. e._ after the great Sabbath,
which fell during the Passover week (Lev. 23: 15, 16).――――On the first
day after that Sabbath, the first-fruits of their barley harvest were
brought before the Lord. From that point seven full weeks were numbered,
and on the fiftieth day the feast of Pentecost occurred.
This festival, unlike the other two in duration, was of one
day only――at least this is plainly assumed: “In _the day_ of the
first-fruits” (Num. 28: 26), also in Lev. 23: 21, only one day
is spoken of.――――It was specially a day of thanksgiving for the
first-fruits of the wheat harvest. Two loaves made of the new wheat
flour were waved before the Lord on this hallowed day.――――The reference
(in Deut. 16: 10–12) gives prominence to the social and joyful
character of the day. “Thou shalt keep the feast unto the Lord thy
God with a tribute of a free-will offering of thy hand which thou shalt
give according as the Lord thy God hath blessed thee, and thou shalt
rejoice before the Lord thy God, thou and thy son and thy daughter,
and thy man-servant and thy maid-servant, and the Levite that is within
thy gates, and the stranger, the fatherless and the widow that are
among you.”
As a feast of joyful thanksgiving over the first-fruits of their
principal grain harvest, it was eminently the appropriate occasion for
the Pentecostal scene of the first great Christian ingathering. How
suggestive of the gratitude due to God for the shedding forth of the
Holy Ghost and the glorious fruitage from this gospel power!
Some have supposed (not without reason) that the Hebrew Pentecost
commemorated the completion of the giving of the laws by the hand of
Moses, which they suppose was brought within fifty days from the first
Passover. Of this however the books of Moses affirm nothing explicitly.
The third and last of the three great festivals was “the _Feast of
Tabernacles_,” otherwise called “the feast of ingathering at the end of
the year when thou hast gathered in thy labors out of the field” (Ex.
23: 16).――――The speciality of this feast was the dwelling in booths or
tabernacles, made of “boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees
and the boughs of thick trees and willows of the brook” (Lev. 23: 40).
This feast began on the fourteenth day of the seventh month and
continued during eight days, the first and the last being days of
special solemnity. It had a double purpose, viz. to commemorate the
forty years wandering of the fathers in the wilderness, dwelling in
tents; and to give thanks to God for the last harvests of the year――the
fruits of the olive and the grape――last in order――being now all
gathered in.
Thus none of these three great feasts omitted the element of
thanksgiving for the fruits of the season, the first barley sheaves
being brought with grateful thanks before the Lord during the Passover;
the first-fruits of the wheat harvest giving a special thanksgiving
character to the Feast of Pentecost; and the latest fruits, the olive
and the grape, reminding them of God’s crowning blessing upon the
labors of the year at the Feast of Tabernacles. What a beautiful
training into the service of thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth!
This last of the festivals was pre-eminently one of joyful festivity,
and of loud and high praises to the Lord, their Great Benefactor. The
Jews have a saying――that “whoever has not seen the rejoicing of the
last great day of the Feast of Tabernacles has never seen a day of joy
in his life.”
The principal passages of Moses that treat of it are Ex. 23: 16, and
34: 22, and Lev. 23: 34–43, and Num. 29: 12–40, and Deut. 16: 13–15.
The celebration of this feast in the age of Nehemiah (8: 14–18) the
reader should not fail to notice. At this time the law was read daily
in the hearing of the people. The law of Moses provided for this public
reading on each seventh, _i. e._ the Sabbatic year, during the Feast of
Tabernacles (Deut. 31: 10–13).
The striking allusion (Jn. 7: 37) to the scenes on the last great day
of the feast will be readily recalled. A custom unknown to the law of
Moses had then come into practice――that of going in vast procession to
the fountain of Siloam for water, and bearing it with joyful acclaim to
the temple to pour it out there before the Lord. While this procession
was passing, Jesus lifted up his voice and cried――“If any man thirst,
let him come unto me and drink.” May we suppose that possibly the words
of Isaiah were before him:――“Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to
the waters”――to these waters of life which I give for the life of the
world!
Upon these three great festivals all the males of Israel were
required to appear before the Lord at the one place of his choice――the
tabernacle or the temple――ultimately in Jerusalem “whither the tribes
go up.” The women of Israel manifestly went when they chose and
could. According to Oriental usage they traveled in groups――little
caravans――several adjacent families, or as the case might be by
households, the patriarch with his children and children’s children
together, moving on with many a song of social cheer and grateful
praise till at length they lifted up their eyes to the hills of the
goodly city. The so-called “songs of degrees” (Ps. 120–134)――more
strictly songs of the stages or upgoings――are specimens of this free
and outflowing worship of the traveling companies, bound upward to
Jerusalem. The allusion in Luke 2: 41–45, is pleasant to think of.
We must not overlook the fact that the Lord relieved their minds of
all fear lest their defenseless homes might be assailed and robbed and
perhaps their wives and little ones murdered by foreign enemies while
all their able-bodied men were away from their homes in Jerusalem.
“Neither shall any man desire thy land when thou shalt go up to appear
before the Lord thy God thrice in the year” (Ex. 34: 24). None but a
God of universal providence and omnipotent resources could safely make
such a promise. In their own Jehovah they might safely trust.
* * * * *
Of sacred seasons, the most peculiar and striking yet remains to be
noticed, viz. _the great day of atonement_. This was one day only; was
not a feast day but a _fast_――a day “in which ye shall _afflict your
souls_,” _i. e._ subject yourselves to the discomforts and pains of
entire abstinence from food for the whole day, “from even to even.”
Whoever would not afflict his soul on this day must be “cut off from
his people.” All labor was forbidden under the same penalty. The
passages Lev. 23: 26–32 and Num. 29: 7–11 give these general features
of the institution. Only in Lev. 16 do we find a full description.
In this chapter it appears that the original appointment of this day
stands connected with the sad death of Nadab and Abihu, the two eldest
sons of Aaron for their rash unauthorized offering of strange fire
before the Lord (Lev. 10: 1–8). That awful scene of death suggested
the great necessity of ceremonial purity in the priesthood and of the
utmost care and self-control when they came before God. There would be
sins in the priesthood and sins among the people of which they might
not be aware: hence the propriety of one comprehensive, all-embracing
service for atonement.
The points to be specially noted in this service are――That the High
Priest washed himself clean; put on white linen garments, symbolic of
purity, and then made a special offering for his own sins and for the
sin of all the people. The latter had this striking peculiarity――that
two goats were taken for a sin-offering, upon whom lots were cast to
select one for the Lord and one for Azazel [Eng. “scape-goat”]. Another
still more important peculiarity was that on this day only (never on
any other) the High Priest went alone into the most holy place, bearing
both the blood of the sin-offering and incense. First he bore into the
most holy place the blood of a bullock as a sin-offering for himself,
and sprinkled it with his finger upon the mercy-seat and in front
of the mercy-seat seven times. He also bore a censer full of coals
from the great altar and upon it burned incense, the smoke of which
enshrouded the mercy-seat. Then the goat upon which the lot fell for
the Lord was slain, and the High Priest bore his blood also into the
most holy place and sprinkled it there to make atonement for the whole
people. No other man save the High Priest might go in at any time on
pain of death.
The other goat, called in our English version “the scape-goat” was then
disposed of thus: Aaron “laid both his hands upon the head of this goat
and confessed over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel
and all their transgressions in all their sins, _putting them upon
the head of the goat_, and then sent him away by a fit man into the
wilderness――the goat bearing upon himself all their iniquities into a
land not inhabited.” He was then set at liberty in the wilderness (Lev.
16: 20–22).――――The precise meaning of the word Azazel [“scape-goat”]
and the reason for using this name have been much disputed. Our English
Bible fails to give a satisfactory translation of v. 8 where by a most
obvious antithesis the sacred lot selects one of the two goats for
Jehovah and the other for Azazel. Was it, as many suppose, for Satan,
conceived of as “walking through those dry and desolate places, seeking
rest but finding none”――to whom this goat, symbolically bearing the
sins of the whole people, is sent? If so, what is implied and signified
in this sending of the goat to him? I must say I am not wise on these
points. If any ideas were current in that age in respect to Satan
which might illustrate this transaction, they have not come down to
us. It must I think suffice for us to see in these two goats for a
sin-offering a sort of double figure to indicate the atonement――the
first one slain in the usual way and his blood sprinkled before the
mercy-seat――a solemn witness that without the shedding of blood there
can be no remission of sin: the other, supplementing the great idea of
atonement by a most vivid representation of _sins borne away_――forever
away, to be known and remembered no more. The sins of the whole people
were transferred to the head of this second goat; he takes them away
into the unknown desolate wilderness, never to return. Symbolically,
the sins are gone forever!――――The prophet Micah (7: 19) gives a turn
to the same thought only slightly different――“Thou wilt cast all their
sins into the depths of the sea.” Jeremiah also (31: 34)――“I will
remember their sins no more.” No symbol could give more precisely, more
unequivocally, more forcibly, the great idea of _taking away sins_.
You see them transferred to this second goat by means of hands imposed
and formal declaration, “_putting them_ [the sins] _upon the head
of the goat_”; and then he is driven away, bearing his burden into an
unknown, desolate land, never to be heard from again!――――The sacrifice
of the first goat for a sin-offering and the sprinkling of his blood
before the sacred Presence of Jehovah had the usual significance of
an innocent animal substituted for the guilty sinner――the former dying
that the latter might not die――thus showing _how_ God could safely
forgive sin. These two goats therefore represent respectively the
two great ideas which make up the atonement――the first signifying _by
what means_ God can testify duly against sin while yet he forgives the
sinner; and the second certifying that――the innocent victim having been
substituted for the sinner and slain in his stead――God does truly _take
sins forever away_. In briefest phrase these coupled ideas stand out
before us in the New Testament: “Behold the Lamb of God who _taketh
away_ the sin of the world” (John 1: 29).
III. _Sacred Edifices and Apparatus._
A system of worship which included altars and sacrifices, and much more,
one which had the ark of the covenant and the visible manifestation of
Jehovah’s presence, demanded an _edifice_ for its center and home. It
was essential to the proper reverence that this edifice should provide
a place of seclusion as well as of safe-keeping for its most sacred
things.――――Moreover, so long as the people were unsettled――subject
to removal any day――this structure must be movable, like the tents of
all nomadic people. Hence the first structure was the _Tabernacle_ or
_Sacred Tent_.――――A general idea of it may be presented to the reader
thus:――Conceive of an inclosed court, one hundred cubits long by fifty
wide [the cubit being eighteen inches]; this inclosure being made by
hanging curtains of linen five cubits high, suspended from horizontal
rods which were supported by posts. The entrance to this inclosure was
always at its eastern end, and the eastern section, forming the outer
or first court, was twenty cubits in depth, cut off from the rest of
the inclosed area by curtains.――――In the center of the rear portion
stood the sacred tent proper, thirty cubits in length from east to west,
and ten cubits in width. This also was in two principal apartments,
the eastern being twenty cubits by ten, known as “the holy place”;
the western, “the most holy place,” or the “Holy of holies,” being
ten cubits square. The perpendicular walls of this sacred tent were of
boards set on end, ten cubits high, so supported as to be readily set
up, taken down, and transported. The covering was four-fold, of cloth
and skins, and was manifestly arranged like the roof of a house, the
covering passing over a ridge-pole in the center. Such briefly was this
sacred structure.
Of its furniture, the important articles were as follows:
(a.) In the open court in front of the tabernacle proper, were the
great altar of burnt-offering and a laver――an immense reservoir or
tank for water. (b.) In the holy place――the first section of the sacred
tent――stood the altar of incense; the table of shew-bread; and the
golden candlestick.――――(c.) In the most holy place, enshrouded in the
thick darkness, stood the ark of the covenant, containing originally
the two tables of stone on which the ten commandments were written, the
pot of manna, and Aaron’s rod that budded. Upon the lid of this ark,
known as “the mercy-seat,” there reposed the refulgence of the Divine
Presence――a visible brightness and glory, called by the later Jews “the
shechinah”――itself overshadowed by the wings of cherubic figures which
rested upon either end of the ark.
The whole structure might be readily taken down and transported from
place to place with all its furniture; parties being designated for
this service.
In Num. 10: 35, 36 we have the words customarily used by Moses as a
form of prayer, accompanying the order for striking and pitching tents:
“When the ark set forward Moses said, Rise up, Lord, and let thine
enemies be scattered, and let those that hate thee flee before thee:
and when it rested he said, Return, O Lord, unto the ten thousands of
Israel.”
Of the temple built by Solomon I need not say more than this――that
its plan was essentially that of the tabernacle, differing in the
following points: Its dimensions were twice as great; and it was built
for a permanent, immovable edifice, of the most substantial and costly
materials.
IV. _The Sacred Orders._
The tribe of Levi was chosen and set apart for the services of worship
and of religious instruction. Out of this tribe the family of Aaron was
selected for the priesthood. The most sacred services devolved upon the
priests, the High Priest only being permitted to enter the most holy
place once a year, as we have seen. The Levites performed subordinate
services, supplying the requisite wood and water for so vast a system
of sacrifices and offerings, and serving also in the transportation
of the sacred tent and its furniture. At a later period the service
of song in the house of the Lord was in their hands.
The law provided a full ritual for the induction of the High Priest
into his office and for the consecration of all the priests to their
work. Their robes of office, their various dress on all occasions,
are detailed with great minuteness.――――The law also provided specially
for their subsistence. A portion of various sacrifices fell to them
as their perquisite. The great expense of the entire ritual service,
including the cost of the animals offered for the people at large; the
support of the priests, and to some extent of the Levites, was provided
for by law in the tithes; the poll-tax of a half-shekel from every man
of Israel; and from various other sources.
In the ultimate settlement in Canaan, forty-eight cities with their
suburbs were given to the Levites. They were thus distributed among
the entire population of Canaan both east and west of the Jordan,
and if true to their mission would fill a very important sphere in
both the civil and the religious life of the nation. Of their civil
and judicial duties I have spoken already. They were also teachers of
religion.――――Their suburban territory would afford them a small amount
of land for cultivation; but the divine plan was that they who served
at the altar should live from the altar. While religious services were
conscientiously performed and the religious spirit was in due strength,
both priests and Levites would be comfortably fed and clad. Idolatry
and religious declension would cut their supplies short.
The careful reader of those portions of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers
which give the plan of the tabernacle, the ritual of the priests and
Levites and the minute detail of numerous sacrifices and offerings and
purifications, will not need the suggestion that in many respects the
interest and the value of these details have mostly passed away. Of
prime importance in that age; vital to the proper construction of the
tabernacle; vital to the due consecration of priest and Levite and to
their instruction in duty; entirely essential to the ends of a ritual
system which was to be the religious law of a great people――they were
all in place then and were indispensable; but in most respects this
interest and value have long since ceased. Whereas in the time of Moses
not one word of this minute detail was superfluous, not one point could
be safely omitted; now, it may be passed over with only brief notice.
Few will care to read all its particulars.
Yet two points deserve remark:
1. That this very minuteness of detail is the strongest evidence of the
genuineness and antiquity of these books. They were certainly written
at the time of the events they record. They never could have been
gotten up in any age subsequent to the events. The specifications for
the tabernacle and for all its furniture had a purpose then; but could
have had no purpose to justify such minuteness after the construction
was finished. It would be the supremest folly to forge such documents
ages after the events had passed. No man in his senses ever attempts
such a forgery. Men never submit to such labor without an object;
and the case precludes the possibility of any object _after_ the tent
was built and after the ritual was fully understood and wrought into
established usage.
2. While these minute details neither require nor reward particular
investigation in our day, yet taken in whole _they are pregnant with
great moral lessons for all time_.
(1.) There was a perpetual inculcation of cleanliness, external purity;
and the most careful avoidance of whatever was defiling. The ceremonial
washings and cleansings, the removal from the camp, or as the case
may be, the seclusion from the court of the tabernacle for a term
of purification, occur frequently. By a natural law of mind, sin is
associated with uncleanness; crime is defiling. Hence, with almost
infinite pains the Lord was impressing upon his people the great idea
that their God who deigned to dwell among them “was of purer eyes than
to behold iniquity.” He could not abide with them save as they kept
themselves clean and pure.
(2.) On every hand we note the most solemn inculcation of care,
thoughtfulness, consideration, especially in their religious worship,
and the most impressive warnings against a rash and inconsiderate
spirit. Hence wine was forbidden to the priests when about to go to the
altar (Lev. 10: 8–11). It seemed that God could have no patience with
the thoughtless and irreverent. At whatever cost, the fear of the Lord
must be impressed upon the people――else all effort for their religious
culture would be vain.
(3.) Their great thanksgiving festivals; their numerous thank-offerings;
their vows; their required tithes――all concur in this one idea――the
recognition of God as the Giver of all blessings, their great personal
and national Benefactor. No pains was spared to impress and enforce
this great truth. The long course of God’s redeeming mercies toward
their nation; the rescue from Egyptian bondage; the miraculous supplies
of bread and water forty years in the desert; the gift of the goodly
land of Canaan;――these were the staple facts of their history which God
sought to engrave upon the national heart and to work into the living
thought of the thousands of Israel. By every hopeful appliance their
religious system was shaped to keep alive and intensify these feelings.
(4.) More important than all the rest were the great moral lessons
set forth _by the perpetual presence of atoning blood_. The Israelites
were never allowed to forget that they were sinners, and that their
approach to God must always be through the blood of atonement. No
day might begin, no day might close, without the shedding of animal
blood――the sacrifice of an innocent animal’s life. The great days
were great because of the multiplication of these sacrifices――evermore
distinguished and memorable for the rivers of blood that flowed; for
the struggles and throes of the dying; for the sprinkling of blood,
_blood_, BLOOD, all round about the hallowed altar, toward the unseen
Presence within the most holy place, and upon the assembled hosts of
Israel.――――It may cost us a few moments’ effort to reproduce those
scenes before our mind’s eye so as to take in their full significance;
but this effort to comprehend that ancient ritual would bring its
reward. What a demonstration it would be in proof that “without
the shedding of blood there is no remission”! that God never looks
propitiously on guilty sinners save through the bleeding sacrifice of
his crucified Son! As bearing upon the great questions――the _fact_ and
the _nature_ of the atonement――this bloody ritual has a most vital and
impressive significance. No questions of deeper and more vital import
can ever arise than such as these: Was the death of Christ expiatory?
Was his blood shed for the sins of men? Did he lay down his life,
an innocent victim, that the guilty sinners who place their hands
upon his sacred head and there confess their sins may live and never
die? In a word, was his death foreshadowed and its true significance
pre-intimated by the bloody offerings enjoined in this Hebrew system?
Argumentatively, it would seem that these great questions are decided
forever by the following considerations:
1. If the bloody sacrifices of this ancient system do not set forth the
atoning death of Christ, they mean nothing; this, or nothing at all.
2. The writer to the Hebrew Christians testifies that they mean this.
To give the proof of this statement in full would repeat entire the
seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth chapters of this epistle. It would be
idle to say that this writer does not refer to the sacrificial system
of ancient Israel; equally idle to claim that he does not speak of the
bloody death of Christ; more than idle to deny that in his view that
old system sought to illustrate this new one――those bloody scenes were
foreshadowing pre-intimations of Christ’s death; that those priests
were precursors of this greater High Priest; that the blood which
Aaron bore once a year into the most holy place meant neither more nor
less than that Jesus was in his time to enter once for all into a yet
more holy place with his own blood and thus achieve for us eternal
redemption. Jesus “needed not daily as did those priests to offer
sacrifice, first for his own sins and then for the people’s; for this
he did once” [for all] “when he offered up himself” (Heb. 7: 27).
3. All the New Testament writers were Jews; men of Jewish education,
men of life-long training in religious ideas based on this Hebrew
sacrificial system. They never speak of the purpose or results of
Christ’s death save in terms and phrases taken from this system given
through Moses. Jesus never speaks of his own death save in these
same words and phrases. When he speaks of “giving his life a ransom
for many” (Mat. 20: 28); when he said, “This is my blood of the New
Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mat.
26: 28); when his great forerunner speaks of him as “the Lamb of God
who taketh away the sin of the world” (Jno. 1: 29);――or Peter (1 Eps.
2: 24) as “bearing our sins in his own body on the tree;” or Paul
(2 Cor. 5: 21) as being “made a sin-offering for us that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him,” it is simply impossible
to disprove the reference of these terms and phrases to the Mosaic
system――impossible to give them any other sense than that which
is illustrated in the bloody death of the sin-offerings and
burnt-offerings of that ancient law.
Thus with bands which no sophistry can sever, the Old Testament
and the New are bound together, and the atonement prefigured in the
former is embodied and made perfect in the latter. The almost ceaseless
blood-sheddings and blood-sprinklings of the former culminate in the
latter in the one great scene of death-agony and blood on Calvary.
The grand idea of expiatory suffering――of the vicarious death of the
innocent in place of the guilty, which ages of ceremonial sacrifice
had been setting forth and working into the minds of all reverent
worshipers, had prepared the way for Christ’s disciples to understand
the mystery of his bloody death and to teach the Christian world in
the writings of the New Testament _how_ the blood of Jesus “_takes away
sin_.”
* * * * *
In closing our notice of this religious system, let us revert for
a moment to the fact that all its important features were so many
important _steps of progress_ in the manifestation of God to man. These
were lessons in advance of all that had preceded on that greatest of
all questions――How shall man approach his Maker, and how shall he offer
acceptable worship?――――That God deigned to come down and dwell with
his obedient people is the precious truth which underlies all these
provisions for his worship. How shall man treat this Heavenly Guest;
how adjust himself to this pure and majestic Presence; with what
state of heart; with what purity and cleanliness of person; with
what offerings and sacrifices and of what significance?――――These are
the points embraced in these great lessons taught in this religious
system. The perpetual inculcation of cleanliness and of conscientious,
scrupulous care; the practice of perpetual thanksgiving; but above all,
the copious illustrations of the great idea of bloody sacrifice to take
away sin;――these have been already named as the salient features in
this system, and all (it will be noticed) are _points of progress_.
Bloody sacrifices and altars appear in the worship offered by Abraham,
Noah, and even Abel. But how much more fully is their true import
unfolded here? Here is confession of sin on the part of the worshiper;
here is the symbolic transfer of sins by imposition of hands upon
the head of the victim brought out to die: here is the sprinkling
of his blood all round about the altar; upon the very mercy-seat
and immediately in the presence of the Holy One who sat beneath the
cherubim; upon the worshipers also gathered round the bloody altar:
here are the special solemnities of the great day of atonement in
which the whole sacrificial system culminated――all combining their
significance to unfold the great idea of the vicarious sufferings of
an innocent victim in place of guilty men.