- V1-4 – Follow God’s ways not pagan ways.
- V5-7 – Take your sacrifices & offerings to the place God will designate
- V8-14 – Don’t offer sacrifices just anywhere, but only in my place
- V15a – Slaughter & eat meat anywhere
- V15b – Clean & unclean alike just like gazelle & deer
- V17-19 – Don’t eat offerings just anywhere, but only in my place
- V20-21 – Slaughter & eat meat anywhere
- V22 – Just like gazelle & deer, clean & unclean alike
- V26-27 – Take offerings to the place God will designate
- V28-32 – Follow God’s ways, not pagan ways.
A few thoughts:
Rashi and the Sages
v8 - You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes...
Rashi said that this verse should be translated "...rather everyone should do whatever is right in his own eyes..." which seems to be precisely the opposite of what is intended. The Jewish sages, including Rashi, frequently have amazing insight into Torah. They have been studying it for more than 3000 years, after all. Unfortunately, 3000 years provides a lot of opportunity for corruption as well. I think this is an example of the latter rather than the former.
The sages also say that the laws in v8-25 are specifically addressing animals that were vowed to be offered at the Tabernacle, but had to be redeemed because of some flaw that developed or was discovered later. This law was given so that the one making the vow would not feel like the animal must still be treated as sacred somehow, hence the explicit allowance for the unclean to eat it.
The unclean and the clean may eat of it as of the gazelle and as of the deer.
That seems reasonable enough, but if it's correct, then it was probably only the initial reason the law was recorded in the way that it was. The rule still applies to all non-sacrificial animals regardless.
Where I think they get off track again is in the reference to the gazelle and the deer. Here they reference a tradition in which the right front leg, cheeks, and stomach of a slaughtered cow, sheep, or goat must be given to a Cohen, while the same is not true of a gazelle or deer. This formerly dedicated animal may be kept in whole without giving a portion to a Cohen.
There's nothing wrong with giving a portion of your slaughtered animals to the local Cohen--it might even be a good thing--but it is only a tradition, not a Torah command, and I do not believe that Moses had even the vaguest notion of this practice when he gave this commandment. I think he meant something much more obvious.
Since gazelle and deer were not domesticated animals, it would have been next to impossible to take them to the Tabernacle to be slaughtered. Nobody would have captured these animals before killing them. They would have killed them in the field using some kind of blade or projectile. Moses was merely saying that in this respect a cow is no different than a deer. Just because it
can be used as a sacrifice doesn't mean that it
must be used so.
The Meaning of the Chiasm and Parallelism
I haven't been studying Biblical literary structures long enough to be confident in these conclusions. I even hesitate to call them conclusions; they're merely speculations.
The religion of YHWH is not random or haphazard. Although God doesn't micromanage every aspect of daily life, His religion is orderly and uniform. Certain forbidden practices will tend to encourage the development of pagan religious systems:
- We must not collect the blood of a slaughtered animal for any purpose other than pouring it out onto the ground. Blood contains life. I won't pretend to know everything that that means, but there is definitely something about blood that inspires mystical thoughts and feelings. Ingesting blood can easily evolve into a religious ritual. Many old movie featuring hunting Indians or a young man's first kill witness to our cultural understanding of this truth. (Laboratory use of blood is fine so long as it is never ingested and it is disposed of when no longer needed.)
- Differentiating between kosher animals that are eligible for sacrifice and kosher animals that are not eligible for sacrifice in the routine practice of slaughtering for food could also easily evolve into a religious ritual. The butcher or the purchaser must ask himself why they are observing this difference. Perhaps the spirit of the bull must be treated differently than the spirit of the gazelle, so he begins saying a little prayer to the bull with the initial cut of the knife. His son builds a small shrine beside the killing floor. His grandson builds a platform on the killing floor to catch the blood. His great grandson dabs the blood on the four horns of the family altar and drinks a cup of the sanctified stuff.
- A difference must be made between sanctified animals and the non-sanctified. However, it is not the animal that makes the offering sacred but the altar. Sacrifices may only be killed and eaten in God's designated place and mundane slaughter may only be done and eaten away from God's designated place. Never mix the two lest the difference in the places be forgotten and the people slide again into paganism.
Now I'm going to really step out into Messianic controversy land. Because you know how I've shied away from that kind of stuff before. Wink, wink.
The contents of the parallelism make sense in the context of the chiasm as noted in the points above. However, why is there a parallelism at all? Why say essentially the same thing twice? The repetition means it's important of course, but wouldn't it be enough to simply say "This is really important?"
On the surface (
peshat), the first iteration concerns where a sacrifice must be killed and the second concerns where it may be eaten. However, it goes on to repeat much of the same rules, including the curious reference to gazelle and deer.
The Law makes no distinction between the native born and the believer who has been grafted in except in one respect: service at the Holy Place. Only the physical descendants of Levi may serve at the Tabernacle and only the physical descendants of Aaron may serve at the altars. Through Yeshua, we have been brought into the Kingdom of God, grafted into the tree of Israel, but, like Yeshua, we will never be qualified to serve as a Cohen or to care for any of the holy articles of the Tabernacle. (Yeshua is a High Priest in the Tabernacle in Heaven, not the one on earth. See Hebrews 8:1-5.)
Likewise, this command says that as far as the Law is concerned, there is no difference between the gazelle and deer (wild & untaught) on the one hand and the bull and the goat (domesticated & trained) on the other, except in one respect: service at the Holy Temple. And it says it twice.
Is this parallelism attempting to draw the reader's attention to the parallel between animals and Israelites? Is it saying, "Whether in offering or in eating sacrifices, the positive commands and the negative commands, you will make no distinction in the Law between the native born and the grafted in except for those who are dedicated to service at the Holy Place?"
The parallelism is at the center of a chiasm which is framed by instructions that all citizens of the Kingdom will worship God in the same way and at the same place. We are one body, one nation, united in Messiah Yeshua.
