Professor Christine
Hayes: Today we're going to
be turning to Leviticus.
 
And Leviticus is a primary
document of the Priestly School.
And we identify this work as
Priestly because it deals with
matters that were of special
concern to and under the
jurisdiction of priests:
the sanctuary,
its cultic rituals,
the system of sacrifices,
the distinction between the
holy and the profane and the
pure and the impure.
 
So the Priestly materials are
found as a block in Leviticus,
a large part of Numbers,
and then they're scattered
throughout Genesis and Exodus.
 
And because of these common
themes, we say that they were
produced by a Priestly School:
we hypothesize a Priestly
School.
We don't quite clearly
understand exactly what that
means and who and exactly when.
These materials emerged over a
period of centuries;
that's clear.
They reached their final form
in the exilic or post-exilic
period.
But they certainly often
preserve older cultic traditions
and priestly traditions as well.
 
We can break the book of
Leviticus down into the units
that are listed on that side of
the board.
You have in chapters 1 through
7 the sacrificial system.
Chapters 8 through 10 recount
the installation of Aaron as
high priest and the Aaronides
then as the priestly clan within
Israel.
Chapters 11 through 15 cover
the dietary system,
the dietary laws as well as the
ritual purity laws.
 
Chapter 16 describes the
procedure to be followed on the
Day of Atonement or Yom Kippur.
 
Chapters 17 through 26 then are
a block of material that's
referred to as the "Holiness
code" because of its special
emphasis on holiness.
 
So most scholars think that
that block of material comes
from a different priestly
school, and so we designate that
H: holiness.
The relative dates of P and H,
P now meaning the non-H parts
of the Priestly materials,
they're much debated;
but I think increasingly,
the consensus is that H--the
block of material in Leviticus
17 through 26 and then also its
got passages scattered around
other parts of the Bible--but
the consensus increasingly is
that H is later.
It's a redactor or editor of
the other priestly materials.
 
So P is a difficult term of
reference, because P can refer
to the entirety of Priestly
writings altogether.
But when we think about H and
talk about H then P in contrast
to H means the Priestly writings
that are not H:
so maybe a small P and a
capital P, I don't know.
Now, the Priestly materials
have for a long time been I
think a devalued part of the
Hebrew Bible.
And scholarship of the
nineteenth century and most of
the twentieth century is
generally characterized by a
deep-seated bias that views
impurity rules as primitive and
irrational taboos,
and sacrifice as controlled
savagery that's empty of any
spiritual meaning.
Religion without such rites is
evolutionarily superior or
higher;
more spiritually meaningful.
And with those kinds of
attitudes, it's not difficult to
understand why scholarship on
Leviticus and those parts of the
Bible tend to be rather
dismissive.
In the later part of the
twentieth century,
the situation began to change.
 
As anthropologists and
ethnographers began to study the
danger avoidance practices of
many cultures,
the taboos and rituals of many
cultures, including modern
Western culture,
new avenues for understanding
the danger avoidance practices
of the Bible began to emerge.
Anthropologist Mary Douglas
changed forever the way scholars
would approach the impurity
rules of the Bible,
because she insisted on their
interpretation as symbols,
symbols that conveyed something
meaningful to those who followed
them.
Biblical scholars like Jacob
Milgrom and more recently
Jonathan Klawans,
attuned to developments in the
social sciences,
have made very great advances
in our understanding of
Israelite purity practices.
 
They've tended to view the
elaborate and carefully
constructed texts of P as part
of a system whose meaning
derives from the larger cultural
matrix or grid in which those
materials are embedded.
 
How much the system laid down
by P represents what ordinary
Israelite Judeans thought and
did;
how much these rules were
actually enacted and followed;
how much they drew upon older
random practices,
brought them together,
modified them,
imposed some semblance of order
upon them;
how much the represent just he
ideal construction or blueprint
of an elite group:
these are all unanswerable
questions.
The fact is,
no one really knows.
 
But we do know from living
cultures that people do engage
in all kinds of ritual and
symbolic actions because of
genuine beliefs about the
importance of those actions,
because those rituals and
symbols are extraordinarily
meaningful to them.
 
And in any event,
our primary concern is with the
program of the texts as they
stand before us:
is there a symbolism operating
here?
What are the key ideas and the
key themes of the Priestly
material?
How do these ideas or how does
this material jive with other
aspects of Israelite religion
that we've talked about so far?
 
What ultimately is the purpose
toward which these materials are
aiming?
Well, like the rest of the
ancient world,
Israel had a cultic system,
and that cultic system featured
a sanctuary: a sacred space with
holy objects;
sacred objects,
where priests performed a
variety of ritual acts.
So Israelite-Judean religion on
the ground shared many cultic
forms and practices and rituals
with Canaanite and Ancient Near
Eastern culture generally.
 
Sanctuaries in the ancient
world were understood to be the
dwelling place of the deity.
 
Sacrifices were offered to the
deity in his or her sanctuary.
P describes a portable
sanctuary, a mishkan,
that's used in the wilderness
period.
Now, if you look on your
handout, there's a
reconstruction of this tent-like
sanctuary at the top as well as
a schematization of its contents
below.
So woven curtains hung from
wooden frames that could easily
be assembled and disassembled.
 
And these curtains surround the
sacred precincts.
You see that in the top picture.
 
And within those precincts,
within that enclosure,
there's a large,
open courtyard.
That was accessible to all
Israelites.
The main sacrificial altar with
a large ramp stood in that
courtyard as well as a basin
that was there for ablutions.
And then halfway across the
courtyard, there was a screen
that marked the entrance to
another little enclosure,
which is the shrine proper,
the sanctuary proper;
and only priests have access to
that area.
The shrine or sanctuary housed
an incense altar.
And then on one side a
seven-branched lampstand or
menorah.
And on the other,
a table, which held loaves of
bread that were changed on a
weekly basis.
The backmost square-shaped
chamber of that inner shrine was
the inner sanctum or the holy of
holies.
And that was accessible only to
the high priest and only on the
Day of Atonement following a
series of heightened purity
observances.
Inside that holy of holies was
the ark.
It was about four feet by
two-and-a-half feet.
It was a wooden ark covered in
gold.
On top was a kind of covering.
 
It's referred to as a
kapporeth:
we don't really know what this
word means,
it's traditionally translated
"mercy seat," I think that's how
the JPS might translate it.
 
But it's some kind of gold
cover and then there were two
cherubim, these enormous winged
lions that flanked the ark.
Likely they were connected to
that mercy seat cover.
If so, then what they were was
a throne.
And we have in Ancient Near
Eastern iconography thrones of
this type.
We have pictures of gods and
kings seated on these seats,
the sides of which are these
giant winged cherubim,
and then their feet rest on a
footstool.
Likewise, in some biblical
verses, God or Yahweh is
described as enthroned upon the
cherubim.
The ark then is said to serve
as his footstool.
 
So that's sort of the box that
he would have rested his feet
on.
The ark itself contained the
tablets of the covenant.
 
And so it was a testament to
the covenant between God and
Israel.
Interestingly,
unlike most ancient
sanctuaries, the Israelite
sanctuary did not contain a
statue of the deity.
And that's I think evidence of
the very strong aniconic
tendency of Israelite religion.
 
Nevertheless,
God was believed to be present
in the sanctuary.
 
Often in the form of a cloud
that will fill,
that will descend to fill the
tabernacle,
particularly as it's assembled
in a new encampment,
and then God will descend down
and the cloud will fill the
tabernacle.
So it is God's presence there
that sanctifies,
which simply means "makes holy,
makes sacred," to sanctify,
to make holy,
the tabernacle.
And to understand this,
we need to understand the
Priestly conception of holiness.
Now, the Hebrew word "holy" has
a root meaning of separate.
Separate.
That which is holy is separate.
It's withdrawn from common,
everyday use.
In the Priestly view,
only God is intrinsically holy;
intrinsically holy.
 
God can impart holiness to,
he can sanctify,
persons and places and things
when they're brought into a
specific kind of relationship
with him,
a relationship that's best
described as a relationship of
ownership.
What is holy is what is in
God's realm, something that's
separated to him.
That which is outside God's
realm is common.
The Hebrew word for "common" is
sometimes translated by the
English word "profane."
 
That has a negative connotation
in English, but in fact it
really doesn't bear that
negative connotation.
Profane simply means not holy;
not sacred.
We use it differently now.
 
But the fact is that the common
or profane state is the natural
default state of most objects
and things.
This table is just profane.
 
It's common.
It's available for everyday use.
It's not separated or marked
off for special kind of
treatment because it's holy.
 
For a common object to become
holy, you need a special act of
dedication to God,
an act of sanctification to
transfer the thing to God or
God's realm or God's service.
So holiness entails necessarily
separation in both its positive
and negative aspects.
 
It entails separation of an
object to that which sanctifies
it, which is God;
and it involves separation
from, in the form of safeguards
against, anything that would
threaten to remove its sanctity.
 
So separation from that which
threatens its sanctity.
Holy things are holy because
they are removed from the realm
of the common by means of rules
or safeguards that demarcate
them as different and separate
and determine that we use them
differently.
The preservation of holy status
therefore depends on those rules
and safeguards.
Their observance protects the
holy object from profanation,
from being profaned,
reverting from holy status back
to common status.
 
Now, it's evident from the
schematic representation or the
way I've described the sanctuary
that holiness increases as you
move deeper into the sanctuary.
 
And the principle here that
holiness increases as proximity
to God increases.
 
The principle is graphically
demonstrated in spatial terms.
So in the biblical view,
the area or the land outside
the Israelite camp is just
common, profane land.
The Israelite camp bears a
certain degree of holiness.
Then as you move in,
the outer courtyard,
the outer enclosure of the
sanctuary, bears a slightly
higher degree of holiness.
 
It's accessible to Israelites
who are pure.
The sanctuary proper,
which is in closer proximity to
God, bears a still higher degree
of holiness: it's accessible
only to the priests,
who are said to be the holy
ones within Israel.
 
And then the inner shrine is
the holiest area:
it's accessible only to the
holiest member of the nation,
the high priest.
You have similar concentric
circles of holiness
characterizing the priestly
conception of time.
 
There are ordinary,
common, profane days,
work days.
Then there are certain holy
days: for example,
the New Year or the Passover
holidays--that's where our word
"holiday" comes from,
holy day--and they are
separated and demarcated from
common time by special rules
that mark them as different.
Holier than these days is the
Sabbath, which is demarcated by
even further rules and
observances.
And the holiest day is Yom
Kippur, known as the Sabbath of
Sabbaths.
This day is separated from all
other days by additional rules
and observances in keeping with
its profound holiness.
 
The holiness of persons,
of objects, of time and of
space all converge on Yom
Kippur,
because it's only on this most
holy day that the most holy
person, high priest,
enters the most holy of holies,
the innermost shrine,
and performs a ritual upon the
most holy of objects,
the mercy seat and ark itself
once a year.
Well, now we need to consider
the deep connection that exists
between holiness and purity.
Because the two are not
identical despite massive
amounts of scholarship that
confuses this issue:
thinks holy means pure,
thinks common means impure,
and it just doesn't:
these are different binary
oppositions.
The two are not identical.
To be holy means to belong to
or to be in the realm of God.
Things can't become holy and
can't come into contact with the
holy or the sacred if they are
not first pure.
Purity, which is the absence of
impurity, is a prerequisite for
access to the holy or for holy
status.
To be in a state of purity
simply means that one is
qualified to contact the sacred:
to enter the sacred precincts,
to handle sacred objects,
and so on.
To be in a state of impurity
simply means that one is not
qualified to contact the sacred.
 
So if you're impure at home and
just minding your own business,
it's no big deal.
 
It's only a problem if you
decide you want to go to the
sanctuary.
So purity and impurity are
states of qualification or
disqualification for contact
with sancta.
The holy is by definition pure:
by definition.
Only that which is free of
impurity can contact the holy.
 
If an impure object--and you
will see here these overlapping
pairs, which were also in your
handout--if you can imagine the
lower pair sort of being plunked
down on top of this pair,
that will give you an idea of
what we're trying to convey with
this image.
Okay?
Things are either holy or
common.
But if they're holy,
they must be pure.
Common objects can be pure or
impure;
it just depends whether or not
they've been in contact with a
source of impurity or not.
 
Alright?
If--but notice that the holy
and the impure are never
conjoined--if an impure object
comes in contact with a holy
object,
then the holy object is
immediately defiled;
it's immediately rendered
impure.
The word "defiled" means to
take on some form of ritual
impurity.
And it loses its holy status
automatically.
So it becomes both impure and
profane.
To be restored,
then, you're going to have to
have two things happening.
First of all,
it's got to be purified--you've
got to get rid of the ritual
impurity,
so there'll have to be some
ritual procedure that purges the
impurity.
So once you've done that,
you've made it pure;
but it's still common, profane.
So it has to,
if it's to be made holy again,
it has to be rededicated or
given over to God again,
re-sanctified:
maybe a little holy anointing
oil poured on it,
that's one means of
sanctification;
simply handing it over to God,
elevating it towards God is
another way of re-sanctifying
something.
But there has to be two steps:
a purification and then a
sanctification to make it holy
again.
Increased access to the holy
requires increased,
an increased degree of purity.
That's the connection between
holiness and purity.
So the purity that's required
of a priest, who has access to
the sanctuary proper,
is higher than that of an
Israelite, who has access to the
outer courtyard only.
The purity required of the high
priest is even greater.
So to be pure,
one must separate ones self
from sources of impurity.
 
What are these sources of
impurity?
And I hope you've had a chance
to look at the reading material,
because I'm going to go through
this relatively quickly.
Jonathan Klawans has been the
most vocal proponent of the
claim that biblical texts speak
of two distinct types of
impurity: ritual impurity and
moral impurity,
which I have up here .
 
You've read the short article
he has in the Jewish Study
Bible, but he's also written
about this at great length in
other places.
And according to Klawans and
others, ritual impurity arises
from physical substances and
states which are not in
themselves sinful.
There's no intimate connection
with sin when we're talking
about ritual impurity.
 
In fact, a lot of ritual
impurity is unavoidable and
sometimes even obligatory,
right?
Sexual contact makes one
ritually impure,
and yet God commands humans to
be fruitful and multiply.
Burying the dead makes one
ritually impure,
but God commands proper care of
the dead.
So there's nothing inherently
sinful about contracting ritual
impurity.
Ritual impurity,
which is generally permitted,
is distinguished by the
characteristics I've quickly
jotted down here.
It's contagious,
that is, it's transferred to
other persons or objects,
depending on how receptive they
are--perhaps by physical touch,
perhaps in the case of severe
impurity by sharing an enclosed
space, by being together under
an overhanging roof,
tent.
Ritual impurity is also
impermanent.
It can be removed or reduced
through rituals of ablutions or
just the passage of time or
other sorts of ritual
observances.
Ritual impurity also defiles or
renders impure sancta,
and so it has to be kept
separate from sancta.
 
In very severe cases,
it can even defile some common
objects, and in those cases,
the source of impurity might
have to be isolated or excluded
if necessary.
Now, the concept of ritual
impurity was a central and
integral feature of most,
if not all, ancient religions.
And the biblical laws of purity
and impurity strongly resemble
those of other Ancient Near
Eastern cultures:
Egyptian, Mesopotamian,
even Hittite culture.
And certainly,
there are Ancient Near Eastern
and Canaanite roots for
Israelite purity practices.
But the system of ritual purity
and impurity that is crafted in
the Priestly writings of the
Hebrew Bible represents an
attempt to monotheize,
to monotheize Israelite purity
practices and to create a system
that differentiated Israel from
her close neighbors.
 
So, for example,
impurity was often connected
with belief in evil spirits and
impure demons.
It's quite possible that
Israel's purification rituals
may have originated and even
long endured as rituals of
exorcism that expelled a demon
who was believed to be causing
the affliction in question.
 
That may be their origin and
source;
but in the Priestly writings,
impurity is generally divorced
from any association with evil
spirits.
Some scholars theorize that the
ritual purity system reflects an
original concern with health or
hygiene.
But this isn't very convincing.
 
Only one set of diseases is
said to generate ritual
impurity, and many substances
that are widely considered
unhygienic by most cultures--for
example,
human and animal
excrement--these are not sources
of ritual impurity to Israel's
priests.
So Klawans is among those who
insist that any effort to
understand the purpose and the
meaning of Israelite purity
practices as schematized by the
monotheizing Priestly writers in
Leviticus 12 through 16--and
again whether actual Israelite
Judeans did this or understood
things this way,
we'll never know--but to
understand the schematization
of, the monotheizing
schematization of Israel's
purity practices,
we would do better to ignore
questions of origins and to
attend to the larger symbolism
of impurity and holiness in
these writings:
in particular,
we need to try to understand
the antithetical relationship
between impurity and holiness.
The two are opposites.
 
They are opposed and
antagonistic towards one
another.
So Klawans points out,
as you know,
that there are three main
sources of impurity in P.
 
First of all,
corpses and certain carcasses
are a source of ritual
impurity: sara'at,
which is this--we translate it
"scale disease," it's been
called leprosy.
It's definitely not leprosy.
People who know such things
have read the details in the
biblical texts and it's not what
is truly known as leprosy.
But it's some sort of skin
disease, flaking skin disease or
other sorts of boils and skin
states that seem to be
associated,
at least in the Israelite mind,
with decomposition and death.
 
We have a couple of passages,
one in the book of Numbers,
one in the book of Job,
which describe this condition
in a way that identifies it with
death.
An aborted fetus is often
described as looking like it has
this condition,
for example--not often,
it happens once in the book of
Job.
But the point is there's a
connection between this
condition, this skin condition,
and its decomposition and
death.
The third source of ritual
impurity would be genital
discharges, both normal and
diseased.
So Klawans notes in the article
you read that the physical
substances and states that are
labeled impure and are therefore
designated as antithetical to
the realm of holiness are states
that are associated with death
on the one hand,
and procreation on the other.
Why should this be?
 
The Priestly conception of god,
you will recall,
is of an immortal and asexual
being.
Think back to the first
creation story,
which is the Priestly creation
story.
To enter the realm of the holy,
in which there is neither death
nor procreation,
requires a separation from
death and procreation.
 
It is association with death
and sexuality that renders one
impure and disqualifies one from
entering the holy sanctuary.
That is not to say that one
shouldn't deal with death or
sexuality in the ordinary course
of life.
On the contrary,
God explicitly commands humans
to be fruitful and multiply,
and he does that in the
P-source, right?
In Genesis 1.
He commands proper care of the
dead, and he also does that in
the P-source.
It simply means that one cannot
enter the holy sanctuary,
God's realm,
when impure through contact
with death or sexuality.
So according to Klawans,
ritual purification involved
separation from those aspects of
humanity, death and sex,
that are least God-like.
 
To enter God's realm requires
imitation of God or imitatio
dei, right,
an idea that I put up here,
imitatio dei:
imitation of god.
And Klawans further argues that
the concept of imitatio
dei also explains the
practice of sacrifice which,
on the face of it,
contradicts the idea that you
must avoid death in connection
with the holy,
right?
Because sacrifice entails
killing right in the sanctuary,
killing of animals right in the
sanctuary.
So Klawans argues,
and I quote,
that "sacrifice involves in
part the controlled exercise of
complete power over an animal's
life and death."
Which is, he says "…precisely
one of the powers that Israel's
God exercises over human beings.
As God is to humanity,
humans in imitation of God are
towards their domesticated
animals."
So the process of sacrifice,
I won't go into his argument
here, but Klawans develops a
strong argument that the process
of sacrifice can be understood
itself as an act of imitatio
dei,
because sacrifice involves a
variety of behaviors in the
biblical text that are analogous
to behaviors attributed
elsewhere in the biblical texts
to God: the care and feeding and
raising of domestic animals,
the selection of one that is
deemed perfect,
control over its life and death
and so on.
And these are all spoken of in
terms that are analogous to
terms used to describe God as
the shepherd of his flock of
Israel and in control of life
and death and so on.
So Klawans argues that the
process of sacrifice,
which grants the offerer
complete control over life and
death, is a kind of imitatio
dei.
But Klawans also asserts,
and I quote,
that "Imitatio dei does
not exhaustively explain
sacrifice in ancient Israel,"
and in fact,
we should be surprised if any
one single theory would indeed
explain sacrifice.
 
So he just says that there are
really two organizing principles
or overriding concerns in the
Priestly traditions and the
Priestly materials regarding
sacrifice.
The first, as we've seen,
is imitatio dei.
But the second is a desire to
attract and maintain the divine
presence, the continued presence
of God in the sanctuary.
The majority of the sacrifices
that are described in the
opening chapters of Leviticus,
in Leviticus 1 through 7,
are voluntary sacrifices.
 
These are sacrifices that are
offered as gifts or in times of
celebration.
I put a little list of them up
here, but the first three are
the ones that will concern us
now.
We have first of all,
the whole offering or "burnt
offering," it's sometimes
called.
This is when an animal is
entirely burned to create,
as the text says,
a pleasant smelling odor or
pleasant smelling smoke that
ascends to God.
So according to P,
the priests are to offer two
such burnt offerings with
pleasing-smelling odors to the
Lord every day:
one in the morning and one in
the evening on a regular basis
from the community.
 
The second kind of offering
that's described is the grain
offering.
This is a gift of flour and oil
and incense, which is burned
after a portion is removed for
the priests as dues to the
priests,
the rest is burned on the altar
again with a sweet smell from
the incense.
Third, we have a set of
offerings known as well-being
offerings, "peace offerings"
it's sometimes translated.
 
These offerings are generally
consumed by the offerer and his
family, very often in a festive
situation,
as a big feast,
after certain portions are
donated to the priests,
again.
Well-being offerings are of
three main types.
You have the thanksgiving
offering.
You have a freewill
offering--just because someone
wants to do this,
a freewill offering.
And you have a vow offering
that would be offered on the
successful completion of a vow,
for example.
And these sacrifices are all
entirely optional.
They were offered in
celebration.
They were offered in
thanksgiving or upon the
successful completion of a vow.
 
In other words,
the sacrificial cult was
primarily a vehicle for
worshipers' expression of a wide
range of emotions:
joy over the birth of a child,
thankfulness for a good harvest
and so on.
Now, texts from Ancient Near
Eastern cultures suggest that a
central function of the rituals
that were performed in
sanctuaries was to secure the
perpetual aid and blessing of a
well-disposed deity.
 
And in important ways,
the Israelite cult is
strikingly similar,
particularly in the sacrifices
I've just described.
 
The Israelites certainly hoped
to secure the perpetual aid and
blessing and protection of a
well-disposed deity.
Blessing and benefaction flow
from God's presence in the midst
of the community in his
sanctuary: when he is there,
there is blessing.
 
So Klawans follows earlier
scholars in suggesting that the
rituals and sacrifices performed
in this sanctuary were designed
to ensure God's continued
residence within and blessing of
the community.
In particular,
the daily burnt offerings
sacrificed by the priests twice
each day,
and emitting this pleasing
odor: these were an effort to
attract the deity.
Likewise, the gifts--the other
foods and pleasing odors of the
sacrifices brought by individual
worshipers--attracted and
maintained the continued
presence of God in the
sanctuary.
So this is the second
overriding concern or organizing
principle of the sacrifice:
not simply that there should be
imitatio dei within God's
realm,
but also that the activities
there should attract and
maintain the presence of the
deity for the well-being of the
community.
But just as God is attracted by
certain kinds of behaviors,
so he is repelled by others.
 
And in the Priestly system,
grave sins generate an
impurity, now a moral impurity,
so now we're coming to the
second kind of impurity,
moral impurity that repels the
divine presence.
Okay?
So moral impurity is the second
kind of impurity that's
described by Klawans and others.
 
In contrast to ritual impurity,
moral impurity does arise from
the commission of sins.
 
Ritual impurity does not:
there's nothing that's
prohibitive about-- you're never
told not to become ritually
impure, okay?
There's nothing sinful about
it, inherently.
But moral impurity arises
specifically from the commission
of certain heinous sins
specifically.
The three that I've listed here
are the biggies:
idolatry, homicide and sexual
transgressions.
These are spelled out in
Leviticus 18 and Leviticus 20,
those two chapters.
Besides defiling the sinner,
moral impurity symbolically
defiles various sancta,
especially the sanctuary,
but also God's name and also
the Holy Land itself.
Moral impurity differs from
ritual impurity not simply
because of its origin in sin,
but also in the fact that it's
not contagious,
alright?
You don't contract impurity by
touching a murderer,
the way that you contract
ritual impurity by touching
somebody with gonorrhea.
 
Also, moral impurity is not
removed or reducible through
rituals, through washings and
launderings, ritual ablutions
and the like.
That does not touch moral
impurity in a person.
 
Moral purity of persons can be
achieved only by punishment for
heinous sins:
for example,
the punishment of
chirate,
or cutting off,
is a divine punishment of being
extirpated from the House of
Israel;
death, alright,
that's one way to be rid of
moral impurity.
Also it can be achieved by
simply avoiding or abstaining
from defiling,
immoral acts in the first
place: that's another way to
achieve moral purity.
 
Also, if you atone for
unwitting sins that you perhaps
later realize and regret;
acknowledge and confess,
then that can also have a
reduced moral impurity.
Very severe moral impurity
defiles the innermost areas of
the sanctuary as well as the
land.
Now, the sanctuary can be
purified of moral impurity,
and I'll come back and talk
about that in a second;
but the land really cannot.
 
Land that is repeatedly
defiled, or the holy land of God
that is repeatedly defiled by
sexual transgressions,
for example,
cannot be purified.
Eventually it will simply
"vomit out," the biblical text
says, it will simply vomit out
those who dwell on it.
This is a reference to exile.
 
This is consistent with the
representation of the expulsion
of the Canaanites from God's
land.
Remember when God said,
"The sin of the Amorites is not
yet complete,
when they have sinned so much
and to such a degree,
they will be vomited out and
then your tenancy can begin"?
 
The land will purge itself of
the impurity by vomiting them
out.
And this is consistent then
with the repeated warnings in
Leviticus to the Israelites not
to engage in similar abominable
and sinful practices--the sexual
transgressions,
the bloodshed,
the idolatry--because they too
will pollute the land until it
vomits them out.
They will be expelled.
The land is also defiled by
illicit homicide.
There is legal homicide,
of course, judicial death and
so on in the Bible,
but illicit homicide,
whether intentional or
unintentional,
murder or accidental homicide.
 
The manslayer bears blood
guilt, what is referred to as
"blood guilt."
That's a kind of moral
impurity, and his life is
forfeit because of that.
In cases of deliberate murder,
blood guilt and impurity are
removed only by the death of the
murderer himself:
only blood atones for blood.
 
In cases of accidental
homicide, the perpetrator can
take refuge in one of five
cities that are designated for
this purpose:
the five cities of refuge.
They can live there until the
death of the high priest,
and the death of the high
priest symbolically serves to
purge or remove the blood guilt
or impurity of the accidental
homicide.
Idolatry also defiles the land.
Offenders are subject to
stoning and the divine penalty
of chirate,
of cutting off.
The Bible repeatedly warns that
idols and their cultic
appurtenances must be completely
destroyed from the Holy Land,
right?
The Israelites have to
eradicate that,
they're polluting the land.
Now, in contrast to the land,
God's sanctuary can be purified
for moral impurity by means of a
special sacrifice.
And this is the fourth
sacrifice listed here,
the hatta't,
which is the purification
sacrifice.
It's often erroneously
translated as a "sin offering."
 
It's better translated as a
purification offering.
How does it operate?
 
The blood of the animal,
the blood of the sacrifice is
the key to the whole ritual.
 
Remember that impurity and sin
are often associated with death.
Holiness, that which is holy,
is often associated with life.
And if the two are antithetical
then it makes sense.
If impurity is associated with
death, it makes sense that its
antithesis, holiness,
would be associated with life.
According to the Priestly
source, blood,
the blood that courses through
one's veins, represents the life
force.
Remember in the Noahide
covenant, in Genesis 9,
which is a Priestly passage,
the Priestly blood prohibition:
You may not spill human blood.
And you may not eat animal
flesh that has the lifeblood in
it because the blood is the life
and that belongs to God,
that's holy,
right?
So the life force is holy and
the life force is in the blood.
Leviticus 17:11 says this;
it repeats the blood
prohibition, and then it offers
a rationale.
"For the life of the flesh is
in the blood,
and I have assigned it to you
for making expiation for your
lives upon the altar."
 
I've assigned it to you to use
in sacrificial practices.
It is the blood as life that
effects expiation,
purging and atonement.
 
So the Priestly texts couldn't
be clearer: blood represents
life.
The blood of sacrificial
animals is assigned by God as a
detergent, if you will,
to cleanse the sanctuary of the
impurities that are caused by
the sinful deeds of the
Israelites.
Sacrifices that purge the
sanctuary of ritual impurity,
primarily the hatta't,
 always involve the
manipulation of the animal's
blood, daubing it on the altar
and on Yom Kippur,
actually entering the innermost
shrine and sprinkling it on the
throne of God and the footstool,
the ark itself.
It symbolizes the victory of
the forces of life,
oath and holiness over death
and impurity.
Other purifactory rights that
are listed in the Bible will
sometimes involve the use of
reddish substances as a kind of
surrogate of blood.
It's a widely--it is widely and
mistakenly thought that the
purification offering purifies
the sinner or the impurity
bearer or the offerer.
 
This can't be true.
 
The hatta't,
the purification offering,
doesn't rid a ritually impure
person of their ritual impurity.
You can't even offer a
sacrifice unless you're already
ritually pure,
because you couldn't get into
the sanctuary to offer your
sacrifice if you weren't
ritually pure.
You can't approach to offer a
sacrifice if you're not in a
state of ritual purity already.
So purification offerings are
brought after the genital
discharge has healed and passed;
after the scale disease has
healed and passed;
after the appropriate ablutions
have been observed and the
person is essentially pure.
But there's one more step they
have to take before they're
integrated back into the
community.
The hatta't also does
not rid a sinner of their moral
impurity, because the offering
is brought after the sinner has
confessed,
after the sinner has repented.
The purification offering acts
on the sanctuary,
not on the offerer.
 
It purges the sanctuary of the
defilement that is
symbolically--it has
symbolically suffered from the
offerer's state of ritual
impurity or sinfulness.
Once the sanctuary is purged,
the offerer has settled his
debt, he's repaired the damage
he caused.
He's fully atoned,
"at one" again with God.
And God is no longer repelled
by the impurity that marred his
sanctuary.
The defiling effect of lesser
transgressions is calibrated to
the sinner's intentionality and
the presence or absence of
repentance.
So inadvertent sins can be
purged, the sanctuary defilement
that they cause can be purged by
bringing a purification
sacrifice.
What about deliberate sins?
As long as there is repentance,
the biblical text says,
then they are converted into
inadvertent sins,
and they also can be purged,
or the impurity they cause can
be purged with a purification
sacrifice.
But brazen, unrepentant sins,
unrepented sins,
or unintentional sins that are
never realized…these stand
unremedied, and they defile the
sanctuary.
So for this reason,
the sanctuary has to be
regularly purged of the
accumulated defilements accruing
to it as a result of such sins.
 
Leviticus 16 describes the
annual ritual which is carried
out on the day of atonement or
day of purgation,
it can be called,
Yom Kippur, when a
hatta't sacrifice,
a purification sacrifice is
brought on behalf of the
community to purify the
sanctuary of the impurities that
have been caused by Israel's
sin.
And the high priest loads all
of the sins and impurities of
the Israelites on the head of a
goat,
which then carries them off
into the wilderness away from
the sanctuary.
Purification of the sanctuary
was believed to be critical to
the health and the well-being of
the community.
If the sanctuary is not purged
of impurity, it can become
polluted to the point when God
is driven out entirely.
Jacob Milgrom has argued that
there's a kind of Archimedean
principle at work here:
every sin creates an impurity
that encroaches upon the realm
of holiness and displaces a
certain amount of holiness.
 
And eventually,
God will be completely
displaced and the community will
be left in a godless state,
without blessing or protection.
 
So Milgrom sees the symbolic
function of the purity system
this way: if the sanctuary
symbolizes the presence of God,
and if impurity represents the
wrongdoing of persons,
then by saying that impurity is
anathema to God and pollutes his
temple,
the priests are able to
graphically convey the idea that
sin forces God out of his
sanctuary and out of the
community.
Jacob Milgrom sees a moral
message at the base of this
complex, symbolic picture.
 
And that is that humans and
humans alone are responsible for
the rein of wickedness and death
or the rein of righteousness and
life.
Human actions determine the
degree to which God can dwell on
earth among his people.
So the goal or the objective of
the Priestly construction or
representation of Israel's
impurity laws was,
in Milgrom's view,
to sever impurity from the
demonic and to reinterpret it as
a symbolic system reminding
Israel of the divine imperative
to reject sin,
to behave in ways that attract
the presence of God and do not
repel him.
You also read an article by
Milgrom where Milgrom talks
about Priestly cultic imagery
serving as a kind of theodicy.
 
A theodicy of course is a
response to the problem of evil.
How can an all-powerful,
good God allow so much evil to
exist and even go unpunished?
 
And according to Milgrom,
this is the priestly answer:
every sin pollutes the
sanctuary.
It may not mark the sinner,
but it does mark the sanctuary.
It scars the face of the
sanctuary.
You may think you've gotten
away with something,
but every act of social
exploitation,
every act of moral corruption,
pollutes the sanctuary more and
more until such time as God is
driven out entirely and human
society is devoured by its own
viciousness and death-dealing.
So again, the ethical message
here is that humans are in
control of their destiny and the
action of every individual
affects and influences the fate
of society.
This is really the Priestly
version of an old biblical
doctrine, a doctrine of
collective responsibility.
Sin affects…individual sin
affects the entire fabric of
society.
There's no such thing as an
isolated evil;
our deeds affect one another.
And when evildoers are finally
punished, they bring down others
with them.
Those others,
however, aren't so blameless,
Milgrom says,
because they allowed the wicked
to flourish and contribute to
the pollution of the sanctuary,
the corruption of society.
So P's cultic imagery is
informed, according to Milgrom,
by the same communal ethic that
we will see running through the
Bible,
much of the Bible,
until a later period.
 
It's simply conveying that
ethic in its own modality
through the symbolism of the
sanctuary and the cult.
The 11th chapter of Leviticus
deals with the dietary laws.
We don't have time to go into
them at any great length.
I will say that Milgrom has
also argued that the dietary
laws of Leviticus are similarly
part of a symbol system that
emphasizes life over death.
 
This is the following evidence
that he cites;
the mainstays of the dietary
laws are these:
first, the prohibition against
eating animal blood from Genesis
9, which symbolizes the life.
 
We also, in Leviticus 11,
meat dietary laws that are
governed by criteria such as cud
chewing and having a split hoof;
you can only eat animals that
chew the cud and have a split
hoof.
And those criteria seem
arbitrary and meaningless in and
of themselves,
and he says they are.
 
But look at their practical
effect: that limits the number
of animals that one can eat to a
mere handful out of the hundreds
upon hundreds of creatures on
the earth,
that basically leaves you
with--my animal husbandry is not
good here--but it leaves you
with the bovine and the ovine
classes--I guess ovine are goats
and some such--so it leaves you
basically with goats and sheep
and cattle.
Some have hypothesized that
whatever the origin of various
food taboos in Israel,
the Priestly texts have tried
to create a dietary discipline
that drives home the point that
all life shared also by animals
is inviolable,
except in the case of meat,
which has been conceded by God,
and provided that the animals
are slaughtered properly,
painlessly, and that their
blood, which is symbolic of the
life, is not appropriated but
returned to God,
its sacred source.
 
So perhaps as it stands,
the system of dietary laws does
in fact emphasize reverence for
life.
But they also serve another
very important function,
and that was the formation and
maintenance of a differentiated
ethnic identity or in Priestly
parlance,
the formation and maintenance
of a holy peoples separated out
from other nations by rules that
mark her as God's people.
It's surely significant that
the dietary laws are followed by
a powerful exhortation to be
holy in imitation of God,
Leviticus 11:43-45.
 
So we've just had the
prohibition of not eating
certain kinds of small animals,
designated as anything that
swarms.
And the text says,
You shall not draw
abomination upon yourselves
through anything that swarms;
you shall not make yourselves
unclean therewith and thus
become unclean.
For I the Lord am your God:
you shall sanctify yourselves
and be holy, for I am holy.
 
You shall not make yourselves
unclean through any swarming
thing that moves upon the earth.
 
For I the Lord am He who
brought you up from the land of
Egypt to be your God:
you shall be holy,
for I am holy.
Look at how much this is
emphasized.
The dietary laws are presented
by the priests not as a hygienic
regimen--who knows if that's how
they started--not as a sensible
way to avoid various diseases
that are caused by the lack of
refrigeration in the desert.
Whatever the actual origin of
these various dietary taboos,
they are here embedded in a
larger ideological framework
concerning the need for the
Israelites to separate
themselves and to be holy like
their god.
The dietary laws are connected
then with this theme of
imitatio dei,
of imitation of God.
As God is holy,
separate and distinct,
so you shall be holy.
 
I just want to take two last
minutes to quickly point to this
theme of holiness that continues
in the section referred to as
the Holiness Code.
 
This theme, and the
exhortation, "you shall be holy,
for I the Lord your God am
holy," they find their fullest
expression in the block of text;
Leviticus 17 through 26 that's
referred to as the Holiness
Code.
There's an important difference
between Leviticus 1 through 16
and the Holiness Code.
 
According to Leviticus 1
through 16, Israel's priests are
designated as holy:
a holy class within Israel,
singled out,
dedicated to the service of God
and demarcated by rules that
apply only to them.
Israelites may aspire to
holiness, but it's not assumed.
However, in the Holiness Code,
we have texts that come closer
to the idea that Israel itself
is holy by virtue of the fact
that God has set Israel apart
from the nations to himself,
to belong to him,
just as he set apart the
seventh day to himself to belong
with him.
Holy things only exist because
of safeguards,
rules that keep them separate,
that demarcate them.
And these safeguards and rules
are naturally addressed to human
beings.
They are the ones charged with
the task of preserving the holy
in its residence on earth.
So although holiness derives
from god, humans have a crucial
role to play in sanctification,
in sanctifying the world.
That's illustrated in the case
of the Sabbath.
God sanctified the Sabbath at
creation;
he demarcated it as holy.
 
But Israel is the one to affirm
its holiness by observing the
rules that make it different,
that mark it off as holy.
So Israel doesn't just in fact
affirm the holy status of the
Sabbath, they actualize the holy
status of the Sabbath.
If Israel doesn't observe the
prohibitions that distinguish
the Sabbath as sacred,
it's automatically desecrated.
"You shall keep the Sabbath,
for it is holy for you.
He who profanes it shall be put
to death.
Whoever does work on it,
that person is cut off from
among his kin."
You automatically,
it is automatically desecrated
and profaned if you don't
observe its rules.
 
So there are two components
integral and inseparable in the
concept of holiness:
initial assignment of holy
status by God and establishment
of rules to preserve that holy
status,
and secondly,
actualization of that holiness
by humans through the observance
of the commandments and rules
that mark that thing off as
holy.
That's going to lead us very
nicely into an understanding of
the laws that mark off Israel's
status and keep Israel distinct
among the nations,
which we'll be looking at on
Wednesday.
So please take a look at the
materials that were sent out:
the Ancient Near Eastern
collection and some of the
questions to guide you through
this material.
