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Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?: A Biblical Theology of the Book of Leviticus

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L. Michael Morales

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“Seen in this light, what strikes many modern readers as the ludicrous attention to detail in the book Leviticus, involving God in the minutiae of daily life—all the cooking and cleaning of a people's domestic life—might be revisioned as the very love of God. A God who cares so much as to desire to be present in everything we do.”

Daily LifeLeviticus
Book:The Quotidian Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy and Women's Work
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“Sacrifice is the only mechanism for forgiveness in the book of Leviticus. There is no suggestion in Leviticus that repentance alone can bring forgiveness for violations of the laws, no indication that one can appeal to YHWH's mercy. His grace, or His kindness for atonement. Indeed, the words "repentance" (šûb), "mercy" (raḥǎmîm), "grace" (ḥēn), and "kindness" (ḥesed) do not occur in Leviticus.”

ForgivenessLeviticusAnimal Sacrifice
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“18.22. you shall not lie with a male like lying with a woman. Why is male homosexuality explicitly forbidden in the Torah but not female? Some would surmise that it is because women are controlled in a patriarchal Israelite society; and so a woman would simply have no choice but to marry a man. But this is not an adequate explanation, because there would still be opportunities for female homosexual liaisons. Some would say that the concern is the seed, which is understood to come from the male, and therefore is "wasted" in another male. But the text calls homosexuality "an offensive thing" (in older translations: "an abomination"), which certainly sounds like an abhorrence of the act, and not just a concern with the practical matter of reproduction. The reason may rather be because the Torah comes from a world in which there is polygamy. A man can have sex with his two wives simultaneously. That this is understood to be permissible is implied by the fact that the law in v. 18 above forbids it only with sisters (see the comment). Or, even if the above case means marriage and not simultaneous sex, then simultaneous sex still is not forbidden anywhere in the Torah. If simultaneous sex with one's two (or more) wives is practiced, it would be difficult to allow this while forbidding female homosexuality. (At minimum, it could require a number of laws specifying what sort of contact is permissible and under what circumstances.) In the present state of knowledge concerning homosexuality, it is difficult to justify its prohibition in the Torah. All of the movements in Judaism (and other religions) are currently contending with this issue. Its resolution ultimately must lie in the law of Deuteronomy that states that, for difficult matters of the law, people must turn to the authorities of their age, to those who are competent to judge, and those judges must decide (Deut 17:8-9). In my own view, the present understanding of the nature of homosexuality indicates that it is not an "offensive thing" (also translated "abomination") as described in this verse. The Hebrew term for "offensive thing" (tô'ēbāh) is understood to be a relative term, which varies according to human perceptions. For example, in Genesis, Joseph tells his brothers that "any shepherd is an offensive thing to Egypt" (46:34); but, obviously, it is not an offensive thing to the Israelites. In light of the evidence at present, homosexuality cannot be said to be unnatural, nor is it an illness. Its prohibition in this verse explicitly applies only so long as it is perceived to be offensive, and therefore the current state of the evidence suggests that the period in which this commandment was binding has come to an end.”

HomosexualityLeviticus
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“19:18. love your neighbor as yourself. Also translated as "companion" or "fellow," the word (Hebrew rea') means a member of one's own group, a peer. In some contexts that will mean one's fellow human being. In others it will mean a friend or neighbor. (Thus, in Gen 38:12,20 it refers to Judah's "friend," who is an Adullamite.) In others it will mean a fellow member of a particular community. Some understand "Love your neighbor as yourself" as applying only to one's fellow Israelites. Even if one takes that view of this commandment, one must acknowledge that in this same chapter there is also the commandment to love the alien, the foreigner, as oneself as well (19:34). The people of Israel are thus commanded to love all human beings, not just their own people, no matter how one understands the term. And this is extraordinary.”

Love Your NeighborLeviticus
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“24:20 an eye for an eye. Perhaps the most perplexing of the ethical laws is the principle of justice expressed in the formulation "an eye for an eye" It has frequently been cited as evidence of the stern character of YHWH, but that is a misunderstanding. In its context in Leviticus it applies solely to human justice. YHWH Himself frequently follows a more relenting course than that, from the golden calf event to a series of reprieves for seemingly undeserving individuals and communities in subsequent books of the Tanakh. As for the meaning of this formulation for human justice, we must read it in its context, where the basic principle appears to be that punishment should correspond to the crime and never exceed it”

LeviticusAn Eye For An Eye
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“26:46. These are the laws and the judgments and the instructions. The present age plainly appears to value the ethical more than the ritual in religion. Some even feel the need to justify ritual by attempting to connect each ritual act to some ethical value: "We keep kosher to remind us to care about animals; we wear fringes to remind us to be kind...." This is misleading. Certainly ritual acts can have consequences in the ethical realm, but that is not their reason for being. If we are to understand Leviticus, we must have an appreciation for what ritual meant in its society intrinsically.”

RitualLeviticus
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“The ritual and the ethical are two components of religion—and of Leviticus—that do not justify each other, but rather unite and produce mutual support. Indeed, it is instructive that Leviticus, a book that is so fundamentally concerned with distinction, does not make any explicit distinction between its ethical and its ritual laws. Sometimes they are mixed together, but they are never identified as two distinct categories of law.”

EthicalRitualLeviticus
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“Leviticus thus is a design for an organized society of people who help one another, who do not intentionally injure one another, who respect one another's property and relationships, who regularly assemble to celebrate together, who acknowledge their errors and atone for them, who regard life—in humans and in animals—as sacred, who pursue purity in various forms, who respect law, and who are utterly loyal to one God.”

Leviticus
Book:Commentary on the Torah
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“In a culture where the brain is considered the center of consciousness, an unraveling brain is an unraveling self. To let the mentally unstable live in our midst is to face the fearful fragility of the ego. So we whisper our fears over their heads, driving them into the wilderness of the streets or locking them away where they can’t be seen. We let them pale into husks of human beings, cut off from the mutual blood of society. Sometimes we toss them a coin; it’s a small price to pay for the relief of looking away.”

Mental IllnessHomelessScapegoatingHomelessness In AmericaHomelessnesss
Book:The Sea Once Swallowed Me: A Memoir of Love, Solitude, and the Limits of Language
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