Lesson 14 - Leviticus 11

[Music] [Music] [Music] well we ended the last time with the proposition that to understand the Hebrew dietary laws given to them by javea Mount Sinai we must understand that in doing so God placed diet directly at the center of holiness and purity as he defines it food was a major issue since the time of Adam and Eve in fact we find it wasn't until after the great flood that the killing of animals for meat was even prohibited that was even permitted by the Lord for sure the Jewish sages and many rabbis have expanded the dietary laws into such complexity that sometimes is hard to realize that God's rules in the Torah about food were few and basic but before we get to food per se let's talk about holiness and purity their and their opposites holy is the opposite of common just as clean as the opposite of unclean common means just what it says common has neither special value nor position it's typical its usual it's not set apart and the term applies to the largest group that is common means that there is more of it then on its opposite wholly on the other hand holds the highest position it carries the greatest value wholly means something that's rare holy means something that's unusual set apart and in context with the Bible and and current physical world holy represents a minority that is set apart for service to God very little and precious few are holy almost everything is common therefore everything that is common is not holy something can't be holy in common at the same time nor can something be clean and unclean at the same time for instance Jehovah deemed Israel as being holy and the rest of the world as common Israel was not somewhat common in somewhat holy in fact nothing can be a combination of holy in common this is not a philosophy this is not an ideal it's a hard fast fundamental axiom that rules the universe everything in this current world since the fall of Adam and Eve's the eve begins as something common you me plants animals dirt water everything in the negative we could say that nothing in this world is natural state is holy can something that begins as common become holy Thank You Yeshua yes you can can something begin as common becomes become holy well if you're a believer that's what's happened to you how does something common like you and me become holy we must be sanctified that is the creator of the universe has to declare us as holy once something is sanctified it's no longer common you're no longer common you're not holy a common thing doesn't start out with a little bit a little bit of holiness and it gets a little holier and a little holier and a little holier over time with your effort or merit things and people are either wholly or they're not once a common thing is sanctified and becomes holy it leaves it's state of cominis behind now think on that Torah principle for a second as believers you and I are called sanctified the instant we placed our trust in his schewe HaMashiach God declares sanctified the Holy Spirit enters us we shed the common we become holy our Western church way of saying it is that we leave the old self behind and we become a new person in Christ which is absolutely correct but this is just a modern Gentile way of reexpress entire concept of the common becoming holy at god's decision it's so important for us to grasp that just like the Israelites once God declares you holy you're no longer common despite how you may still view yourself as a believer you're a hundred percent holy in his eyes non-believers are a hundred percent common now believe that you trust it and live it out so let's peel this onion back one more layer common things can be divided into two separate and distinct groups clean and unclean only clean common things are eligible to become sanctified that is only common things that are also clean can become holy unclean common things cannot become holy in Leviticus chapters 11 through 16 we're going to find God's lists of what denotes clean common things and what denotes unclean common things despite what modern church doctrines might say the reality is that what constitutes clean and unclean holy and common are not defined in the New Testament for that we have to turn to the Torah now clean things can be polluted by contact with unclean things but unclean things can't be cleansed by contact with clean things it's a one-way street when something clean comes into something comes into contact with something unclean the result is always that now both things are unclean we have a similar condition when dealing with the Holi the result of the Holi coming into contact with the common is that the Holi becomes defiled however it never happens that the common thing that touches holiness is allowed to become holy merely because of some accidental contact that said certain incidents in the Old Testament show that while it may be theoretically possible for holiness to be transmitted to something common or unclean by simple contact the contact has to first be divinely authorized by the Lord or he interrupts the process by destroying that thing that has touched the holy and we see many instances of that in the in the Bible that's while it really makes the whole question kind of kind of moot so in the end it winds up being one of those one-way streets and I'll stay with me huh I know this is deep and it's technical for Western believers to deal with because we've never been introduced to these biblical realities but we should have been when we first believed now what I'm trying to show you using mere words is something almost indescribable in the form of spiritual principles that the Lord has built into the entire universe everything operates in accordance with these principles nothing is exempt there aren't any exceptions if we're going to understand or even remotely grasp what salvation is and why it's so necessary if we're going to understand how to live in the manner God expects of us then these are the core principles that we must understand and digest and I'm sad to say that most Christians will never in their entire church lives encounter and explanation of these principles but any six or seven-year-old Jewish child who has gone to a typical Jewish school will already know them by heart even if they don't fully comprehend yet the significance of it so back to some more explanation while everything in the world begins as common most things become begin is clean clean and common are generally but not entirely the current natural state of the following world so what we see then is that on the one extreme is the holy on the other extreme is the unclean and in between those two lay the common and the clean as a kind of middle ground the middle ground clean it can be pulled in one way or the other you can go in one of two directions it can be made holy by means of sanctification it can be made unclean by means of defilement something holy can't ever be allowed to come into contact with something unclean the result is that the holy is defiled and the unclean thing gets annihilated so here's the easiest rule for you to remember about everything I've just described common and clean is the natural and the beginning state of most things mankind included common and clean things can be elevated into something holy or common and clean things can be degraded into something unclean now we're gonna hear a lot of the words clean and pure in datura they mean the same thing for all practical purposes they're synonymous well with these basic rules of purity to go by an understanding that these rules underlay the basic fabric of the entire universe as we know it then we can begin to see why there were some barriers put up by God between his holy self and common man now Adam and Eve were unique because they were created in a holy state therefore they could have almost unlimited contact with the holy Jehovah but after they rebelled they weren't holy anymore now they were common as such they couldn't have contact with his presence that's why the Lord had them put we're outside the garden his earthly dwelling place he even had a fearsome angel put there to make sure they didn't try to get back in remember that see but it was less a matter of punishment upon Adam and Eve more a matter of God protecting his holiness that's why he erected a barrier and that is the same state that we currently find ourselves in as mankind on the outside looking in God's holiness must be protected he will not allow himself to be defiled he will protect his holiness at all costs only something that is holy can come into contact with a holy God period I mean do you see this do you see this now here is a second rule that has made most clear by the Torah and it is it was in effect from the first day of creation and the rule is simply repeated in the New Testament the rule is that the only way something common can ever become holy is if God authorizes it by means of his grace the church word for this process or event of the common becoming holy is sanctification or for the more evangelical it's called being saved in the era of Moses and up until Christ's death God granted His grace upon those whom he called and whom he called was Israel God granted His grace upon Israel contingent upon them obeying the Torah rules and rituals that he ordained now today God's grace is available to all humans contingent upon them trusting solely in the finished work of Yeshua HaMashiach Jesus the Christ the Son of God this is also called grace because man can't do anything without this grace we can't gain salvation without God's grace but in either era Moses or Christ's holiness was granted by means of God's grace that's how you got it look most modern people tend to see the end game of salvation as being forgiven and cleansed from our sin that's it but that's not really it the real end game is being declared holy so that we can be in the presence of the ultimate holiness the holy god jehovah which is what he's always desired he wants us back in the Garden of Eden with him he wants to remove that angel he wants no barriers salvation forgiveness of sins is that means for our becoming holy therefore a human who is born common which is everybody and who remains common all of his or her life and dies common never becomes holy and therefore they can never throughout all eternity come into the presence of his holiness but a man who was born common again all of mankind but is declared holy by God by means of trust and Yeshua lives his life we live our lives in a holy state we die in a holy state and we remain in the presence of holiness for all eternity talk about polarization holiness purity and Clement cleanliness cleanness rather are the fundamental issues that all believers should be concerning ourselves with at all times the Hebrews of the biblical times were obsessed with purity with cleanness issues for very good reason their status of being holy could be lost please grasp this is a typical Hebrew marched up and down a spiritual ladder with holiness at the top and uncleanness at the bottom and if they broke the law they sinned they disobeyed one of the commandments given to them by Moses their holiness was put into a state of suspension so to speak disobedience to the Torah degraded them down to a common state but even worse they could commit acts that made them unclean but let me say that again disobedience to most Torah Commandments brought them to a temporary state of being common but typically clean can't clean in common but no longer holy yet there were other acts that they could commit such as touching a dead body which not only degraded them to a common state it made them unclean unclean and common so the first thing an unclean person had to do was become clean again step one they had to get back to what I would kind of call a neutral State which is common and clean that's the purpose of the ritual purity laws and remember that part of the process of an unclean person becoming ritually pure again was bathing in a mikveh a ritual bath once a person who was unclean for whatever reason was made cleaned again then they could go to the sacrificial system then they could perform the appropriate sacrifice to regain their status as holy so the ritual purity provisions were for bringing a person from an unclean state back into a clean state the sacrificial system was to bring a person in a clean and common state back into a state of acceptable holiness two different things the term used to describe this this process of regaining the holy status that has been put on hold is atonement atonement had to be made in the form of a specific animal sacrifice in order to elevate a person who was common and clean back into a state of holiness I keep repeating back into a state of holiness because a person who has never been declared holy by God can't make himself holy simply by performing the purity and the atonement rituals that doesn't do it so the typical Hebrew was on this constantly moving elevator up and down the holiness scale is it any wonder that Paul and other Torah observant Jews who understood and accepted what Christ did for them who are so excited to explain it all to their Jewish friends no more up and down the ladder of holiness no more and you hold these presents one day and barred from it the next Christ's sacrifice of atonement put the believer into a permanent state of holiness never to be common again one final comment we're gonna read the Leviticus chapter 11 of all the great quests undertaken by rabbis and sages and Bible scholars ancient or recent Jewish or Gentile few subjects have been so challenging and as to comprehensively identify the underlying meaning of the term holiness what does God mean by the term holiness what did Moses mean by it it is understood by Jews and Christians alike that one attribute of holiness is separateness set apart yet that somehow seems incomplete inadequate Leviticus shows us there's far more involved in that simplistic statement for instance what is the nature of holiness how is holy difficult is different from all other possible states of being what's the chief characteristic of holiness of all the explanations that I have come across the one that best brings it together for me the one that seems most true to the Word of God blending the spiritual with the physical is this the chief nature of holiness is whole mess and complete Ness wholeness and completeness nothing lacking without imperfection and after we read chapter 11 we're going to take a further look at holiness and more of its characteristics so for now open up your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 11 if you have a complete Jewish Bible as page 119 we're gonna read all of chapter 11 odd and I said to Moshe and Aharon tell the people of Israel these are the living creatures which you may eat among all the land animals any that has a separate hoof which is completely divided and chews the cud these animals you may eat but you may not eat those that only chew the cud or only have a separate for example the camel the cony and the hare are unclean for you because they chew the cud but they don't have a separate hoof while the pig is unclean for you because although it has a separate and divided hoof it doesn't chew the cud you're not to eat meat from these or touch their carcasses they're unclean for you of all things that live in the water you may eat these anything in the water that has fins and scales whether in seas or in rivers these you may eat but everything in the season rivers without both fins and scales of all the small water creatures of all the living creatures in the water this is a detestable thing for you yes these will be detestable for you you're not to eat their meat you're not and you are to detest their carcasses whatever lacks fins and scales in the water is a detestable thing for you the following creatures of the air are to be detestable for you they are not to be eaten the eagle the vulture the Osprey the kite various kinds of ravens the ostrich the screech owl the seagull various kinds of Hawks the little owl the cormorant the great owl the horned owl the pelican the barn owl the stork various kinds of herons the Hoopoe and the bat all winged swarming creatures that go on all fours are a detestable thing for you except that of all winged swarming creatures that go on all fours you may eat those that have jointed legs above their feet enabling them to jump off the ground specifically of these you may eat the various kinds of locusts grasshoppers katydids and crickets but other than that all wings warming creatures have having four feet or a detestable thing for you the following will make you unclean whoever touches the carcass of them will be unclean until evening and whoever picks up any part of their carcass is to wash his clothes and be unclean until evening every animal that has a separate but in completely divided hoof or that doesn't chew the cud is unclean for you anyone who touches them will become unclean whoever whatever goes on its paws among all animals that go on all fours is unclean for you whoever touches its carcass will be unclean until evening whoever picks up its carcasses to wash his clothes and be unclean until evening these are unclean for you the following are unclean for you among the small creatures that swarm on the ground the weasel the mouse the various kinds of lizards the Gecko the land crocodile the skink the sand lizard in the chameleon these are unclean crawling creatures whoever touches them when they are dead will be unclean until evening anything on which one of them falls when dead will become unclean wooden utensil article of clothing leather sacking any utensil used for work it must be put in water and it will be unclean until evening then it will be clean if one of them falls into a clay pot whatever's in it will become unclean here to break the pot any food permitted to be eaten that water from such a vessel gets on will become unclean and any permitted liquid in such a vessel we become unclean everything on which any carcass part of theirs falls would become unclean whether oven or stove is to be broken into pieces they're unclean and will be unclean for you although a spring or cistern for collecting water remains clean but anyone who touches one of their carcasses will become unclean if any carcass part of theirs falls on any kind of seed to be sown it's clean but if water is put on the seat and a carcass part of theirs falls on it it's unclean for you if an animal of a kind that you are permitted to eat dies whoever touches it whoever touches its carcass will be unclean until evening a person who eats meat from its carcass or carries its carcasses to wash his clothes he'll be unclean until evening any creature that swarms on the ground is a detestable thing it is not to be eaten whatever moves on its stomach goes on all fours or has mini legs all creatures that swarm on the ground you're not to eat them these are detestable things you are not to make yourselves detestable with any of these swarming crawling creatures do not make yourselves unclean with them do not defile yourselves with them for I am I deny your God therefore consecrate yourselves and be holy for I am holy do not defile yourselves with any kind of swarming creature that moves along the ground for I am Adonai who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God therefore you are to be holy because I'm holy such then is the law concerning animals flying creatures all living creatures that move about in the water all creatures that swarm on the ground its purpose is to distinguish between the clean the unclean and the clean and Beach the creatures that may be eaten and those that may not be eaten by the way and I'm gonna repeat this a number of times look at that last statement its purpose is to distinguish between the clean and the unclean and between the creatures that may be eaten that those that may not be eaten unclean and clean versus acceptable and prohibited are two different sets of rules they're not synonymous and we're going to talk about that I'm gonna bring that up over and over and we'll talk about it at length is these lessons go on in verse one we find that Jehovah is speaking presumably audibly to both Moses and Aaron and he tells them they are to teach Israel what he's about to pronounce to them God's first important instruction is that Israel may freely eat now living creatures this is a milestone this is the first time that yahoo v has given a list of exactly which animals could be eaten with his blessing oh yeah men had been eat meat for a long time but not before now is there a record of their being limits on a species of animals other than the limit not to eat the blood of a living creature in the beginning living creatures animals were meant to be a companion for mankind after the fall they were to be killed and used for the purpose of sacrificing to Yehovah so that mankind could atone for his sin by using that innocent animals blood after the flood God told Noah how an animal was to be properly killed and eaten but he didn't particularly specify some animals as acceptable on other animals as off-limits for food Genesis 9:1 God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth the fear and dread of you will be upon every wild animal and every bird in the air and every creature populating the ground and all the fish in the sea they've been handed over to you every moving thing that lives will be food for you just as I gave you green plants before now I give you everything only flesh with its life which is in the blood you're not to eat now in Leviticus 11 the Lord was allowing men to eat living creatures but only of certain types interestingly some time after Yeshua comes again animals are not going to be permitted for food so get used to it eat those apples go get that spinach the Hebrew word for living creature is haya a very generic term for any type of living creature but not for plant life and the first group of living creatures from which men can kill and eat are in Hebrew Bama and Bama denotes two characteristics they are land animals as opposed to sea creatures or animals that fly in the air and these animals that currently are or rather these are animals that currently are or they can be domesticated cattle sheep goats things like that we're going to see the Yehovah is will show men that they can kill and eat animals that inhabit three different spheres of the earth that is three different types of earthly environment that water the air and the land this has a lot of spiritual meaning which we'll get into later now of the bama the land animals that Israel may freely kill and eat are declared to be clean why are they clean and others aren't oh that's a biggie again we'll go into depth on that matter sometime over the next few weeks for now the primary notion to hang on to is that they are clean because God said so it's not that simple but note this until Israel was elected divided and separated from all other nations by the Lord all people on earth were of the same status in God's eyes common once God took Israel and set them apart as his chosen people and redeemed them suddenly the world became divided into two distinct groups of people with a different status those who were holy and everybody else and more to the point Israel and everybody else the everybody else or what the Bible calls Gentiles now that he has separated Israel out to be holy he begins to separate animals into clean and unclean suitable and unsuitable permitted and prohibited Jehovah lays down a visible means for Israel to discern which of the many kinds of baihe ma he approves for uses food physical characteristic number one is that a and approved baya ma must have a cloven hoof physical characteristic number two is it must chew the cud so what's a cloven hoof well basically it means the hoof split such that at some point it separates into two completely separate parts like two toes many animals like horses have hooves that split at one end but they don't completely separate front and back to form two separate pieces therefore horses have unclosing hooves and are deemed unfit to eat in the biblical way of speaking they are unclean and or better as we get deeper into the issue of diet in later lessons we're going to again see that prohibited is a more appropriate word than unclean in this context now chewing the cud for you non farmers or ranchers it's a little bit on the growth side so for you city slickers I need to explain what that means so it's well understood basically it means that the animal only partially chews its food it swallows it and then it mmm brings it back up again when it's more convenient and it chews on it a little bit more and it swallows it again and so on and technically animals with this characteristic are called ruminants animals whose stomachs usually consist of four compartments so chewing the cud is basically a description of how a certain animals digestive system works thus far we have four necessary Christic characteristics of a clean or acceptable and edible bama it's a land animal it's a domesticated animal it has to have a fully cloven hoof and it has to chew the cud now in verse four Jehovah gives us some examples of common animals that were typically used for food in that era but they were off-limits for Israel and he explains just why they are off-limits the camel for instance chews the cud doesn't have a cloven hoof the hyrax chews the cud it doesn't have a cloven hoof matter of fact it really didn't have a hoof at all the hare chews the cud but doesn't have hooves cloven or otherwise and now for perhaps the best-known symbol of an animal that is not prohibited the pig it does indeed have a cleft hoof but it doesn't chew the cud to be clear these are not the only unclean or unprotected animals they're just illustrations used in the Torah so perhaps it's good for us to learn the Hebrew word that is translated as unclean because we're gonna run into a time and again in the Torah that word is time a let's be very clear about this term Tamm a unclean it has nothing to do with hygiene or whether it is inherently edible by humans rather it's a spiritual matter yo-ho he has for his own good reasons declared by Fiat that certain animals are not to be eaten by anyone considered to be one of his people first he gives us another important bit of information jehovah instructs that unclean animals may not be eaten and an Israelite cannot touch the dead carcass of one either what this means is that is for some reason you stumble over a dead animal or have to kill one for some purpose you can't touch it however as we find out in later chapters there's no prohibition against touching a live unclean animal catch that touching a lot touching a pig does not make you unclean if it's live therefore a hare could be a pet or a camel it could be ridden or a beast of burden could be used by Israel no problem you just can't eat it you can't touch it if it if it's killed by a wild animal or it dies now verse 9 begins to deal with living creatures from the waters fear sea creatures fresh or saltwater and the most visible characteristic of an approved for eating sea creature is it has to have fins and scales so any sea creature that has both fins and scales is clean Sproat it's allowed for eating clean by the way is in Hebrew - Tom a unclean tahor clean unclean sea creatures are ones that the Bible calls swarming and the Hebrew being translated as swarming in English is shruts and it means well it has this idea of crawling as well as swarming now exactly what swarming means is a little harder to decipher it seems to carry with it the idea of randomness something that that tends to stay in a group but something that also unpredictably darts around it does not refer to fishes that's cool the chief characteristic of the unclean sea creature is that rather than swim through the water using its fins it crawls on the ball Moret slithers around like a snake so for instance shellfish are considered Tam a unclean lobsters and crabs sorry are also off-limits as our eels and sea snakes now in verse 10 a kind of super category of unclean animals introduced something described as cats cats in Hebrew pets is translated as detestable or an abomination it's something to be avoided at all costs and just as we've seen sin categorized and then sacrificial rituals requiring a hierarchy of animals from the least to the most valuable to be used and according to the nature of that sin its seriousness we see that unclean things seem to have some kind of classification as well based on the least and the most the terms shaked detestable an abomination is reserved for the worst the most serious category a good thing to know as we go through the Bible because we can all probably think of a verse or two in which you ho he calls something an abomination before him that is really bad it's the worst sort well the Torah moves quickly now the creatures that inhabit the air sphere creatures that fly and since there are several types of creatures that fly the first category to deal with the most obvious birds and interestingly in a deviation from previous practice rather than describe the characteristics of the clean and therefore edible bird it describes the characteristics of the unclean bird with the idea that all the other varieties can be so we get a list of birds that are held chickens not just unclean but really unclean and abomination the eagle the vulture the kite and the Falcon our names first followed by a couple of kinds of owls pelicans a stork even a bat yeah I know bats not a bird all right but by tradition Hebrews never put a bat in the bird category the common attribute of all these birds is that they are either birds of prey which kill and eat other living creatures or as with vultures they eat carrion however please note that the Scriptures do not specifically say that the attribute of eating other living creatures is what makes birds on this list unclean I mean certain other birds like chickens again for you non farmers they'll eat anything and I mean anything they'll eat rodents I've seen a chicken chaser mouse across a barnyard and get it eat it right so we need to be a little bit cautious and by what chickens are considered clean animals so we need to be a little bit cautious about assigning a reason for the list of unclean birds why they're unclean because the Bible doesn't really give us specifically the reasons now next in verse 20 we get another category of living creatures that reside in the air sphere insects flying insects now what in the world are insects doing in a list of food kosher or not insects or a normal and everyday part of diet in most societies of that era and Yoho he tells the Israelites which insects they could eat he does so by giving a broad and sweeping category of insects that are detestable shaked and then he lists the exceptions to the rule those that would be acceptable all insects with wings and that swarm and that have four legs are prohibited except for four kinds of locusts and grasshoppers what's different about them they have jointed legs that is their legs were designed to bend and operate with a springing action so that they can jump or hop as part of a further discussion of holiness and purity after we've gone through Chapter eleven we'll delve into the possible reason why this particular characteristic of hopping on all fours made these insects clean for eating okay now you're ready for a surprise this pretty much concludes the scriptural scriptural commandments as regards kosher eating done all we're gonna get a little detail added from time to time outside of this chapter but these 23 verses pretty much do it Deuteronomy 14 more or less just repeats what we read now I point this out because Judaism has evolved these few scriptural laws into this enormous man-made system of dietary rules and regulations complete with ritual hand-washing a prohibition against eating in the presence of Gentiles who might touch your food and defile it and later as part of what we'll discuss at the end of chapter 11 we're gonna get to the famous story of Jesus saying it's not what goes into your mouth that makes you unclean it's what comes out in a couple more weeks we're gonna be a lot better equipped to understand what this issue was that Yeshua was dealing with and let me preview it by saying that like most things he got into arguments with the Jewish religious leadership over it all revolved around his revulsion of man-made traditions those things that had become these burdensome doctrines of Judaism not the Torah lessons and teachings of Torah of holy scripture well verse 24 brings into play the concept that we discussed in the previous lesson of the unclean polluting the clean simply by contact to remind you the notion is that when something that is unclean touches something that is clean the clean thing is degraded and it becomes unclean never is it the reverse so beginning in verse 24 we get a list of unclean things that if one comes into contact with one of these you become ritually impure and there are basically three kinds of contact discussed you're touching carrying and containing containing refers to containers like bowls and pots so from here through about verse forty we're gonna deal with how uncleanness gets transferred from one thing to another thing basically the rule is that whoever touches the carcass of some categories of dead animals is considered unclean but only in a very limited way they're unclean until sundown that day why sundown because sundown ends the day and starts a new one remember the Hebrew Day starts and ends at sundown another part of the rule is anyone who carries the carcass of one of the prohibited than animals is also clean and Sun until sundown plus there is the added requirement they must wash their clothing their clothing the list of animals that are clean and unclean sprit II much the same as the list it applies to kosher eating animals without cleft hoods and animals that don't chew the cud or unclean when they're dead but a new categories now discussed animals that have paws like cats or dogs these are considered unclean for eating and if they're dead for touching these are considered unclean once again it's okay to touch them dogs and cats for instance animals with paws if they're alive it's fine and the result is the same as if you touch a dead animal that doesn't have a cloven hoof notice something interesting about the contamination of a nun deep unclean dead thing it cannot only be transmitted to a person a living human is uncleanness can be transmitted to inanimate things like clothing and verse 29 discusses the transmission of uncleanness from a different category of living creatures those described as swarming animals that dart about kind of haphazardly and the list includes mice rats and lizards even crocodiles and presumably alligators you can add all those to the list of unclean things that can't be touched after they're dead now as with the previous list of unclean thing dead things anyone who touches one contracts uncleanness until the start of a new day which begins at the end of evening now please notice that we're being taught that death is unclean why is that because in God's realm death is abnormal we're not supposed to die mice birds fish are not supposed to die death is a condition that was not present what God created the world the world became polluted by sin and then things became abnormal abnormality is detestable to Yehovah death is the most abnormal condition that exists at the end of chapter 11 when we discuss more about purity and about holiness we're going to talk about what's normal and abnormal and how it has so much to do with what God has declared clean and unclean beginning in verse 32 another angle concerning uncleanness is stated it is that what at whenever an unclean animal unclean dead creature falls upon that thing becomes unclean actually the English translation kind of obscures the real Hebrew meaning of this sentence and what it says is that what it whatever an undead rather an unclean dead animal falls on to becomes unclean and whatever an unclean dead creature falls into becomes unclean so if a mouse dies and falls on top of your sandal that's one condition if a mouse dies and falls into a cooking pot that's another condition of course one has to do with a more or less serious type of uncleanness well now the things of thing now we know about how things become unclean the next thing to discuss is how do you remedy that situation and we will do that next time father god I know how hard this is for your people all of these rules and regulations it is for us to take in and understand especially father because of the way we've been taught all of our Christian lives if this has nothing to do with us well father Christ says it does and father I pray that we'll begin to understand these critical rules of purity and cleanness and what's prohibited for us and what is acceptable but also father this sense this is about like learning the multiplication tables and it can be tedious that you'll keep us alive and awake and alert so that we can hear and so father that we can put this into our thinking on a day-by-day basis and not misunderstand what you're saying Lord we love you and we understand that you have divided away those who you set apart as holy from those who are not from those things that are for us in this world and those things that are against us in this world and Lord we want to learn to honor those things in our lives so father teach us verify it all through the Holy Spirit that lives within us and let us follow those ways and not the ways of mankind we bless your Holy Name air law amen okay have a good [Music] [Music] yes you issue mission you

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Published: Fri Dec 21 2018