Torah Pearls Lite – Vayikra

Bite Size and sharable!

This video featuring Nehemia, Keith and Jono can be heard in full right here and are created by our friends over at SpiritualBabies.

2 Comments

  1. Elena says

    Hello there, thanks to you all for your efforts and work to study and divulgate the Word of God.
    I have also been taught that there is no atonement without blood.

    There definitely is a New Testament verse that teaches this, but this is not as relevant to me as it is the Genesis account of Cain and Abel, and that of Adam and Eve. There, when the world was brand new we see two brothers bringing an offer to YHWH. One brings the fruits of the land and the other brings an offer of the flock, an offer with blood. It is written in Genesis that God accepted Abel’s offer and did not regard Cain’s offer.

    For a long time it was difficult for me to understand why God accepted one offer and not the other. After all, in Psalms we are told that God needs nothing. If He were hungry he would not ask us for food, and if he needed anything He would not expect it from us, for all the World is His.

    So the reason why God would accept one offer and not the other had not to be in the material offer itself (what they brought), but in the faith through which the offer was brought. In fact, I know that 1)Without faith it is impossible to please God and 2) Abraham believed God and this was imputed to him as righteousness.

    Faith is the discrimination point that separates the children of God from the people of the world, the sheep form the goats, the heirs from the slaves.
    Abel therefore had somehow believed God while Cain had followed his own understanding in bringing the offer.

    But how had Abel believed God? In order to understand this I checked backwards what did Abel know About YHWH and about the truth in general.

    When Adam and Eve sinned they tried to ‘patch’ themselves with fig leaves in order to conceal the shame that they suddenly and for the first time felt. However, the ‘patch’ was not functional and not lasting. In order to effectively ‘cover’ their shame, the Almighty God did something horrible that no one in the Universe had witnessed before: YHWH killed one of His innocent creatures to dress up Adam and Eve.

    Later, when Abel brought his offer to God, to cover his shame before the Holy God, Abel did exactly the same as God had done.
    Cain, however, brought fruits from his land, as if that present was able to cover his shame.

    Later, when God made a covenant with Noah after the flood, Noah brought an offer with blood.
    When Abraham believed God and God made a promise to (covenant with) him, YHWH Himself requested Abraham to bring an offering with blood.

    YHWH requested Job to bring an offering with blood in order for Job’s friends to be forgiven.

    These episodes are all before the law of Moses, they show God in action before Torah had been given and show a clear pattern.

    In the Torah verse discussed here it is clear that the offer of flour (without blood) is permitted only to those persons who are so poor that they cannot afford to buy an animal. First they should try to capture (or buy) two turtledoves or two pigeons (a common bird, even in Italy, they are everywhere), but if they are not able to do that, then let them bring about 3.6 litres of flour (that is quite much!).

    In my understanding, Torah here is not teaching that a person could just come to God with flour as an offering for sin. it just shows God’s mercy that if someone was really incapacitated either financially or in hunting skills, still he would not be cut off from Israel. If anyone sincerely believed God’s instruction and, having tried to capture the doves, would still have failed, then he could go to the corners of the fields of rich people, or wait for the sabbatical year, work hard to reap whatever he needed, ground it and bring the offer proportioned to his skills. It is not a matter of choosing freely, but of understanding from God’s side, of our incapability.

    in case of ‘incapability’ then faith (believing God’s Word) fills the measure.
    Faith, however, upholds not the exception, but the principle, that is that the offering for sin is with blood, as it has been from the beginning.

  2. jono vandor says

    G’day Elena, thank you for your comment. It should be noted that we do not know exactly why Cain’s offering was rejected, the text is note specific. Therefore your principle, which you say has been there from the beginning, is based on an assumption. Also, you suggest that God sacrificed a lamb to cover Adam & Eve’s sin, yet we know from Numbers 15:30-31 that there is no sacrifice for intentional sin.

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