Leviticus 24: 1 – 23
The balance of Justice and Mercy
24 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying: 2 “Command the children of Israel that they bring to you pure oil of pressed olives for the light, to make the lamps burn continually. 3 Outside the veil of the Testimony, in the tabernacle of meeting, Aaron shall be in charge of it from evening until morning before the LORD continually; it shall be a statute forever in your generations. 4 He shall be in charge of the lamps on the pure gold lampstand before the LORD continually. 5 “And you shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes with it. Two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each cake. 6 You shall set them in two rows, six in a row, on the pure gold table before the LORD. 7 And you shall put pure frankincense on each row, that it may be on the bread for a memorial, an offering made by fire to the LORD. 8 Every Sabbath he shall set it in order before the LORD continually, being taken from the children of Israel by an everlasting covenant. 9 And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy to him from the offerings of the LORD made by fire, by a perpetual statute.” 10 Now the son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the children of Israel; and this Israelite woman’s son and a man of Israel fought each other in the camp. 11 And the Israelite woman’s son blasphemed the name of the LORD and cursed; and so they brought him to Moses. (His mother’s name was Shelomith the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.) 12 Then they put him in custody, that the mind of the LORD might be shown to them. 13 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 14 “Take outside the camp him who has cursed; then let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him. 15 “Then you shall speak to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. 16 And whoever blasphemes the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall certainly stone him, the stranger as well as him who is born in the land. When he blasphemes the name of the LORD, he shall be put to death. 17 ‘Whoever kills any man shall surely be put to death. 18 Whoever kills an animal shall make it good, animal for animal. 19 ‘If a man causes disfigurement of his neighbor, as he has done, so shall it be done to him— 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; as he has caused disfigurement of a man, so shall it be done to him. 21 And whoever kills an animal shall restore it; but whoever kills a man shall be put to death. 22 You shall have the same law for the stranger and for one from your own country; for I am the LORD your God.’” 23 Then Moses spoke to the children of Israel; and they took outside the camp him who had cursed, and stoned him with stones. So the children of Israel did as the LORD commanded Moses.
Today we are going to see some judgments declared and made by our Holy God. Over time people have come up with concern and have asked that what is discussed in this chapter might be a little too harsh. So questions arise in how does Justice and Mercy come into play?
Our Holy Ruler Jesus Christ really jumped on the Pharisees. They seemed to be the picture of religion which would point people away from God. They kept the law meticulously where it suited them. They tithed, fasted, prayed eloquently and kept the Sabbath's regulations with no measure for error. They though their careful observance of God's word would give them special honors in the presence of God. Surely, the Messiah Himself would come to reward them. They neglected what Jesus said was the weightier or more important matter of the law: justice, mercy and faith.
Justice and mercy seem to be at opposite ends. Justice makes sure that everyone is rewarded for his righteousness and punished for his unrighteousness. Justice demands that these rewards and punishments reflect the measure of devotion or lack of devotion to obedience for God's law. Thus, justice seems to be something which will condemn the sinner and award the saint. However, while there are moments of virtue, no virtue can erase the wrong each of us has done. Ultimately, we stand guilty under a strict justice system.
In that same sentence, our Lord Jesus placed mercy. Some people think that mercy is ignoring guilt. It is not. Mercy is consciously refusing to exact the punishment for guilt.
Our society is afraid of leaning too hard on justice and forgetting mercy. However, there is danger in giving mercy without regard to justice as well.
How do you know how to balance justice and mercy? I believe this is where faithfulness comes in. Faithfulness depends upon God Who Is just and has given us mercy. Faithfulness is walking with God daily so that you know Him so clearly that you can make judgments of justice balanced with mercy. It believes in consequences for sin and help to work through those sins to the other side. By faithfulness to God and His creation I give mercy and understand justice. By faithfulness to God and His creation I give those who will turn from their sinfulness all the mercy necessary to walk through the consequences. By faithfulness, I know that justice must prevail too.
There seems to be a system of right and wrong that is personal but not universal. In other words, I can administer justice if you have personally hurt me but I have no right if you hurt yourself or someone else.
This is other side of the Pharisees' lack of justice, mercy and faithfulness. The absence of these things promotes liberalism for those who want nothing to do with judgment.
Justice and mercy must be handled carefully. Each must be balanced against the other with faithfulness to our Lord being the force which keeps them in check. These are the more important matters of the law.
So, we begin this chapter in witnessing that our Holy God Yahweh having established the importance of the seven-day Sabbath, and the set periods of sevens over the year when His people will gather to worship Him and renew the covenant, He now goes on to deal with the day by day ministry in the Tabernacle which will demonstrate Yahweh’s continual interest in and concern over His people. For His watch over them is not only on the Sabbath, and at special times and seasons, but day by day, and week by week over the years and the centuries. They are ever remembered before Him.
The sevenfold golden lamp stand, representing divinely perfect (sevenfold) light, revealed the One Who was the Light of the world, and was symbolic of the presence of God among His people, calling to remembrance the pillar of fire and all the times when God had revealed Himself in fire. He was the One Who gave light to Israel in deliverance
This is confirmed by the fact that our Lord Jesus applied the same picture to Himself when He called Himself the Light of the world (John 8.12). It is the constant stress of John’s Gospel that God’s light had come among us, His lamp stand in a dark world (John 9.5).
It is stressed that all Israel contributed the olive oil in order to keep the flame burning continually. While the flame shone they knew that He was there and that they were His people. And it was up to them to ensure that it remained so.
In the Old Testament a man’s life was often called his ‘lamp’ and this golden lamp stand was God’s perfect sevenfold lamp, representative of Himself, of His life, of Himself as the living God. Thus the lamp stand represents the very life of God present with His people.
24 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying: 2 “Command the children of Israel that they bring to you pure oil of pressed olives for the light, to make the lamps burn continually. 3 outside the veil of the Testimony, in the tabernacle of meeting, Aaron shall be in charge of it from evening until morning before the LORD continually; it shall be a statute forever in your generations. 4 He shall be in charge of the lamps on the pure gold lamp stand before the LORD continually.
In the tabernacle, in the Holy Place outside the veil, was the seven-branched golden lamp stand (Exodus 25.31-37). This represented the perfect light of God shining in Israel. While it shone out God was present with His people. This light had to be maintained by Aaron, the High Priest, so that one of its lamps burned ‘continually’, fed with olive oil specifically provided by the people of Israel. Whether God remained with His covenant people or not depended on them. Its seven foldness declared the perfection of God’s light. It declared that day after day, on and on throughout their generations, God was present with His people, ready to act if they were responsive to Him.
But the prime emphasis here in line with the emphasis in this part of Leviticus is on the people’s responsibility. This was to provide pure oil for the lamp so that it could burn continually. Aaron is then to ensure that it maintains its function day by day continually.
5 “And you shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes with it. Two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each cake. 6 You shall set them in two rows, six in a row, on the pure gold table before the LORD.
The showbread consisted of twelve large cakes placed on the table in the Holy Place. It was the responsibility of the sons of Kohath (1 Chronicles 9.32). The number twelve suggests that the cakes represented the twelve tribes of Israel.
Like the lamp stand the table is also ‘pure’ (compare 2 Chronicles 13.11). It receives on God’s behalf this continual offering of the twelve baked cakes which symbolize God’s provision for His people in the grain, the people’s activity in the milling and the baking, and their worship in the frankincense. They are a continual grain offering, and are a continual reminder to Him of His people.
7 And you shall put pure frankincense on each row, that it may be on the bread for a memorial, an offering made by fire to the LORD.
On the bread is placed the frankincense. This is primarily intended to be a pleasing odor to Yahweh, an act of worship and homage. It is a memorial to be offered by fire to Yahweh while the bread will be eaten by the priests.
8 Every Sabbath he shall set it in order before the LORD continually, being taken from the children of Israel by an everlasting covenant.
It is to be set before Yahweh every Sabbath day, it is set on behalf of the children of Israel, and it is for an everlasting covenant. It represents the oneness of Yahweh with His people in their lives in continuity and emphasizes their covenant responsibility. The aim is a continual act of worship and that it will result in His provision of their needs as promised in the covenant, forever.
9 And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy to him from the offerings of the LORD made by fire, by a perpetual statute.”
Like all grain offerings, once the memorial has been offered by fire to Yahweh, the remainder is for the priests as a most holy thing. It is indeed the most holy of the offerings made by fire to Yahweh. And this too is for a perpetual statute.
The lesson we can derive from this scripture is that we who are more privileged enjoy a greater blessing. We walk in His light (1 John 1.7) because we have the light of life (John 8.12) and have His light continually in our hearts. We are the children of light (John 12.36). And we partake continually of Him as the Bread of Life (John 6.35).
Now we are going to be taught that here concentrates more on the practical expression of the covenant and its moral demands as associated closely with the name of Yahweh (we have noted the continual stress on ‘I am Yahweh’ in 18-22), comes a practical example of the danger of blaspheming the Name. God’s instructions are not to be taken lightly.
10 Now the son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the children of Israel; and this Israelite woman’s son and a man of Israel fought each other in the camp. 11 And the Israelite woman’s son blasphemed the name of the LORD and cursed; and so they brought him to Moses. (His mother’s name was Shelomith the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.)
An incident takes place in which a man ‘blasphemes the Name and curses’. His father was an Egyptian and his mother a true-born Israelite whose genealogy can be traced. These were the facts. However the Egyptian had no doubt become a partaker in the covenant (Exodus 24) and identified himself with a tribe, probably the tribe of Dan, as had the entire ‘mixed multitude’ which had come out of Egypt. The description is not derogatory but because the man had no antecedents in the tribe. The contempt is revealed in the failure to give the name of either the son or the father. The son has made himself a nonentity and an outcast whose name was not to be mentioned. But the mention of ‘an Egyptian’ would have the underlying significance that this was something that harked back to the influence of Egypt.
The incident was merely a brawl between this man and an Israelite, but the crime lay in the blasphemy against the Name. It would appear that he cursed Yahweh in disobedience against the third commandment (Exodus 20.7).
12 Then they put him in custody that the mind of the LORD might be shown to them.
As it was the first time that this had happened he was kept under guard until they could discover from Yahweh what should be done with him.
13 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 14 “Take outside the camp him who has cursed; then let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him.
Moses approaches Yahweh about what should be done and Yahweh gives His verdict. It is given in such a way that the man’s crime is compared and contrasted with what are seen as the worst sins of men, harm against the person.
In it He commands that the man was to be brought outside the camp, identified with the laying on of hands by those who had heard him, and then stoned by the whole congregation. This latter would mean that the whole congregation was gathered together for the judgment and execution, while some of their representatives actually hurled the stones on their behalf. The point is that all are a part of the execution.
One reason for the method of execution was probably so that the man would not need to be touched once the execution began. The man could be buried under the cairn of stones. But it may be significant that he was not burned with fire. This may have been because he could not be devoted to Yahweh because of his crime.
The incident, and the execution, followed by these instructions, is intended to bring out the sacredness of life and the awfulness of the crime. It was true that life was sacred, but for one who had cursed or blasphemed God, or who took human life, it was forfeit.
The instructions cover all forms of assault moving downwards: cursing God (spiritual weapons against a spiritual God), blaspheming the Name, deliberate murder, killing an animal belonging to another, physically harming a neighbor. Each strikes at a life principle and they move from high to low, and punishment is to be tempered to the level of the crime. By so listing these greatest of crimes in descending order the enormity of what this man has done is brought out.
The punishments are also in descending order. Death by stoning (in both cases of crime against God), death, full substitution, like for like.
15 “Then you shall speak to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. 16 And whoever blasphemes the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall certainly stone him, the stranger as well as him who is born in the land. When he blasphemes the name of the LORD, he shall be put to death.
Anyone who curses God will ‘bear his sin’, that is will be judged and punished accordingly as previously declared by God in verse 14. Anyone who blasphemes the Name of Yahweh will surely be put to death. In this case the crime is so serious that the whole congregation will be gathered and participates in the execution as in the example above. This applies to all, both home-born and resident alien. Anyone who comes under the authority of Israel is bound by this requirement.
17 ‘Whoever kills any man shall surely be put to death.
A man who deliberately slays another shall be put to death. Provision is to be made elsewhere for one who does so accidentally. For such the cities of refuge are provided.
18 Whoever kills an animal shall make it good, animal for animal.
Anyone who slays a beast belonging to another will replace it with another its equal.
19 ‘If a man causes disfigurement of his neighbor, as he has done, so shall it be done to him— 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; as he has caused disfigurement of a man, so shall it be done to him.
But if anyone causes a blemish in his neighbor this is not to be the reason for a revenge killing. Rather the punishment shall be limited to the same blemish being given to the guilty party. The purpose of this law was to prevent revenge killings and put a limit on the extent of punishment, while still satisfying the sense of justice of the injured party. In practice satisfactory compensation would no doubt often have been agreed on and accepted. This was merely the maximum that could be demanded.
21 And whoever kills an animal shall restore it; but whoever kills a man shall be put to death.
This now summarizes the two main principles above to make clear the differences in punishment for different deaths. It differentiates quite clearly between capital punishment for a human death and some other form of punishment for a beast’s death. It is to stress that no one must be slain because of the death of a beast, but that human life is sacred so that the murder of a human being must result in death for the perpetrator. Both these were something on which there must be no doubt. Death for death only applies to when a man is slain.
22 You shall have the same law for the stranger and for one from your own country; for I am the LORD your God.’”
All laws are to be applied equally to home-born and resident alien. Both are to be treated equally for Yahweh Is their God and He Is totally just and fair.
23 Then Moses spoke to the children of Israel; and they took outside the camp him who had cursed, and stoned him with stones. So the children of Israel did as the LORD commanded Moses.
Then Moses communicated God’s decision about the man and he was taken out of the camp and stoned with stones. It is stressed that all the people did as Yahweh commanded Moses. All were appalled at the blasphemy.
The placing of this incident here would seem to be because it follows the examples of Yahweh’s continual daily and weekly presence with and watch over His people. The sons of Aaron had sinned grievously in the responsibility that was theirs as priests; this man had sinned grievously against the very light of Israel. It was a warning of the fact that God’s presence among His people made them a holy people, and that to dishonor His name in any way could only bring supreme judgment.
