GOD SPEAKS TO MOSES OUT OF THE TABERNACLE, AND COMMANDS HIM TO CONSECRATE AARON AND HIS SONS. THE BURNT OFFERING AND THE PEACE OFFERING. THE LORD SENDS FIRE UPON THE ALTAR. NADAB AND ABIHU ARE SLAIN.
AFTER the tabernacle was finished God did not call Moses up on mount Sinai again, to speak with him, but he called him into the tabernacle. For God came into the tabernacle in a cloud, over the mercy-seat, where the golden cherubim spread out their wings; and he spoke with Moses there, and gave him many new laws for the children of Israel.
And God told Moses to bring Aaron and his sons to the door of the tabernacle, to consecrate them, or make them priests. Then Moses brought them, and he called all the people that they might come and see what the Lord had commanded him to do. And while they stood around the door of the tabernacle, he took Aaron and his sons, and washed them with water; and he put on Aaron the beautiful garments that had been made for him. Then he poured oil upon his head and anointed him. He took Aaron's sons also, and put their garments on them, and afterward offered up sacrifices to God. So Aaron and his sons were made priests, to stay at the tabernacle, and burn incense and offer up sacrifices for the children of Israel. Before this time, other men might offer up their own sacrifices, as Abel, Noah, and Abraham had done. But now that God had chosen Aaron and his sons to be priests, no one else, not even Moses, might offer up a sacrifice; every man must bring his offering to the tabernacle, and let the priests burn it for him on the altar that was there.
After Aaron was made high priest, he took a lamb and killed it, and laid it on the altar, as an offering for the sins of all the people, but he put no fire under it. Then the Lord sent fire that burned up the lamb. When the people saw it they shouted for joy, for now they knew that the Lord was pleased with their priest and with their offering. Afterward the priests always kept that fire burning on the altar, and would not let it go out, because the Lord had sent it there for them.
The priests were commanded to offer up two lambs every day, one in the morning, and the other in the evening, for the sins of all the children of Israel. But God told Moses that if any man who was sorry for his sins, wanted to bring an offering for them, alone, he might bring an ox, or a sheep, or a goat, to the door of the tabernacle. There he was to lay his hand upon its head. This meant that the man put his sins away from himself, on to the animal. Then he was to kill the animal; and Aaron's sons, the priests, would burn it for him on the altar, and God would be pleased with it for an offering. God would be pleased with the man's offering and forgive his sins, not because the innocent animal had died for him, but because the Saviour was coming to bear his sins and die for him, like the animal. The animal, (like Abel's lamb and the passover lamb), was meant to represent the Saviour, and to show that he was coming. This was the only reason why God was pleased with animals for offerings.
There were different kinds of offerings. When a man brought one because he repented of his sins, and wanted to be forgiven, the priests took it and burned the whole of it on the altar. Therefore it was called a burnt offering. But when he brought one because he was thankful for some blessing which God had given him, or because he wanted some blessing which he was praying that God would send him, then the priests took the animal and burned only a part of it on the altar, not all; some of it the priests kept for themselves to eat, and some of it they gave back to the man for him to eat. This offering, that was part burned and part eaten, was called a peace offering.
And the man who brought the peace offering, after the priest had given him back his part, invited his family and his friends, and perhaps his poor neighbors, and they feasted on it. For the man was not allowed to put his part by, and keep it to eat at some future time; it must be eaten that same day or the next day. We often read in the Bible of the feasts which the people made with their peace
Aaron had four sons who were all made priests when he was made high priest. It was their duty to attend to the worship of God at the tabernacle, in the way that God commanded. We have read that God commanded incense to be burned on the golden altar. This incense was placed in a censer, which was something like a cup, made, we suppose, of brass. The priest first put coals of fire in the censer; afterward he carried it into the tabernacle and set it on the golden altar, and he sprinkled the incense on the coals, that it might burn and send up its sweet smoke there. The fire which he put in the censer was taken from off the altar of burnt offering, where God had sent it, and where, as we have read, it was never allowed to go out; for it was sacred fire.
But the Bible tells us that two of Aaron's sons, named Nadab and Abihu, put strange fire in their censers to burn incense. And God was angry at their sin, and sent fire that burned them to death. And Moses called men to carry their dead bodies away from the tabernacle, and out of the camp. And God commanded Aaron, and his two sons who were still living, not to rend their clothes, nor show any grief for Nadab and Abihu, because they had been put to death for sinning against God.
And the Lord told Moses what animals, and birds, and fishes, the children of Israel might eat, after they should come into the land of Canaan, for they were not to eat of every kind. They might eat of the ox, the deer, the sheep, and the goat; but not of the camel, the rabbit, or the pig. Of fishes they might eat all that had fins and scales on them, but those whose skins were smooth and without scales, they might not eat. And they might eat of some kinds of birds, such as the dove, the pigeon, and the quail. But there were many others which were forbidden them, such as the eagle, the raven, the owl, and the swan. Those that they might eat were called clean animals, and those they might not eat were called unclean.
We have read of the leprosy which came suddenly upon Moses' hand, making it white as snow, and then was taken away again, leaving it well as it was before. God sent it upon Moses, so that he might show that miracle to the children of Israel in Egypt. But the leprosy was a very dreadful disease that was sometimes sent upon persons for their sins. It was not taken away quickly then, but it stayed, and often spread over their whole bodies, for no one could cure it but God.
And God told Moses and Aaron that when a man should have a spot, or sore in his skin, that seemed like the beginning of leprosy, he must be brought to the priest, that the priest might look at it and, say whether it were the leprosy or not. If it were, the man must go away from the camp, from his family, and from all the rest of the people, and live in some place alone until he should be made well. When God should make him well, he must be brought to the priest again. Then the priest would look at him and say that he was well. After that, he might come back and live in the camp. But he must bring three lambs, or, if he were poor, and could not bring so many, he might bring one lamb, and two doves or young pigeons, to the tabernacle, as offerings to the Lord who had healed him.
Now that room in the tabernacle where Moses had left the ark, and where God came and dwelt, in a cloud, over the mercy-seat, was the most holy part of the tabernacle; it was called the most holy place. And the Lord told Moses that no one but Aaron, the high priest, might ever go there. And Aaron himself must not go often, lest he might die. He might go but once every year, and then he must go very carefully. Before going he was to wash his flesh in water, that he might be clean, and he was to take off his splendid high priest's dress, and put on a plainer dress of pure white linen; for he must go in humbly dressed before the Lord. He was to offer up sacrifices before going, for his own sins and the sins of all the people, and he was to take the blood of those sacrifices into the most holy place, and sprinkle it, with his finger, before the mercy-seat; and there Aaron was to pray that the Lord would forgive him, and all the people, their sins.
And what was meant by the high priest doing these things? It was meant to show what the Saviour would do for us. The high priest went to pray for the people, into the most holy place on earth. The Saviour, after he was crucified, went to pray for us up in heaven. The high priest asked God to forgive the people, for whom the sacrifices had died. The Saviour asked God to forgive us, for whom he himself had died. Now the high priest has long since been dead himself, and can no more ask God to forgive us; but the Saviour still lives in heaven, and there he is asking God to forgive us every day.
On that day when Aaron went into the most holy place, the children of Israel were commanded to do no work, but to remember the sins they had committed. God said they should afflict their souls for their sins, which meant, they should think of them and repent of them, with great sorrow. Whoever would not do this, God said, should be punished; for that day was to be the most solemn day of all the year to the children of Israel. It was called the day of atonement.
God said that when the children of Israel should come into Canaan, and go into their fields, to cut down their grain and bring it into their barns, they must not bring it quite all in, they must leave a little. And when the grapes should be ripe on their vines, and they should go out to gather them, they must not take every grape, they must leave a few. They must do this so that poor persons and strangers, who had no fields or vineyards of their own, might come and take what was left.
The Lord said that the children of Israel must not steal, nor deceive, nor lie to one another. When a man had been working for them, they should not tell him to wait until the next day to be paid for what he had done; they should pay him that same day for his work.
If a person were deaf, they must not speak against him because he could not hear; or if he were blind, they must not put things in his way to make him stumble and fall. If any one knew some evil of another, he must not go about telling it, he must not be a tale-bearer.
And the children of Israel were not to hate one another, but they were to love each other as they loved themselves. When one of them should see another do wrong, he must reprove him kindly for what he had done; perhaps, then, he would repent of his sin and do so no more.
If a stranger from another country should come to live among them, they must not treat him unjustly, nor take away what belonged to him. They must be as kind to him, and love him as much, as though he had always lived with them and was one of their own people.